Refugee Poster Contest for U.S., Caribbean Students
As the armies mass for a war in Iraq that could start at any moment, a steady stream of refugees fleeing from that nation pours into neighboring countries. A war would increase the exodus of Iraqi refugees by millions – swelling a worldwide population estimated at some 20 million refugees, half of them under the age of 18. For most American children, if they are exposed to the war at all, it will be from the images on television.
However, in some classrooms in the United States and Caribbean countries, teachers will use the war to offer poignant lessons not just about the military violence of war, but about its devastation on people who survive it by running from it into the limbo of refugee camps.
To draw attention to the special plight of refugee children, the United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees is sponsoring its third annual poster contest for U.S. and Caribbean students in grades 4-10 in public, private and parochial schools.
Posters, which will be judged and categorized by age groups, should be no larger than 11 by 17 inches. The poster should reflect the theme: “Shared Wishes, Shared Dreams: Refugee Youth and Us”. The deadline is April 1.
World Refugee Day, will award winners. Entries will be on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C.
Jolie, who won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress in 2000 for Girl, Interrupted, said that those who enter the contest should begin by thinking what they have in common with refugee children around the world.
“Refugee youth have the same wishes and dreams as children all over the world – to go to school, to play games and sports, to be surrounded by friends and family, to feel safe and secure, to have a home”, said Jolie, who has traveled to several troubled nations in her quest to bring more attention to refugees.
In her journals, Jolie has written about the squalor of camps, finding it difficult to describe the conditions.
“I can’t tell people what it is like to sit with wounded men and abandoned women and children all hungry and desperately trying to survive, holding onto what is left of their dignity, their self-worth, their hope”.
Jolie said that one young refugee girl described to her dreams about a classroom with smiling school friends or a street without machine guns and a field without mines or a home with a mother and father and brothers and sisters.
The lives of such refugee children can influence their peers, giving hope that the next generation can seek peace.
“The strength of the United States depends on that very diversity. And by encouraging and teaching our youngest citizens about tolerance and diversity, we can encourage them to make a difference for a much better world tomorrow”, Jolie said.
Tina Ghelli, a spokeswoman for UNHCR, agreed that the poster contest may expose students to an ugly reality so it can be replaced with empathy and greater understanding about the world.
She said that such lessons are necessary because school children grow up to become American citizens who don’t understand that the difference between a refugee seeking asylum in a friendly country and an immigrant seeking a better life in another country.
“The difference is this: An immigrant has a choice; a refugee has had to flee to save their life”, Ghelli said.
Even before the threat of war intensified, Iraqis were the largest group of asylum seekers in industrialized countries in 2002, according to UNHCR.
Iraqis replaced Afghans as the largest national group seeking asylum in 37 industrialized countries in 2002, when 51,000 Iraqis applied for asylum, up slightly from 50,400 in 2001.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, who honored last year’s poster winners, said that America has a historic connection to people uprooted by war.
“It is often said that America is a nation of immigrants. We are also a nation of refugees. And as President Bush said in his statement, refugees who have settled here in the United States have given back so much in return, contributing to America’s great vibrancy and our great diversity. America’s commitment to refugees is enduring. It is about who we are as a people”, Powell said.