Our project FRCI Supporting Migrants aimed to support migrants, asylum seekers and refugees who currently reside within County Fermanagh. The initial step was to provide ESOL training to support those attending to support their quest to achieve the essential support with health, education, childcare and financial support. Migrants, asylum seekers and refugees are entering our community, and many have had traumatic experiences from their homelands which has impacted on their health and well-being. Arriving in a new environment with a different language makes it difficult to access support for health and well-being issues that they might not even fully understand themselves which can also be the case for their wider family circles and friends.
The range of English levels presented varied but the majority required additional support to decide on what the next step would be for them. The project reached out to all age groups and attracted both males and females, with the female participants being accompanied by their husbands. However, as the weeks went past they came by themselves and integrated well within the group.
We had three young refugee males who were due to leave the care system as they turned eighteen and decisions about their future was at an important stage. One outstanding achievement was the progression of one young male student who lost all his family in the conflict in Syria One and has gone on to full-time education to complete his A levels and hope to progress to become a doctor and the other two males progressed to South West College to further their studies.
The knowledge and experience we gained from delivering the project has supported FRCI to gain an additional £5,000 from Migrant Help to continue with the project until June 2024. We have also gained confidence to submit a 5-year project to Comic Relief to support Asylum Seeker and Refugees. The ability to do this was by supported by listening to participants and monitoring evaluating and assessing the overall impact on what we had achieved and what needed to be achieved in the future. All of this was supported by mentoring and the Community Development and Health Network’s different training sessions, such as addressing health inequalities using a community development approach, has built our confidence and skills to address these issues.
The experience FRCI had working with and supporting disadvantaged communities within a rural area like Fermanagh was ideal as their command of the English language improved. Listening to the experience knowledge and skills gave a real understanding of the additional barriers the group in addressing health inequalities.
“Elevate is nurturing the capacity of joined up thinking within local communities to address health inequalities and FRCI are delighted to have been part of this journey”
