Aryn Bernardo watches Filipino telenovelas to feel connected to the country her parents left just before she was born.

She can understand Tagalog in the shows and when her parents speak it to her at home, but she doesn’t know how to speak the language. As a junior at Concord High School, she wants students from immigrant families, like herself, to feel more included.

She’s working toward that goal as the president of the school’s racial equity club and through the district’s equity advisory committee by engaging in conversation about inclusion and belonging in the district.

In her conversations with school employees, one topic has never been broached – the building of a new middle school in Concord adjacent to Mill Brook and Broken Ground elementary schools, where she was once a student.

Personally, she thinks Rundlett should remain where it is. But she knows many friends and neighbors who are struggling to form an opinion. They feel left out of the discussion to move the school despite equity being cited as a justification for doing so.

“My parents, they don’t really know. My friend’s parents also don’t know. We know that they’re planning to move to school, but we don’t really get that much reason, like, why necessarily,” said Bernardo. “It’s all in English. I have some friends and their families, their first language is not English. So it’s going to be hard for them to understand what’s going on with these big, major changes and there’s no other way of communication for them to know what’s happening within their schools.”

‘They’re not included’

Clement Kigugu, the director of Overcomers Refugee Services, is certain Concord’s middle school should remain where it is.

In the South End, the middle school, high school and Memorial Field provide a vital hub for families near Concord’s downtown. 

“It connects the kids who live at the Heights to the other side, downtown and other kids from around. All the activities, YMCA, Boys and Girls Clubs are downtown. Memorial Field, the high school,” he said. “There’s so many activities there.”

Since 2011, Concord has welcomed over 1,500 refugees – a third of all those who were resettled in New Hampshire – according to data from the state refugee program. As a result, Concord’s overall diversity is growing, but that growth is clustered in certain parts of the city. Census data shows that in 2020, the Heights was one of the most racially diverse neighborhoods in the state, with only 66 percent of residents identifying as “just white.”

Mill Brook and Broken Ground elementary schools are the two most diverse elementary schools in the city, with 15 and 18 percent of students identified as English as a Second Language learners, compared to the other three schools in Concord where the population is less than 10 percent.

While Kigugu said the district has attempted to engage families, hosting a few meetings to talk about the changes to the middle school, the lack of an understanding about the project underscores a disconnect between the district and immigrant parents.

To many, the school board, and its subsequent power, are unfamiliar. Words like “charter amendment” are a foreign concept to most. Without any engagement, which he emphasizes is mutual, it’s hard for immigrant parents to think of the school and their own influence beyond their kids in a classroom.

“We as New Americans, we need to learn the school system, how it works,” he said. “Also the school district needs to learn about the New American culture.”

Fisto Ndayishimiye graduated from Concord High School in 2019 after immigrating to New Hampshire from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

He could be convinced about relocating the middle school. A community organizer leading a group called Change For Concord, Ndayishimiye has long been a strong proponent of building out resources in the Heights. To him, the current epicenter of Concord’s downtown only reinforced racial and economic segregation.

But he hasn’t heard a compelling argument to relocate the school from the school district. In fact, he’s heard little from school leaders and knows that families in Concord’s immigrant community have heard even less.

To him, that effort needs to span school board meetings or information sessions at the district offices across town. School leaders should meet immigrant families where they’re at – attending a church service over the weekend or hosting events in the Heights outside of working hours, with facilitators present.

“People continue to argue, ‘oh this is better, this is better,’ but honestly there’s no marginalized community voices. They’re not included in the conversation,” he said. “That makes me afraid of moving the middle school without having conversations with families over there and making sure that this is a positive decision for everybody.”

Outreach and understanding

To kick off the school year, Concord School District invited parents to Keach Park for a back-to-school night.

Ahead of the event, Charm Emiko – who founded Project S.T.O.R.Y., an organization that supports immigrant children in Concord – saw dozens of fliers, posts online and direct outreach to families to attend.

And those efforts worked.

At the park, staff answered enrollment questions and helped families connect to pediatricians and understand medical records required to attend school.

For educators at Broken Ground and Mill Brook, the event is the first step in connecting with families during the school year.

“All the resources were there, all the people were there,” said Kyle Repucci, the Broken Ground principal. “It was great that they could actually meet some folks that they were going to work with later.”

Throughout the year, home-to-school liaisons in each school will visit with families – getting to know students and parents in their space and forming a connection they hope leads to more familiarity and engagement.

“We meet them where they’re at… just sit with them and talk with them and see how they’re doing,” said Ruth Christino, the liaison at Broken Ground. “You know, get to know their children and carry it into school.”

The outreach for events like Keach Park night is what Emiko wished the district would have employed for the middle school relocation. To her, it’s proof that they can, and do, break language barriers to engage families.

In this instance, though, that didn’t happen.

“There has been nothing to my knowledge done to help educate other communities that necessarily, English is not a first language,” she said. “When I asked some of my families about it they’re a little confused, especially if they don’t have a child at the middle school. They have really no idea or they don’t even know that’s going on.”

‘Easy for everbody’

For 17 years at Concord High School, Ghana Sharma walked students through algebraic equations and geometric proofs as a math tutor – in his official capacity at least.

As one of the only New American employees, though, his job included more than math. In a school district where 17 languages are spoken in addition to English, students need teachers with similar lived experiences.

On any given day Sharma translated forms, served as an interpreter and provided direct outreach to families who may not know how the public school system works otherwise. This year, he was relocated to Beaver Meadow Elementary School.

He immigrated to the United States as a refugee in 2009 with his wife. His two children attended Concord schools – one graduated and is now in college while the other is a freshman at Concord High School.

“As a parent of a New American student, employment diversity is one of the most important things,” he said. “If we do that it will be easy for everybody.”

For families in the district, where English isn’t their first language, interpreters are available for school meetings, back-to-school nights and other events through Language Bank, a translation service in Manchester. Parents can also set a default language for online communication with the district.

These tools help the school system connect with parents, said Sharma. At the end of the day, though, there are still gaps that can only be filled by hiring people who are able to directly relate to and engage with immigrant families.

“So many things, cultural ways of speaking, the native dialog, and there are so many things going on, right?” he said. “That’s why I think employment diversity is the conclusion.”

The bureaucracy of a school board and decisions made beyond the classroom curriculum are not of concern to many families, said Sharma. In many ways, families don’t care where a new school is built, as long as they feel connected to and supported by staff.

“That doesn’t impact the New American families wherever the school is,” he said.

And he can be more blunt about it, too.

“As a refugee student, I went to a school made out of bamboo. When there is rain, no school that day,” he said. “Quality of education is what matters, not the school building.”

Bernardo commuted downtown daily to Rundlett from the Heights with no problem. Preserving the South End location is a shared opinion she feels is vocal among her classmates, but not acknowledged by school board members or district leaders.

The relocation decision, though, opens a larger door to talk about equity in the district – and her list of improvements for Concord schools is plentiful.

She’d like to see social students’ curriculum adjusted to be more inclusive and Advanced Placement African American History introduced as a course. These are all topics her club works on weekly.

And she echos Sharma’s focus. Regardless of a school’s location, without educators of color employed by the district, she only sees herself reflected in a few.

“I would love to see more diversity in our staff,” she said. “The only diversity I really see is within our cleaning custodians, which is really sad to see.”