From The Fields: The Paradox of each new Migrant Season

This season will be my 5th year working for the Beaufort County Migrant Education Program. I have to admit that I begin to look forward each year to seeing the same men, women, and children who have been passing through Beaufort County over the years. And yet, if this were an ideal world, there would be no need for my position as the OSY Coordinator, there would be no need for any Migrant Program.

In the ideal world, the political and economic opportunities would be of such a nature that these same men and women and children would be able to work in their own countries. They would be able to adequately educate their own children in schools in their own communities surrounded by family and friends and a culture that they truly understood because they were born into it.

However, this is not the world in which we live. So while I will enjoy seeing Miguel from Guatemala and Juan from Honduras and Irene from Mexico again this summer, I am also aware that the forces that brought these individuals here have made their lives quite difficult.

In conclusion, I do look forward to another year with the migrant program. The paradox? My excitement is tempered by the wave of human need coming our way.

A lesson on handling money at Shop Camp

This year the OSY team is making a concerted effort
to fill out a Needs Assessment on every OSY we enroll.

An active game of soccer at Paragon Camp
after a long day of getting the fields ready for planting.

Jamye enjoys working with some of the many children who live in the camps.

 

This is one of three OSY who have been enrolled in local
schools so far this migrant season. With any luck, these students
will remain in Beaufort long enough to complete the school year
before moving north to the Eastern Shore of Virginia to pick
tomatos.