Bridging Borders with Words: Writing with Immigrants and Refugees
Merna’s article, “Poems Without Borders: Writing to Bear Witness” is part of a series in Teachers & Writers Magazine on writers working with immigrants and refugees. Read Merna’s full article here on her work with refugee women in Athens, Greece.
We Are the Future: Poems with A Voice for Peace
Proceeds from this full color book of heartfelt poems and striking images will directly benefit the Stories of Arrival project.
Namaste Garden Project
The new Word Travels project at the Namaste Garden in Tukwila, WA is part of the IRC New Roots program.
Word Travels: Refugee and Immigrant Voice and Visibility
In autumn of 2018 Merna traveled to Europe to realize a longstanding goal of working with refugees in Berlin and Athens, two of Europe’s major hubs for immigration.
New for the Stories of Arrival Project: A Broadside Project and a New Anthology!
In 2019-2020, Merna and Foster High School ELL teacher, Carrie Stradley took a new direction for the Stories of Arrival Poetry project, with an ambitious poetry poster project. The creation of visual poems (broadsides) shows the deep humanity of each young person in the project.
Holding the Earth Together: Youth Voices Speak for Our World
The garden is an IRC New Roots Program for refugee gardeners which also has a focus on youth programs that support learning about food systems and sustainability from a social justice perspective.
Stories of Arrival in Collaboration with Project Feast
As the project has grown, so too Merna’s commitment to nourishing community partnerships. In 2015 Merna established an intergenerational collaboration with Project Feast, an organization that serves refugee women that was located at the Tukwila Community Center and is now in Kent.
Stories of Arrival: Refugee & Immigrant Youth Voices Poetry Project
Founded by Merna in 2009, the Stories of Arrival: Refugee and Immigrant Youth Voices Poetry project takes place at Foster High School in Tukwila, WA, one of the most language and culturally diverse high schools in the U.S.