The Refugee and Immigrant Center

yesterday we had the opportunity to do a little service project for the 'refugee and immigrant center' in salt lake.  this is an incredible organization that's helping hundreds of people!

here is their mission statement:

The Refugee and Immigrant Center at the Asian Association of Utah (RIC-AAU) is a private, non-profit and community-based organization. The RIC-AAU was founded in 1977. Our mission is to improve the quality of life of refugees and other immigrants. We provide culturally-sensitive and language-specific social services that include education, employment services, advocacy, mental health treatment, domestic violence counseling, substance abuse treatment for adults and youth, parenting classes, English Classes, after-school tutoring and activities, and case management.

The RIC-AAU provides multi-level services to the immigrant and refugee populations. In 35 years, we have served more than 7,500 with job placement; 40,000 hours of counseling, 9,500 youth and families in prevention programs, 1,450 families in parenting skills training, and 6,600 adults in English and Citizenship classes. We work closely with the resettlement agencies, state protective services, alcohol and drug prevention and treatment programs, and many others.

Three weeks ago the center moved to a new, larger building that was donated to the organization.  Here are some pics of some of our team doing a little clean up and organizing... 

this is yang song, the volunteer coordinator for the center, explaining a little about what the organization does

the conference room: before

jenni and brooke, little worker bees cleaning the chairs

james the handy man, putting the big conference room table together

robbie, doing what he's told, like a good boy

scotty and lizzie doing some heavy lifting

andy, an intern at the center, washing windows

 chantell and lizzie, little sweeties

the girls

the crew for the day.  and the conference room: after

thank you to the 'refugee and immigrant center' for giving us the opportunity to come help a little and a big thank you to the 4 charity team members who gave up part of your saturday to come and work so hard!

to learn more about this important organization or for info on how to get involved please visit their website here.