This collection highlights documents relating to the Integration and Belonging Hub's ongoing activities and initiatives in addition to materials relating to internal conceptual and planning efforts.

The Integration and Belonging Hub at Clark University is a nexus for fostering migrant and refugee-inclusive communities locally, nationally, and globally. Established in January 2022, The Hub focuses on new ways to imagine how societies and the mobile people among them (refugees, asylum seekers, and others) can continually ‘become together.’

The Hub promotes collaboration among departments among academics, practitioners, and community partners. It involves students in discovery and creating change, and supports innovative research to understand multi-directional processes of migration and social cohesion.

With initial support from Clark's Academic Innovation Fund, the Hub was spearheaded by Anita Fábos (Associate Director of the Sustainability and Social Justice department (formerly IDCE), coordinator of Clark's Refugee, Forced Migration, and Belonging Certificate program), in collaboration with Jude Fernando (associate professor of international development and social change), Sharon Hanna (director of career development and external relations) and Jozefina Lantz (research scholar in Sustainability and Social Justice). Dr. Leora Kahn (Executive Director of PROOF and research scholar in Sustainability and Social Justice) stepped into the co-convenor role upon Jozefina Lantz's retirement

One of the Hub's priorities is to establish a network by building on established partnerships and connections and to seeking out new ones. Below is a list of partnerships connected with the Hub.

Partnership Organizations:

ACE: African Community Education has been a consistent partner for our internship program. Several of its team members are Clark University graduates, and have been involved with the Refugees, Forced Migration, and Belonging concentration at IDCE. Executive director and co-founder, Kaska Yawo is a consultant to four universities in Worcester, including Clark.

ARISE: Advocacy for Refugee and Immigrant Services has hosted multiple past and current Hub interns, and presented a session to the Hub's interns in 2022 about their missions and projects of training ‘refugee advocates’. Center for Lebanese Studies— https://lebanesestudies.com/centre-directors/ CLS is “an independent academic institution established in 1984 to undertake impartial and balanced research and contribute to Lebanon’s development. CLS is affiliated with the Middle East Centre at St. Antony’s College, and the History Department at the University of Cambridge and works rigorously in conducting research and organizing conferences that address key issues in Lebanon” (quoted from website). Cathrine Brun, the CLS Deputy Director for Research has written multiple articles on refugees and belonging.

PROOF: Media for Social Justice: Founded by Leora Kahn, this organization “creates visual documentary projects that become sustainable educational tools in regions riven by recent armed conflict and atrocities".

Share the Platform: An organization co-founded by Alfred Bobo, Anita Fábos Leora Kahn, and Craig Mortley, Share the Platform “supports and trains institutions and people from both refugee and non-refugee backgrounds to move towards full partnerships to create meaningful change in program design, policy making, and action.”

Urban Action Institute, Worcester State University: The Hub has worked with Adam Saltzman, director of the Urban Action Institute, Worcester State University, in developing collaborations with local universities, including Worcester State, to facilitate learning programs and academic collaboration, between scholars, students, and refugees.

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Browse the Integration and Belonging Hub Collections:

Vision, Mission, & Funding

Webinars & Events

Internship Program

Worcester Inter-Unversity Refugee Workshop

Faculty Works

Photos

Press