‘Public education is really about public good’
University of Maryland works with aid group to temporarily house 25 Afghan refugees
The University of Maryland is working with an international aid group to temporarily house 25 Afghan refugees on its College Park campus, officials said last week.
The families, each with at least seven members, will start settling on campus over the next few weeks and stay for up to one year, officials said. Among the arrivals are people granted “humanitarian parole” who were evacuated through Operation Allies Welcome — a Biden administration effort to resettle Afghans who worked alongside U.S. personnel — and those who face persecution in Afghanistan because of their work as interpreters, drivers or cultural advisers.
“The University of Maryland is part of a global community, and when we have the opportunity to support humanity, we embrace it,” Darryll J. Pines, the university’s president, said in a statement Tuesday. “We look forward to providing on-campus housing and being good neighbors to Afghan families. They are U.S. allies who have braved a terrifying situation, and we are happy that we can offer them a welcoming community as they seek permanent housing.”
University officials declined to say where exactly the families would stay, citing safety concerns. The arriving families include infants and teens, officials said.
The university last week provided a welcome meal for the Afghans and provided them with staples such as beans and cooking oil, officials said. The school’s library system is assembling a collection of bilingual books to deliver to the families, along with snacks, toys and kitchen items.
U-Md. is hosting evacuees through a partnership with the International Rescue Committee, a humanitarian aid group. The organization will help the families find permanent housing, employment, education, counseling and social services.
Thousands of Afghans have arrived in the Washington region since August, when the United States pulled the last of its troops from Afghanistan and the country’s government fell to the Taliban. But in the months after the Afghans’ arrival, overwhelmed resettlement groups have struggled to find many of the families permanent and affordable housing.
The aid group faced criticism this year after several Afghan families under the organization’s care said they had spent months in a hotel outside Baltimore. Some families complained that the organization had been unable to find them permanent housing in safe neighborhoods, according to community activists.
The organization in January said it had doubled its staff in Baltimore to keep up with the demand for services.
As Afghans continue to settle throughout the region, university officials said they are planning to welcome additional refugees.
“Public education is really about public good,” said Patty Perillo, the school’s vice president for student affairs. “We are creating the model here at Maryland. We are developing the structure and systems for others to carry forward, helping many more refugees in need.”
Elsewhere in the country, other campuses have also extended support for evacuees. Eastern Michigan University shared plans in December to host about a dozen refugee families in its campus apartments. The University of Tulsa announced that it would offer two scholarships to Afghan students.
The development in College Park comes as the United States prepares to welcome up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees who have been displaced by the Russian invasion. Perillo said the campus is looking into ways of providing assistance to Ukrainian students and scholars.
Maryland enrolls 4,274 international students, most of whom are from China and India, according to fall 2021 campus data. Ukraine and Afghanistan each have fewer than 20 students on campus.