The Mosaic of Our Future
"It has been one year since the refugee crisis landed on our doorstep here in Germany with the suddenness of a tsunami. In these last twelve months my horizons have been stretched, my heart pulled, my life lit up and my perspective forever changed. I now consider many beautiful men, women and children, whom I ordinarily should never have met, to be some of my closest friends. But these times are anything but ordinary...never before in history has the world been in such flux.
"Their world was shattered, and the pieces are being sprinkled like some new mosaic across ours. It is up to each one of us to determine what our new shared world picture will look like. Peaceful or in turmoil. Accepting and open or discriminating and closed. Integrated and colorful or segregated and black and white.
"Whatever we decide, their future is our future. Their story is our story."
- Trisha Leimer, TSOS President, quoted in November 2016.
Why consent matters to us (and why it should matter to you too).
It is especially important to provide accurate information as to how a photo will be used and obtain consent when working with refugees.
Stories are Changemakers: An Instagram Live with Sarah Kippen Wood
Sarah Kippen Wood, Former Executive Director of Their Story is Our Story (TSOS), shares how stories connect and lead to change in an interview with Darien Laird, our Director of External Media. Sarah gives us an inside look at how TSOS functions and shares how telling her story helped her fight a stage four cancer diagnosis.
Uniting for Ukraine: U.S. Sponsors Needed
Just as citizens in Europe and the U.K. have heroically supported displaced Ukrainians by opening up their homes or securing other housing, assisting with school enrollments, employment needs, and language learning, Americans now have the opportunity via the Welcome.us Sponsor Circles program to directly help newly arrived Ukrainians. The United States has committed to welcoming 100,000 Ukrainians temporarily for a period of two-years and the ability to apply for employment authorization in the U.S. as long as they have a U.S.-based sponsor to petition for them.