St. John’s Ukrainian children seeking shelter given special class

Around 50 kids came together at a St. John will go to a special class on Saturday to learn about the Ukrainian language, culture, and history for the first time.

The weekend program, called Ridna Shkola, is the first one in Newfoundland and Labrador, but there are many other classes like it in the country.

Liubov Hrysiuk, who teaches one of the program’s three age groups, says, “It makes us feel like we belong to this community. ”

“We can chat, we can enjoy our holidays together. ” Perhaps we can assist each other.

Hrysiuk, who used to teach in Ukraine, felt happy and nostalgic during the Saturday classes.

“It felt like I was back in my past, and I was in Ukraine with the best students ever,” she said.

In 2023, she came to Newfoundland and Labrador from Ukraine, like many others who have moved to St. John’sJohn has been sad since his country was taken over by Russia in 2022.

The government of Newfoundland and Labrador tried very hard to encourage Ukrainians who were thinking about leaving their country to come to their province.

Employees at the immigration office in the province set up a desk in Poland to reach out to people looking for asylum. The province also arranged four flights to bring Ukrainians to the country in 2022.

Approximately 700 people moved to Newfoundland and Labrador during those flights. Sofia Dubyk, who works for the Ukranian National Federation in the province, thinks there are now about 3,500 Ukranian people living here.

She and her friends worked to plan the Saturday classes and put them together after a few weeks of organizing.

“Two years ago, we weren’t prepared to move to a different country and start over,” she said. She also mentioned that people from Ukraine, like her, received a lot of help from local officials and people from Newfoundland and Labrador.

“Now I believe many Ukrainians here have a job, a place to live, and we can start helping the local community. ”

The program will help Ukrainian children, even some who are only five years old, to learn more about Ukrainian culture. Dubyk wants to start a pre-school program in the future.

Ridna Shkolas in different parts of the country have been important for connecting Canadians with Ukrainian background and new Canadian residents escaping the war in Ukraine.

Olena Shyian helped start a program in Regina in 2009 to bring back a class that had stopped in the 1970s.

Recently, it has been a place where her kids can learn from Ukrainian kids, and the other way around.

“They both are gaining,” she said. “The children born here, or whose parents or grandparents were born here, are learning Ukrainian, making friends, fitting in, and talking to each other. ”

Stcan be rewritten as “Saint”. John Hrysiuk is teaching his students about Canadian symbols with Ukrainian backgrounds.

“You know a lot of talented and famous people,” she said. “Take Wayne Gretzky, for instance. “