The Oregonian
Saturday, April 21, 2007
by SCOTT LEARN

When Wanning Su’s family moved from southeastern China to a tiny east Portland apartment in 2004, she was 12 years old, barely spoke English and confused about how to get to school.

"I was a little bit scared," she says. "I didn’t know the language. I didn’t know what the teacher was saying."

Wanning’s experience has not been unusual in East Portland. The area, peppered with relatively low-cost infill apartments and a growing array of social service agencies, is Oregon’s most diverse destination for refugees and immigrants, including newcomers from Asia, Africa, Latin America, Russia and the former Soviet republics.

That United Nations mix is reflected in the area’s schools. It also shows at the East Portland headquarters of the Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization, where staff members speak roughly 40 languages and executive director Sokhom Tauch predicts the immigrant influx will continue.

"Immigrants like to cluster among themselves," said Tauch, who came to the United States as a Cambodian refugee in the mid-1970s and earned his MBA from Marylhurst College (now University) 16 years later. "This is the only place that still has some available land, and the housing is better than on the west side."

Portland has become more immigrant friendly since he arrived, Tauch said, both in acceptance and services. The immigrant organization he directs offers help from infancy to old age, including job training, translation, parenting help and school-based instruction, among other services. In 2006, it served about 7,000 clients.

Services and schools attuned to immigrant needs are helping draw immigrants and "second migration" ethnic families from elsewhere in the United States, Tauch said. Wanning’s family came for better jobs and opportunity — her dad works in construction and her mom at a restaurant — and because an aunt and uncle were here.

Wanning, an eighth-grader at Binnsmead Middle School, gets as much as three hours of English tutoring after school and participates in a girls’ leadership class.

The 14-year-old is making the tough adjustment to U.S. life better than most immigrant kids, said May Donohue, an academic support specialist for the Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization. "She’s very diligent and willing to learn."

But some things were strange, Wanning said. Her classmates’ various skin colors and hair styles were a bit of a shock. So was the American teenage diet (she doesn’t like pizza or hamburgers). And so was the relatively sedate pace of American life compared to its thrill-a-minute image in China.

Her advice to other immigrant kids: "Don’t be scared" and "school is fun."

Scott Learn: 503-294-7657; scottlearn@news.oregonian.com.

Last Modified : April 22nd, 2007 Filed under : Uncategorized Navigate : Previous post /