view . summer 2010
5
Opposite page top: Dr. Ben Kuo talks to PhD student Ann Marcoccia. Bottom: Social work professor Sung Hyun Yun
listens as Theresa Hughes shares the findings of her study on the needs of refugee women who have survived political
torture in their home countries.
With a well-established global reputation as
a supportive, humanitarian and economically
stable nation, Canada receives hundreds of
refugees every year who are trying to escape
unspeakable horrors.
Canada does what it can to help these
refugees start over. Citizenship means access
to health care, education, employment
opportunities and all of the other privileges
that come with being a Canadian.
A gap exists, however, in helping new
arrivals cope with the complex emotional
and psychological scars stemming from the
torturous conditions they’ve fled. Researchers
at UWindsor are doing what they can on several fronts to help
narrow that chasm.
“The recent arrivals reflect world events,” Ben Kuo, associate
professor of adult clinical psychology told a
Windsor Star
reporter
this spring. “From my point of view, the government helps them
with housing, employment and social services. But their emotional
and psychological needs are not looked after. There’s a real and
growing need out there and we’re helping.”
To help fill that need, graduate students in Dr. Kuo’s program
provide pro-bono counselling to refugees struggling to adjust to life
in their new country while often dealing with the post-traumatic
stress associated with violent conditions in their countries of
origin. Clients get free counselling while the students get invaluable
training experience and the opportunity to research methods to help
future psychologists in diverse communities treat clientele who have
suffered similar circumstances.
Sometimes, that simply involves listening. Fourth-year grad
student Elisabeth Kunzle counselled Mohamed Ahmed Mohamed, a
49-year-old Somalian man who was abducted from a refugee camp
in 2008 and accused of being a member of a guerilla group. He
spent a year shackled alone in a vermin-infested cell where he was
tortured daily with beatings, whippings and electrical shocks.
He eventually managed to escape to a United Nation refugee
camp and then made it to Windsor in February 2010. The
Multicultural Council of Windsor-Essex
referred him to UWindsor’s counselling
program and he attended five counselling
sessions with Kunzle.
“This has made me much more aware,”
she said of the experience. “It builds
compassion, and that’s a good thing as a
psychologist.”
Ann Marcoccia, another PhD student in
the program, learned some new strategies to
get people to open up and express themselves.
“Many are just so grateful to be here and
they’re reluctant to appear ungrateful by
talking about their problems,” she said.
Besides counselling and researching methods to treat refugees,
UWindsor academics have helped identify ways that existing
service agencies can better assist survivors of political torture. In
May 2010, social work graduate student Theresa Hughes held a
research dissemination event for more than 50 representatives of
Windsor-Essex community service agencies that help recent arrivals
to Canada.
Under the direction of social work assistant professor Sung
Hyun Yun, Hughes – also an employee at the Sexual Assault
Crisis Centre of Windsor and Essex County – spent two years
interviewing hundreds of refugee women to better understand their
needs as they struggled to adapt to life in their new country. One
of her main findings was that there should be more co-ordination
and communication among agencies, since there can be no one-
stop shopping approach to the problem. Among the needs cited
were: language training and access to interpreters; specially trained
counsellors to help victims deal with post-traumatic stress; job and
career training; inter-agency protocols to make it easier for victims
to get medical attention; help in finding suitable housing; and family
support to help their children cope at school.
“One agency can’t do it all because of the number and
complexity of issues,” said Yun. “It would be impossible. All the
services need to collaborate. And the refugee community needs to
know what services exist.”
n
v
“THE GOVERNMENT HELPS
THEM [REFUGEES] WITH
HOUSING, EMPLOYMENT
AND SOCIAL SERVICES.
BUT THEIR EMOTIONAL
AND PSYCHOLOGICAL
NEEDS ARE NOT LOOKED
AFTER
.
”
DR. BEN KUO
HEALING
THE SCARS
BY STEPHEN FIELDS
