Funded Projects

Promoting Literacy in Pediatric Refugee Population

Project Year

2025

City & State

Providence, Rhode Island

Program Name

CATCH Resident

Topic

Immigrant/Migrant/Refugee/Undocumented Health

Program Description

Problem Nationwide, school-aged children are scoring lower in reading assessments compared to pre-pandemic, and refugee patients may be particularly at risk for poor literacy outcomes. Our primary care clinic at Hasbro Children’s Hospital provides literacy education during well-child visits. We give out books from Reach Out and Read, which includes a supply of bilingual books in Spanish, Haitian Creole, Swahili, Arabic, and well-child information handouts from AAP’s Bright Futures. However, refugee patients may be unable to fully benefit from our clinic’s literacy campaign given potentially inconsistent or lack of access to education in their home country. Dorcas International Institute of Rhode Island is an immigrant and refugee resettlement agency. They offer English classes for adults, but currently do not have similar on-site programming for children. The Providence library system provides programming for all-aged children, including an annual summer reading challenge and mobile book van. Newly resettled refugee families may not be aware of all the library system has to offer. Families with non-school aged children particularly may not be exposed to the same marketing typically provided by school librarians. Children under 3 can obtain early literacy services through Early Intervention, while children aged 5 and up can access literacy promoting services though the school system and through the Brown Refugee Youth Tutoring and Enrichment program. This leaves children aged 3-5 years old with limited literacy support. There is also limited understanding of refugee parents’ attitudes and perspectives on literacy at home as their priorities may have varied in conflict-stricken regions. Although we encourage shared reading in the language of their choosing, refugee parents may not know what this activity might look like or may struggle with literacy themselves.   Primary Setting Hasbro Children’s Hospital Primary Care Clinic/Refugee Health Program and Dorcas International Institute of Rhode Island, both located in Providence.   Number of Children Affected According to the Rhode Island Department of Human Services, refugees have entered RI from 20-30 different countries with 100-345 families entering annually. Hasbro Children’s Hospital’s Refugee Health Program regularly sees 500-1000 patients annually. 1 in 5 Rhode Islanders speak a language other than English at home, and about 8.35% of the state’s population has limited English proficiency; many of our refugee families fall in this category.   Project Goal  Our project goals are to 1) assess literacy development needs in refugee families with non-school aged children, 2) promote awareness of the Providence library system for refugee families, 3) develop culturally sensitive parent-child literacy workshops to promote literacy at home.  Proposed Intervention First, using interpreters, we will survey families with children aged 3-5 at the Hasbro Refugee Health Program during their well-child visits to assess current home literacy practices (e.g. how often do they practice shared reading), general perceptions of literacy (e.g. how important is it for work on literacy at home), prior experiences with literacy (e.g. parental reading level, literacy access in home country), and awareness of current literacy resources (e.g. knowledge of library system, having a library card). Second, we will connect the library system and Dorcas to promote library resources to our target population and develop parent-child workshops to empower parents to promote literacy at home. Workshops will include shared-reading modeling and practice, and will provide translated materials to supplement guidance families receive in clinic. We will survey parental comfort with literacy development practices at home before and after the workshop is completed.   Anticipated Outcomes We anticipate 1) increased access to literacy resources among non-school aged refugee children, 2) increased parental involvement in literacy development following attendance of our workshops, 3) greater engagement with the library system through our interventions. 

Project Goal

In the 2025-2026 CATCH cycle year, our goal is to assess the needs of and improve literacy support for refugee families with non-school aged children living in Providence, Rhode Island in an equitable and culturally sensitive manner.  

Project Objective 1

By August 31, 2025, we will survey at least 15-20 refugee families with 3-5 year old children during 3-, 4-, and 5-year well child visits in the Refugee Health Program at Hasbro Children’s Hospital to assess current perspectives of literacy and literacy needs and advertise parent-child reading workshops at Dorcas. 

Project Objective 2

By August 31, 2025, we will procure at least 30 bilingual and monolingual books for Dorcas mini-library and sign up at least 15-20 refugee children aged 3-5 for a library card during the ReadMobile summer event at Dorcas to increase awareness of the Providence library system.

Project Objective 3

By April 30, 2026, we will design and host three parent-child workshops (Oct. ‘25, Jan. ‘26, Apr. ‘26) at Dorcas International Institute of Rhode Island with the help of Dorcas and Providence library staff to 1) demonstrate and practice shared reading with at least 30 Reach Out and Read books provided to Dorcas, 2) disseminate supplemental translated literacy development materials.

AAP District

District I

Institutional Name

Brown University Hasbro Children's Hospital

Contact 1

Natalie Qin, MD

Contact 2

Anneliese Lapides, MD