Skokie School Helps Foreigners Gain English, Job Skills

Zarem/Golde ORT Technical Institute has been working with students for 30 years. Its 300 students hail from 60 different countries.

Farha Binyamin arrived in the United States eight years ago from her native Syria when she married an American citizen. Three years later a baby boy came along.

Soon the boy was enrolled in day care and Binyamin found herself with free time.

So what was Binyamin now going to do? She took the opportunity to improve her English at Zarem/Golde ORT Technical Institute, in her hometown of Skokie. Binyamin signed up for one of an English as a Second Language course. When the class ended, she decided it was time to pursue a vocation. Binyamin enjoys the challenges of working with senior citizens and so she studying at ORT to become a medical assistant.

Farha Binyamin came from Syria and is now pursuing a medical assistant’s certificate at Zarem/Golde ORT Technical Institute.

For the past 30 years, ORT has been working with foreign students to help them enter the workforce. Right now, its 300 students are from 60 different countries.

An industrial park in southern Skokie may not seem to be most likely of places for an educational institution, but not every successful school requires wide-open campuses or endless coffee shops.  Most of ORT’s approximate 300 students are from foreign lands, with roughly 80 percent of the current students taking English as a Second Language courses.

“Our goal is to get them to a level of English proficiency so that they can go into one of those technical programs and be career bound,” said Michelle Movitz, ORT’s recently installed executive director.

ORT does not pretend to be college or university in terms of diverse course offerings or amenities seen on other campuses. Yet it also does not have the tuition costs associated with colleges.

Instead, ORT, which is part of a network that has five schools in the United States, offers the language training courses as well as offering many different types of certificate programs, which can lead to employment. For those people willing to make a longer commitment, there is an associate’s degree in accounting available after two years.

“They can earn a really nice living with that type of certification and have a profession and work their way up,”  Movitz adds.

Today, ORT boasts that at least 75 percent of its students found jobs in the field they pursued with the exception of a nursing assistant program, which was recently discontinued.

Students at Zarem/Golde ORT Technical Institute chat on a pretty summer day.

Over 60 nations are represented in the student body, which has an age range from 18-65. Right now ORT officials depend on word of mouth to recruit students. ORT does provide a visa for students and the school offers transportation so the new students don’t have to worry about driving in unfamiliar surroundings.

If students do go back to home countries after completing courses at ORT, there may be new opportunities awaiting them.

“It is very prestigious for many depending on what country they are from to have a certificate that they have studied in the U.S.,” Movitz notes. “We can provide that to them.” 

The English courses are currently the most popular, but Movitz hopes that will change over the next few years as different degrees may soon be offered. She also hopes to have more students already in the United States come to ORT to acquire new skills in the ever changing and evolving job market.

Those are long term goals for the school and still being worked on. A more short-term goal is a successful open house and family picnic on August 29.

“It will really be a community event,” Movitz said. “We are providing this opportunity to some smaller businesses in the community that are having a hard time to get the word out as well because we have 300 students here who could be their patrons as well.”

A job fair is scheduled for the September 13.

These two events are intended to showcase what the school can do for its students who sometimes have a difficult time adjusting to American culture. Movitz hopes ORT can ease that.

“The world can be unkind,” she said. “But in this building you will experience support and mentoring and we know we are going to help them not only learn but also to acclimate and become accustomed to being here.” 

By Daniel I. Dorfman

skokie.patch.com