Course Spotlight - MDP-514R Refugee Resettlement
As a part of the Applied Development series, Refugee Resettlement will be offered Spring 2020. This five-class unit is designed to introduce students to the topic of refugee resettlement including human rights laws, national policies and procedures, and current issues and events.
According to the UNHCR, there are more than 70 million refugees and displaced people around the world, but only 92,400 refugees were resettled in 2018. This 5-session course aims to answer the following: How are decisions made about refugee status and who gets resettled? What are the standards, policies and procedures? How do they differ by location and over time? What role does gender, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, disability, history, politics, culture, etc. play in how refugees are perceived and treated?
The course is taught by Gender, Diversity and Inclusion Specialist Susan Somach, JD, whom served as Gender & Youth Advisor for the USAID/Russia Mission and has worked on gender issues in Eastern Europe and Eurasia, Central Europe, the Middle East, Southern Africa, and Southeast Asia. A former banking and securities lawyer, Ms. Somach also has 25 years of teaching, training, facilitation, and presentation experience on a wide variety of topics, as well as strategic and project planning.
Dr. Somach was the Executive Director of the refugee social service agency, Newcomers' Network (formerly part of Save the Children, and then renamed Refugee Family Services), dedicated to refugee women and children. In recent years, she has conducted gender assessments for USAID/Jordan and USAID/CAR, and has completed several research projects for the Eastern Europe and Eurasia region, including a 13-country research report on domestic violence, an analysis of men's issues in the region, and a toolkit for trafficking in persons programming.
We are excited to welcome Dr. Somach to MDP and pleased to offer Refugee Resettlement in Spring 2020.
Curriculum
The Emory MDP curriculum combines natural, social, health sciences and management.
FIELD PRACTICUM
The Field Practicum is a core component of the Emory MDP curriculum.