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Letter from the YEO Team
The last few months have been challenging ones in our country and around the world.
We witnessed the largest mass shooting and deadliest hate crime, the police killings
of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling and the shootings of multiple police officers in
Dallas, the Brexit vote largely tied to growing xenophobia, the spread of hate crimes in our
communities here and abroad, and the escalation of violent rhetoric in our politics. We saw
a hobbled Supreme Court threaten millions of our immigrant families with deportation.
We’ve turned our backs on those fleeing war and seeking refuge. At the YEO Network, we
are devastated by the continued loss of life, by the racism and violence that threatens our
communities, by the failures in justice that persist.
We know that none of these issues are simple or easily fixed. The racism and violence we
need to root out is wide-reaching, with a long history and a firm grasp in so many areas
of our work and our lives. Conflict and violence are connected to economic inequality,
to globalization, to climate change, to migration, to forces both within and beyond our
control. But hate is also taught. And the YEO Network is committed to doing all we can
to counter bigotry and violence in our own capacities and communities. We are pleased
to announce a partnership with Open Society Foundations and Local Progress that will
launch this month to organize and support elected officials in speaking out and passing
policies against xenophobia, Islamophobia, racism, and bigotry. You will be hearing from
us in the coming weeks and we encourage you to contact us with your own ideas, too. This
rising tide of hate impacts all of us.
On a more positive note, we also celebrate the recent Supreme Court victories for women’s
reproductive freedom, for gun violence prevention, and for affirmative action policies. We
are also thrilled to welcome our newest member of the YEO team, Taif Jany. You can read
more about him in the announcement that follows.
YEO Network
Announcement
Please join us in welcoming Taif Jany
to the YEO Network family as our
new policy coordinator. Taif was born
and raised in Baghdad, Iraq. At age 16,
Taif fled the conflict in Iraq and sought
refuge in Damascus, Syria where he
joined the Iraqi Student Project, a
grassroots effort to help Iraqi refugee
students finish their education in the
United States. Taif immigrated to the
US to attend Union College where he
graduated with a degree in sociology
and French.
Most recently Taif served as the
program manager for the Education
for Peace in Iraq Center (EPIC),
working one-on-one with young
people and civil society leaders in Iraq
to inform public policy and advocate
for peaceful change.
In coming months, we hope to continue our focus on progressive change and to foster
acceptance, kindness, and inclusion in our communities. We want to use the full force of
this network for good. We are here to listen and to support you all as you listen to and
support your own communities. We are committed to standing in solidarity with you and
to instilling a racial justice lens into every facet of our work. Please reach out if there’s
anything we can do as a network to support one another, if you have an idea, a question, a
reflection -- we hope you will lean on this community.
YEO F r o n t l i n e N e w s • S u m m e r 2016 • PG 2
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