Ease the Struggles of the Rohingya Community
Most Rohingya work in service or labor jobs and make minimum wage. Many do not have savings and live paycheck to paycheck.
Our
Programs
Health Support
During the COVID-19 lockdown RCC made the difficult decision to keep our doors open. Our staff recognized that given the language and education barriers, help via phone was not feasible.
English as a Second Language (ESL) Classes
Most of the Rohingya community is pre-literate because they were denied an education in Burma. It is essential that our ESL classes be designed for pre-literate learners. Attending class for the first time in their lives is a huge undertaking for our adult learners.
Rohingya Youth Club
The Rohingya Youth Club was formed to maintain cultural identity and to develop a sense of community through service. It connects the youth to the elderly and needy, and allows them to understand the needs and challenges of the community.
Religious Education
The Rohingya are a religious and Ethnic minority. Religion ties the Rohingya community to their culture and their roots. It allows them to be connected to their heritage as they navigate the challenges of settling into a new country.
Youth Sports
Soccer is a popular pastime in the Rohingya community and is a great way to tie the youth to RCC. Soccer teaches them how to function as a team, become leaders, and learn the benefits of cooperation, hard work, and practice.
Citizenship Classes
Passing the citizenship test is extremely difficult as one has to read, write, and speak English. RCC has designed the curriculum to best meet these needs.
Academic Support
Academic Support was one of the first programs started at RCC. It is supported by volunteers from local universities who come to support students.
Case Management
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Case Management has become our most important program. Many of the local Rohingya families lost their source of income, as wage earners have become unemployed.
About the Rohingya
Culture Center.
The United Nations lists the Rohingya Muslims of northwestern Burma (Myanmar) among the most persecuted people in the world. Burma’s 1982 Citizenship Law denied the ethnic minority Muslim group legal status, rendering them stateless, and denying them the right education, work, and travel. Since then, many of the Rohingya have been displaced by ethnic violence and have been forced to flee the persecution….
We’re here to support you every step of the way.
Media
Executive Director Nasir Zakaria for receiving the Leaders for a New Chicago Award.
This award is given to 10 individuals in Chicago who are advancing the racial and social justice movement in Chicago. Rep. Olickal and I have had the honor of working alongside Nasir and the rest of the team at the RCC to serve the needs of the Rohingyan community and have seen his impact firsthand.
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Meet Our 2023 Health & Medicine Award Winners
Health & Medicine is pleased to announce our 2023 award winners! These Chicago-area leaders exemplify the Health & Medicine mission to build power and momentum for social justice and health equity in Illinois.
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Rohingya sue Facebook for £150bn over Myanmar genocide
Facebook’s negligence facilitated the genocide of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar after the social media network’s algorithms amplified hate speech and the platform failed to take down inflammatory posts, according to legal action launched in the US and the UK. The platform faces compensation claims worth more than £150bn under the coordinated move...
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Rashid Ahmed’s Family Fled Persecution In Myanmar. Now, He Is Chicago’s First Rohingya Refugee To Graduate College
Ahmed is the first person of Rohingya descent in Chicago to graduate with a degree in higher education, said Sarah Pajeau, program director at the Rohingya Culture Center.
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Rohingya Diaspora in the U.S.
This project includes interviews with Rohingya people of various ages living in the U.S. Two organizations established by the Rohingya people, the Rohingya Cultural Center of Chicago (RCC) and the Rohingya American Society (RAS) are cultural centers at the heart of the Rohingya communities in Chicago and Milwaukee.
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Rohingya refugees sue Facebook for $150B
Rohingya refugees from Myanmar are suing Facebook for $150 billion over allegations that the platform failed to act against anti-Rohingya hate speech that fueled real-world violence against the group in the region, according to a complaint filed Monday. Refugees in the U.S. filed the case in California superior court, and Rohingya...
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Hopeful Rogers Park Rohingya Vote in First Presidential Election
The journey from refugee to registered voter isn’t always an easy one. But this past October, more than a dozen Rohingya-Americans completed it when they cast their ballots for the first time in the 2020 U.S. general election. Those Rohingya refugees took a van to vote at the Warren Park..
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Rohingya American voters ‘grateful,’ ‘excited’ to cast ballots for the first time in Chicago
CHICAGO (RNS) — About a dozen Rohingya refugees voted for the first time Tuesday (Oct. 20) at an early voting site in Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood. It wasn’t just the first time they voted as United States citizens. It was the first time they’d ever voted, period.
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Stripped of citizenship in Myanmar, Rohingya immigrants find new home in Chicago — and a chance to vote for the first time
Chicago is now home to about 2,000 Rohingya, making it the largest Rohingya population in the United States.
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Rohingya Americans in Chicago venture out to local polling place en masse to cast their first-ever general election votes: ‘Really I’m so grateful’
In the seven years he’s lived in America, Nasir Zakaria has hardly felt as grateful as he did Tuesday waiting at the Warren Park polling site in Rogers Park to cast his first-ever vote in his lifetime, he said. “Really I’m so grateful for country of United States,” Zakaria, a...
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Rohingya Resettlement During a Pandemic
September 8, 2020 In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the terrible toll it’s taken on the the city of Chicago and especially on it’s black and brown residents, there’s one population whose plight has been severely exacerbated by the virus and yet who’s been virtually absent from the..
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Coronavirus shutdown threatens Chicago’s Rohingya cultural centre
11 May 2020 Coronavirus crisis forces the centre to cancel Ramadan fundraiser and puts the community it serves in dire straits. Chicago, Illinois – Ramadan for Chicago’s only Rohingya Culture Center is not just a time for prayer, community and service, but also a time for survival. Every year, the centre, located in the...
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Rohingya refugees rebuilding their lives in Chicago
Jan. 24, 2019 Chicago has one of the largest number of Rohingya refugees to have been resettled in the United States. More than 1,600 Rohingya are based in Chicago, having spent years in Malaysia after fleeing persecution and violence in Myanmar in the 1990s and 2000s.
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Chicago Red Cross Global Citizenship Hero 2018: Nasir Bin Zakaria
May. 08, 2018 Nasir Bin Zakaria was inspired by his personal experience to help fellow refugees. At 14-years-old, Nasir was forced to leave his family and flee from Myanmar. Twenty-three years later, he was granted refugee status and arrived in Chicago.
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Rohingya Refugees
May. 04, 2018 When Aisyah Salamutallah stepped off an airplane onto U.S. soil in October 2016, she was greeted with blast of cold air. “I really happy,” she recalled. After fleeing discrimination in Burma as a child, then living without legal status in Malaysia for more than 30 years, Salamutallah
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Rohingya refugees in Chicago face stress, anxiety after escaping horrors in Myanmar
Dec. 26, 2017 Hasan Korimullah was 8, maybe 9, when he saw his mother hacked to death. The pair had been on a shopping trip near their home in Myanmar when two men jumped out of the bushes with machetes, he said. Hasan took off running, eventually escaping, while his...
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Web Extra: Rohingya Find New Life in Chicago
Dec. 11, 2017 As they flee persecution in Southeast Asia, Chicago has become home to the largest population of Rohingya Muslims in the U.S. Paris Schutz has this report.
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Rohingya culture center in West Ridge offers comfort amidst crisis
Nov. 29, 2017 CHICAGO (WLS) — Tragic images from Myanmar are difficult to watch. They show the plight of the Rohingya people, described by ABC News as a Muslim minority in the country also known as Burma. The Rohingya were stripped of citizenship by Myanmar’s government in 1982, though they’ve..
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North Side cultural center unites Rohingya refugees together
Nov. 28, 2017 Nasir Zakaria is one of hundreds of Rohingya, a stateless Indo-Aryan people from the Rakhine State, Myanmar, who found refuge in Chicago’s North Side. After immigrating to the U.S. from Myanmar in 2013 and settling in Rogers Park, Zakaria said he could not sit idly while his...
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Rohingya who fled Myanmar find refuge in Chicago
Nov. 4, 2017 Muslim Rohingya who escaped deadly violence and persecution in Myanmar have found new homes in the United States. Muslim Rohingya who escaped deadly violence and persecution in Myanmar have found new homes in the United States. One of the largest concentrations of Rohingya is in the US city of Chicago.
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Rohingya Expatriates Push US Lawmakers to Act on Myanmar
Oct. 18, 2017 CHICAGO, ILLINOIS – Although he hasn’t seen his home country in more than a decade, modern technology has made it easy for Abdul Jabbar Amanullah to stay in regular contact with his family in Myanmar’s remote Rakhine state. Using email and social media to interact with loved...
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Adjusting to New Lives, Chicago’s Rohingya Look to Aid Those Still in Myanmar
There are now approximately 1,500 Rohingya living in Chicago’s north side, according to the Rohingya Culture Center (RCC), an organization that helps the refugees settle into the city.
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Refugees Fleeing Ethnic Cleansing in Burma Are About to Get Even Less Help From the US
SEP. 29, 2017 The phone rang, and Nasir Bin Zakaria jolted awake. It was almost 2 a.m. on Tuesday, and the 40-year-old community leader had gone to bed only an hour earlier. The streets outside his apartment in downtown Chicago were quiet. “Hello?” The men on the line sounded panicked.
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The Rohingya Who Made It to Chicago
The Rohingya people are desperately escaping Myanmar, the country where they have faced persecution for generations. The situation now borders on genocide and more than 500,000 have fled just in the past few months.
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Persecuted Rohingya community find sanctuary and solace at a cultural center in Chicago
Oct. 11, 2016 A dozen primary school-aged children sit around desks taking instruction from their tutors, local college students who volunteer as English language teachers at the Rohingya Culture Center in Chicago. Zakaria, who works full-time as the director of the center, fought tirelessly to create this space for refugees.
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Refugees from Myanmar’s persecuted Rohingya community find sanctuary and solace at a cultural center in Chicago
A dozen primary school-aged children sit around desks taking instruction from their tutors, local college students who volunteer as English language teachers at the Rohingya Culture Center in Chicago.
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Myanmar refugees, including Muslim Rohingya, outpace Syrian arrivals in U.S.
Sept. 20, 2016 CHICAGO (Reuters) – The resettlement of refugees from Middle Eastern countries, particularly Syria, has been the center of a heated political debate after President Barack Obama last year pledged to resettle at least 10,000 refugees from the war-torn country in the United States. But refugees from Myanmar..
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Persecuted Rohingya Muslims find rare refuge in Chicago
April. 15, 2016 For the majority of his life, Nasir Bin Zakaria was a citizen of nowhere. He was 14 when he was kidnapped by militants at a bazaar in west Myanmar. “Kalah,” they hissed at him, a racial slur used toward Rohingya — the ethnic Muslim minority residing among...
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Chicago Rohingya Organize To Help Their Own
A growing number of Rohingya Muslims, who fled persecution and violence in their native Burma, have made Chicago home. The community has grown over the last several years and this Saturday they’ll open the Rohingya Culture Center.
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Media
