Leaders in Arizona’s refugee communities are having virtual meetings with state lawmakers this week.
Meeting members of the Arizona Legislature is a chance for people who were forced to flee their old country to homogenize in a new one. They see how government works, build ties with those who represent them and advocate for their community.
State lawmakers heard from Rami Khoshaba, who told the Fronteras Desk that refugees from his native Iraq likely don’t know that coming here means a chance to move up in society.
“If your family is low class or middle class even, you can’t really aspire to be an engineer, a doctor or lawyer,” he said.
Medical school is where Khoshaba hopes to soon be, but he didn’t know a career was even possible when his family moved here in 2008. Now Khoshaba works in a neuroscience lab doing research on genes that cause schizophrenia.
