Eighteen Sudanese students in the Grand Island Public Schools will participate in "The Quilted Conscience" project from Sunday through Sept. 21.
A 60-minute video documentary about the project will be prepared for broadcast on PBS (Public Broadcasting Service), said project director John Sorensen of New York City and a native of Grand Island.
"The Quilted Conscience" will tell the stories of a group of Sudanese-American children whose refugee parents have settled in Grand Island. The students are mostly from the Nuer, Nuba, and Dinka tribes of South Sudan.
The Sudanese girls in fourth through 12th grades will work after school on the project at Stuhr Museum from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. The students and their families will also participate in a family event at Stuhr Museum on the afternoon of Sept. 21.
Sorensen is the executive director of the Abbott Sisters Project and is a co-editor of "The Grace Abbott Reader" (University of Nebraska Press, 2008).
He has organized major Abbott events for the New York Public Library, the University of Chicago and Chicago Public Radio.
Nationally known quiltmaker Peggie Hartwell of Summerville, S.C., will lead the girls in creating a story quilt. She is a founding member of the Women of Color Quilters' Network and has been the subject of major profiles by the Smithsonian Institute.
The story quilt's theme is "Dreams and Memories." The students will develop their quilt images by first interviewing their elders about life in their African homeland, then by imagining their own future lives and careers in the United States.
Each student will make a quilt block illustrating her memories of her heritage and a quilt block depicting her dreams for the future. Some blocks in the quilt may call attention to the "common ground" of the African and American experiences of the refugees.
"Many of the Sudanese have come from a cattle-based culture in a grassland home to live in a new grassland home where cattle are also of great significance to the culture," Sorensen said.
The mural-like story quilt will be unveiled at Edith Abbott Memorial Library during a ceremony to celebrate Abbott Sisters Day in March 2009.
"The completed work will be augmented by an extensive photo exhibition documenting the students' creative process and honoring their families and traditions, both here in the United States and back in South Sudan," Sorensen said.
"This project is the culmination of the Abbott Sisters Living Legacy work -- finding ways to allow the social justice heritage of Grace and Edith Abbott to improve the lives of the children and immigrants of today," he said.
Other project partners include Terese Svoboda and Stephanie Riak Akuei.
Svoboda is a New York City resident who was born in Ogallala and who lived for a year in Sudan during the 1970s. Akuei is a social anthropologist with expertise about Sudan and Sudanese refugees. She lives in Grand Island with her Dinka husband and their young son.
Local quilters will also assist the students.
The documentary will be distributed to libraries, high schools, colleges, and universities nationwide, particularly those with educational programs that emphasize African Studies, American Folk Arts, Black History, Children's and Immigration Rights, and Women's History.
The Abbott Sisters Project, with financial support from individuals and organizations including the Grand Island Community Foundation, Heartland United Way, Principal Financial Group, and Swift & Co., is sponsoring the endeavor, Sorensen said.
Partner organizations involved in the project include the Grand Island Public Schools, Stuhr Museum, and Edith Abbott Memorial Library.
Grand Island Public Schools Board of Education President Lynn Cronk heads the project's steering committee. Tracy Morrow, an English Language Acquisition teacher at Gates Elementary School, is the project's schools/students coordinator, and English Language Acquisition Director Kris Burling is also assisting.