Article: Polish School Helps New Bedford Immigrants

From http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/2013/01/20/polish-school-helps-new-bedford-immigrants/DJ9MPxw0DYRJQKrAoP0oyI/story.html

Polish school helps New Bedford immigrants
By MATT CAMARA
January 20, 2013

‘‘What day is it? What day is tomorrow? Yesterday?’’ she'd ask each of the students, girls between 7 and 14-years-old, in turn.

The girls answered the teacher’s questions without reverting to English, their responses punctuated by the instructor saying ‘‘dobry’’ — Polish for ‘‘good’’ — and moving on to the next lesson.

‘‘Even though (the students) speak Polish at home, it’s difficult to teach the grammar, the writing,’’ said Renata Morrison, principal of the Polish School of New Bedford, while she walked a reporter through the halls of Holy Family-Holy Name School, where Polish is the language of instruction Saturday mornings. ‘‘We don’t make money on this, it’s just to help our children become fluent in a second language, their native language.’’

The Polish School of New Bedford took in its first students last March after a group of parents banded together in search of a way to keep their native culture alive, said Morrison, herself a Polish immigrant. The nonprofit school holds classes at Holy Family-Holy Name on Saturday mornings and $50 buys a month of classes, she added.

Read the full article at http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/2013/01/20/polish-school-helps-new-bedford-immigrants/DJ9MPxw0DYRJQKrAoP0oyI/story.html