Source: MEATINGPLACE, 12/5/16

A recent University of Kansas (KU) study concludes that Garden City, Kan., home to a Tyson Foods beef packing plant, sets a positive example for how a community can help new immigrants and refugees assimilate.

Tyson’s Finney County complex, as it is called, employs 3,200 workers, according to the company’s website.
The plant in southwest Kansas has attracted immigrants and refugees seeking employment since IBP opened the facility in 1980, KU said. Refugees from Vietnam and immigrants from across Latin America have been joined more recently by refugees from nations such as Somalia and Myanmar.

Rural communities across the country have had similar experiences as food processing became central to many local economies in the 1980s and 1990s.

KU researchers spent five months in Garden City interviewing educators and community leaders and observing how schools taught a student population in which as many as 21 languages other than English are commonly spoken.

They found the school district does a good job with teacher training and efforts to diversify school personnel.

Among recommendations for improvement was a greater focus on teacher recruitment and retention. Like the meatpacking industry, the school district has a high turnover rate of nearly 15 percent annually, the study found.

The researchers concluded that Garden City’s commitment to meeting the challenges of educating its diverse student population could serve as a model for other communities.  

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