Discover our Work

Know your neighbor is not only a vision and a global project. We strongly believe that small acts will help us to change the world. That is why we launched several small projects through France. As usual, our goal is to make people meet, so that they realize their neighbor is not the cliché they imagined. Even in France, where there is not any open war between two groups, we can make progress in the way we consider our neighbors. Differences between suburbs and downtown are huge, so are they between countryside and urban areas. Sometimes people live alongside and do not even try to meet each other. Let us show you how we change the world on daily basis.

First project : School work to educate young generations about immigrants/refugees

One of our programmes involves making school students interact with refugees and their children. By proposing these activities the initiative can help integrate positive influence on school children and the refugees. Basically to provide a meaning for their presence and make the world a more compassionate place.

Storytelling:

This activity would involve refugees who were highly qualified and employed in their home country to share their experiences and field of work with the children. They can also narrate their journey in a positive light and share key values. A translator can be used if necessary.

Workshop:

As an extension of storytelling refugees can conduct workshops based on their expertise in a school friendly manner. For example: It can be a workshop on construction, tailoring, etc.

Admission for refugee students:

By partnering with schools we can also ensure that schools accept refugee children and are educated, in return this program can increase high value for schools.

Sports:

Another interactive activity where refugees can teach a traditional sport that is played in their home country.

Art and Music:

Different forms of art and music can be explored together by the refugee and the students in school. This can be in the form of workshops or regular classes.

Health Check Up:

Doctors in certain communities can form a voluntary movement and offer free dental, eye and general health check up for refugees one a month or once in two weeks.

Second project : Know your refugee neighbour

One neighbour we do not really know is the refugee. Coming from another part of the globe, this person is often over qualified, has a powerful story, and wants to share her.his life and her.his competences with her.his neighbor. At KYN, we imagined a few operations that could help people know their refugee neighbour, and help them to be integrated to the French society.

Speed refugees dating

“Who am I?”, “What did I live” and “What can I do?”, these are the three questions we asked refugees to answer during our “refugee speed working day”. Our idea, matching people who need competences and people who wants to work. In partnership with Sciences Po Refugee Help and the “CE” and HR teams of huge French companies, we organized these special speed datings. The success was greater than we could hope, since it has led to more than 300 hires during the past year, (50% in Paris – 50% in the rest of the country) We also update constantly our databases to match refugees and potential employer. Our goal, on the one hand, allowing refugees to meet people from French companies and sell their competencies, on the other hand, create new reflection about diversity and improvement in the French companies, by hiring refugees.

New life in deserted small towns

What if refugees replaced the daughters and sons gone for the city in rural zones ? This is the bet we made with the village of Polminhac (Cantal). With the help of locals, refugees integrated abandoned houses. All the inhabitants, leaded by the mayor office, decided to give an opportunity to three of these immigrants. They rehabilitated these ancient houses against the promise that the three men would stay for a while in town and help to maintain the local activities (becoming farm hand, or helping local artisans). Bring back life into the town and give to three men an opportunity to integrate themselves in the French society that was the goal of the initiative. A few months after the beginning of the project, both part, which now trend to become only one, are happy, and the inhabitants of Polminhac deeply want to become KYN ambassadors. The idea is such a success that we already think about reiterating the experience in two other towns; Gabat (Pyrénées-Atlantiques) and Contrazy (Ariège).

When children Meet the street

“A homeless is someone who has not been as lucky as you”. That was the notion we wanted to give to the children from Parisian schools, aged from 5 to 15. With the association l’Armée du Salut, we imagined a program which could make children and homeless people meet. For two days, children (who wanted to) have met homeless people. The concept, do some activities together, and, for both, tell your life and your story. The goal, make the children understand why and how, and make them tell around them how special were these days. We then asked them to write a little essay to share one or two things they learnt from the meeting. For the homeless person, bringing joy during a day, and a presence without “a priori”.

The initiative has been a success, and will be replicated in other schools.