Roger C. Sullivan High School in Chicago serves as a historic “landing pad” for waves of immigrant and refugee students, its student body representing over 30 languages and backgrounds. Journalist Elly Fishman spent three and a half years following the 2017–2018 school year as the subject of her book Refugee High: Coming of Age in America, exploring the immigrant experience through lives shaped by trauma, resilience, and teenage realities.

Fishman interviews students and staff—such as Principal Chad Adams and the English‑learner director Sarah Quintenz—highlighting families from places like Iraq, Guatemala, Syria, Myanmar, and Congolese refugees from Tanzania’s Nyarugusu camp The Washington Post. The book is structured around the school calendar. Fishman captures the tension between refugees’ harrowing pasts and their immersion in typical teenage concerns: homework, pop culture, romances, social dynamics, and school hierarchies The Washington Post.

Despite arriving with minimal English and often living in crowded or austere conditions, the students are portrayed with empathy—they aren’t defined solely by hardship. They are young people navigating adolescence as keenly as they navigate America, negotiating traditions from home alongside jokes, social media, and peer pressure. At the same time, readers gain insight into their parents’ sacrifices: holding down low-wage nighttime jobs, mourning lost lives, and forging a new reality in often unfamiliar surroundings.

Toll’s review underscores Fishman’s underlying message: Sullivan High doesn’t just absorb refugees—it can help launch them. The school functions as a microcosm of American identity in flux, inviting reflection on how fear and xenophobia coexist with generosity, and how public education plays a pivotal role in welcoming and shaping future generations. Learn more about this book here!

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