The fundraising video for The Nest Academy features heartfelt testimonials from students, parents, and staff describing the unique challenges faced by refugee and immigrant children arriving in the United States and how the academy’s comprehensive, gifted‑private‑school model addresses those challenges. Speakers highlight cultural and language barriers, lack of support systems, and the trauma of war, then explain how the school provides wrap‑around services—including uniforms, transportation, meals, a rigorous curriculum, and dedicated mental‑health care—to nurture the whole child. They stress that these resources enable students to dream, become productive citizens, and feel love and family within the school community, positioning the academy as a vital lifeline for a growing refugee population in Charlotte, one of the nation’s top resettlement cities.
Chapters
I can't imagine having been through warfare and violence and finally coming to America, but being thrown into a public school where you don't know the culture, you don't know the language, you don't have a support system.
The children that come to us are from families who are escaping the most difficult situations. possible, whether that's prior to coming to the United States as refugees or immigrants, or families that are just really the marginalized, underprivileged, struggling socially, economically, and that creates a certain type of student. And that's why we've created A Nest, to nurture the whole child.
Charlotte is one of 10 cities that resettle refugees in the entire United States, and so So our population here in Charlotte is large and it's continuing to grow. Because they come to the Nest Academy, they will have the opportunity to dream about their future, to become a productive citizen. And without the Nest Academy, I don't know if it would be possible for these students.
They actually took the time out of their day to spend time with me, to talk to me about how I was doing, asked about my family, made sure I was having my daily laugh, And that's what really helped me get better as time went by because they were really focused on my mental health. I mean, education was important, but like when you're mentally not okay, of course that affects your education too.
All they want is an opportunity. I can't imagine as a parent uprooting my children and bringing them here, and all you would want is for them to thrive, and we help them do that.
I've been here for 5 years, and when I came here, I was like really young, like around 12. Because of the nuns that carry me, like, I can read, and I can also speak a good, like, good English, and I can understand and also can like translate for my mom. I'm just developing a lot of intelligence.
It is a completely gifted private school education, and that means that their uniforms, their transportation, their meals, all of their curriculum, their experiences, the tools in their toolkit that they will graduate with— all of that is gifted.
The Nest Academy is love. The Nest Academy is opportunity.
The Nest Academy is love and family. When I needed help the most, they were there.
It's a nest. It's a nest where Where you can be reborn into this culture and grow and learn and flourish. Fly away.
