CURRENT POSITION Associate Director, Adult English Language and Literacy, New York Public Library DEGREE MLS, St. John’s University, 2011 FOLLOW nypl.org/english Photo by William Neumann Photography

Supporting Asylum Seekers

What does a major metropolitan area do when faced with an influx of 100,000 non–English speaking asylum seekers? It turns to the public library. The New York Public Library system (NYPL) is the largest non-municipal provider of free adult English classes in New York City. As Associate Director, Adult English Language and Literacy, Steven Mahoney manages 167 classes per semester at 24 sites across three boroughs. His team helps patrons become more active participants in New York civic life. 

When Texas governor Greg Abbott began busing migrants from the southern U.S. border into New York City in 2022, Mahoney’s team leapt into action. Visiting migrant shelters to provide on-site English class demonstrations and facilitate library card sign-ups, Mahoney discovered that many lacked the necessary language skills or living stability to join NYPL’s existing core language program. So he launched a pilot program specifically for asylum seekers, increasing their learning through weekly English classes led by an instructor using Mango Languages. The program started with just a few participants but grew 125 percent from FY22 (5,502 students) to FY23 (12,406 students). The formal English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) program’s enrollment also more than doubled during that time, serving 2,676 unique individuals in FY22 across 11 branches and online, and 5,532 across 24 branches and online in FY23.

“The objective of this outreach,” Mahoney says, “is to convey that the library is for everyone.”

He currently collaborates with colleagues in Career Services and Tech Training to offer an ESOL Podcasting class that teaches digital literacy and employment skills in addition to language acquisition. “I would like to see how further partnerships like these can challenge people’s perceptions of what can happen in a library,” he notes.