New Student Book Experience
2011 Selection

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Outcast United: An American Town, a Refugee Team, and One Woman's Quest to Make a Difference

by Warren St. John

"OU is an engaging read, a true story detailing how one "outcast" coached other outcasts to develop a sense of identity in their new and in many ways unwelcoming home. As new students come to their new college community and begin to navigate diversity and new challenges on the path to growth and development, they will empathize with the book's youth and their experiences in a new culture, growing in a new community while reconciling their home values and family traditions.  As the students in OU learned to work as a team respecting people from different backgrounds, readers see other young people overcoming stereotypes with courage and leadership. By capitalizing on their talents for soccer, these students blossom and prove themselves in their new town. New UMBC students also bring talents with them and will build on these, sharing passions and connecting with others who seem so different and finding connections with fellow students from many backgrounds."

"Outcasts United has something for everyone. Soccer is a universal sport played by girls and boys, and men and women. If you know the rules you can play, whether you speak the same language or not. This book tells the true story of a strong willed recent college graduate who takes a group of refugee boys, from many different war-torn countries, speaking many different languages, and turns them into a soccer team in a small Georgia town. On one level this book should appeal to anyone who's ever felt like an outcast or alien in a new setting. At the same time it should open the reader's eyes to the world outside (and inside) the US and how America is viewed. UMBC is hailed for it's diverse student body and I think this book should help generate conversations between groups. And soccer games!"