The word “refugee” sparks conversation and fuels emotion. There are more than twenty-two million refugees worldwide and another sixty-five million who have been forcibly displaced. But who are these people? Images filter into our consciousness via dramatic photographs—but these photos only offer a glimpse into their stories.

As a young ER nurse in Boston, Roberta Gately was stopped cold by stark images of big-bellied babies with empty haunting stares in the news. She called the aid organization featured in the news story, and, within two months, she had become a humanitarian aid worker. Soon she learned that the world into which millions of children around the globe are born is fraught with unspeakable horrors. The only certainties for so many of these children are disease and devastating injury.

Footprints in the Dust aims to share the real stories of these refugees in hopes of revealing the truth about their experience.