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December 08, 2020

Connecting resettled refugees with the right tools helps them make the U.S. home

resettled refugee in the US

In the past five years, more than 250,000 refugees have been resettled in the United States. Newly resettled refugees receive assistance from one of the nine resettlement agencies for as few as 90 days, after which they are responsible for navigating their path to self-sufficiency. While there are many organizations that provide refugee assistance, many refugees are not familiar with their services or are unsure of how to ask for help. 

The Census Open Innovation Labs (COIL), an innovation team within the U.S. Census Bureau,  selected The Hive, USA for UNHCR’s innovation lab, to participate in The Opportunity Project (TOP). TOP is an initiative consisting of a twelve-week development sprint that aims to bring together industry, government and nonprofits to develop innovative tools that can help address national challenges. In addition to USA for UNHCR, organizations participating in the effort include Casa Alitas, Georgetown University, Graphicacy, Hello Neighbor, IRC, Mapbox, OpenStreetMap, Refugee Congress, Refugee Services of Texas, SAS Institute, Save the Children, The United States Department of State and USAHello.

The Hive proposed creating a tool that connects resettled refugees with resources and vital services available in their local communities, such as medical and mental healthcare, English language learning classes, job training and education. The proposed tool will allow resettled refugees to easily identify local services and empower them to successfully integrate into their new communities. 

When designing the tool, the team gathered input from resettled refugees and nonprofits, both of which emphasized the importance of including images, symbols and other language agnostic tools to represent services. Further development of this tool will be especially relevant as refugee resettlement is expected to increase in the coming years. 

On December 9-11, the Hive and partners will participate in TOP’s Demo Day to explore how to implement the designed tool so as to ensure refugees receive the support they need while they rebuild their lives in the U.S.