Supporting Afghan Allies + Refugees
During the summer, U.S. armed forces ended their mission in Afghanistan after more than 20 years. The withdrawal left thousands of Afghan allies vulnerable to the Taliban as they assumed control.
Nearly 100,000 of our Afghan allies made their way through the summer and fall of 2021 to military or other safe-haven sites throughout the U.S. Upwardly Global quickly mobilized, forming partnerships with these sites to offer humanitarian aid and career support to Afghans.
Some 20 to 30% of evacuees have professional training and are proficient in English. We need their skills and talent in the U.S. workforce.
Our goal over the next 18 months is to provide 1:1 career coaching services to 1,400 Afghans and access to our job readiness and learning management system to an additional 5,000.
In 2022, we along with our Afghan allies entered a new stage of rebuilding. The thousands that were evacuated have now left their safe-haven sites and are being resettled in communities across the country. Upwardly Global is continuing to work to ensure workforce development and inclusion, while also lifting up their stories through narrative, storytelling and media engagement.
Seeing the incredible work of Upwardly Global and CEO Jina Krause-Vilmar gives me hope and joy as these families begin a brand new chapter.”
Senator Chris Coons (D-DE)
Upwardly Global set up career centers and offered training for Afghans on the military bases where new evacuees arrived.
Oct. 2021-Early 2022
Launched our Afghan rapid-response portal with job readiness e-learning pathways for all English-proficient Afghans, and added up/reskilling courses.
and counting since fall 2021
Provided humanitarian support to address immediate short-term needs—leveraging significant goodwill and partnerships with Accenture, Bloomberg, the Lawrence Foundation, the Afya Foundation, and the Jewish community in Westchester and NYC.
and counting since August 2021
Provided humanitarian support to address immediate short-term needs in our full coaching, skilling and networking program, plus thousands more accessing our resources.
Jina Krause-Vilmar, Upwardly Global CEO & president, appears on CBS News in August 2021 to discuss the Afghan evacuation and the need for workforce integration.
Now more than ever, resources are required to ensure newcomers entering our country under dire circumstances have the tools needed to integrate and restart their lives in the U.S.”
Turbulence causes migration; we are currently seeing the largest refugee crisis since World War II due to war in Ukraine.
We are handed a choice: We can embrace immigrants and offer them the support they need to regain agency and contribute to their new homes. Or we can demonize them, relegating them to poverty and isolation and building up walls of exclusion.
Upwardly Global and thousands of you — our partners, donors, volunteers and alumni — chose to support inclusion and to take an active role in building solidarity and transforming opportunity. We have our work cut out for us as we look to deepen our impact and to scale our work to millions of new immigrants and refugees.
The United States has announced it will accept 100,000 displaced people fleeing the conflict in Ukraine. Refugees fleeing Ukraine have been met with humanitarian concern and care in Europe. We believe differentiated support for workforce reentry — which benefits immigrants and the societies in which they settle — must be a critical component of resettlement planning, funding and coordination.
Upwardly Global CEO Jina Krause-Vilmar and staff gather with Upwardly Global community members in April 2022 to discuss support for Ukrainian refugees.
Many refugees from Ukraine have professional backgrounds; some 60% of Ukrainian women have a bachelor’s degree or higher.
Upwardly Global is committed to offering workplace skills to immigrant professionals coming to the U.S. Our goal is to ensure that refugees get jobs at their skill level. Over the years, we have served over 500 Ukrainian job seekers and we are connecting to community organizations and services.
Yet we have seen time and again that even when the will for immigrant and refugee inclusion is strong, the implementation is often lacking. This is a moment to ensure together that we connect good intentions with expertise to ensure strong implementation. That means coordinating among those engaged in workforce training, including refugees themselves, employers and the government, and ensuring that the voices of those impacted are centered in conversations and programs.
Upwardly Global is all-in at this moment and committed to offering help and connecting those eager and able to support with those for whom this moment means everything.
We are excited to collaborate with you and activate and expand our community to get involved with this work:
Connecting with partners in immigrant and refugee support to create referral pipelines for our free career resources program
Coaching newcomers with expertise and care, and through individualized, self-paced learning
Supporting career pathways to jobs that pay family-supporting wages; offering upskilling, reskilling and support relicensing when needed for workforce integration
Sharing career resources broadly with coalitions, organizations and individuals who are sponsoring new refugees
Activating hundreds of companies and volunteer mentors to offer jobs, industry expertise and open networks while deepening their ability to integrate and appreciate immigrant contributions
Building funding partnerships that support strong work and innovation to deepen and expand services
For most immigrants and refugees, arrival in the U.S. is a time-sensitive and watershed moment. We soon have to choose if we want to continue to work in our area of expertise or enter the job market in an unrelated profession as nonskilled workers to make a living. Upwardly Global’s support in this critical juncture of our life has enormous multi-generational impact on our career, our children, and the communities we live in.”
Dr. Mohammad Sediq Hazratzai
Principal Investigator at the Public Health Institute Visiting Professor at the University of California, Davis Upwardly Global Alumnus