Exactly one year ago, the world watched US troops withdraw from Afghanistan. As a result, thousands of Afghan people and families desperately tried to escape before it became impossible.
Those fortunate enough to leave the country are just beginning their arduous journey to various landing sites abroad, military bases where people are held in large white tents on the tarmac, and a string of resettlement agencies across the United States. did.
They faced new challenges. Finding housing, employment, education, health care, and community. All of this while learning a new language was far from everything I knew.
Massachusetts’ Ascentria Care Alliance needed to act quickly to prepare. Our resettlement services reached their lowest level during the previous administration, with one office (out of three) closed.
In October 2021, we learned that there are over 75,000 Afghans living in the United States. This is beyond the capacity of the Resettlement Service. Initially, Ascentria agreed to take in about 300 Afghans, but that number quickly grew. We were in uncharted territory and had to identify a way to help many people very quickly.
Metaphorically speaking, we were building planes while flying planes. We will find enough volunteers to help with resettlement, raise enough funds to help Afghan evacuees, and ensure that we manage the hundreds of tasks associated with each person’s resettlement. I needed to be able to.
From health checks to home inspections to checking supplies lists, there seems to be an endless list of tasks that every person entering as a refugee must complete within 90 days of arrival.
technology to rescue
When we got word that a huge number of people needed help, we had weeks, not months, to prepare. As we were trying to bring together community resources, we realized we needed a place to organize them.
One of many conferences with volunteers in an exciting series, Boston-based with a community care records platform that organizes and customizes fields to reflect over 100 tasks across multiple agencies and volunteers I learned about a company that Understand the nature of resettlement work and do so in a manner consistent with governmental compliance requirements.
In record time, we worked with Activate Care to set up a platform to manage, track, and collaborate with over 1,500 volunteers.
Over the past 12 months, Activate Care’s technology has enabled a more seamless, collaborative and effective way to manage the resettlement process. And we haven’t fully exploited that potential yet.
Organizational game changer
Since resettlement work is relatively new, the number of jobs scheduled in the first 90 days is staggering. Our teams typically have different case files for different domains, and rarely see parallel efforts. Their ability to design a resettlement workflow, put all the necessary tasks in one place and link to the necessary forms for additional instructions was amazing.
But more importantly, they wanted to give the team of volunteers who had raised nearly $1 million a clear way to submit refund requests and track the process.
We will continue to work with Activate Care to coordinate and streamline workflows so staff can focus on delivering services instead of worrying about ticking boxes or messing with Excel spreadsheets. .
After the workflow is put in place, we would like to collect data to better understand the impact of the programme, which should improve service delivery. We also want to ask broader questions, such as how to reduce the impact of isolation and improve economic self-sufficiency.
accomplished
Refugee resettlement requires many people working together on a daily basis. There is no substitute for those “human” hours. But technology has played a key role, allowing people to focus on the work that only they can do, and facilitating the critical collaboration needed to achieve this feat.
Now that the intensity of the work has eased, we look forward to welcoming new community members from Ukraine and looking forward to other opportunities that technology presents as we continue to work to ensure our neighbors in Afghanistan receive the support they need. to
Aimee Mitchell is the Chief Community Services Officer for the Ascentria Care Alliance.
