Founded to help Jews fleeing pogroms in Europe, today HIAS stands for a world in which refugees of all faiths find welcome, safety, and opportunity.
Temple Emanu-El’s Philanthropic Fund was pleased to make a grant in the fall of 2023 to support HIAS’ volunteer infrastructure which enables volunteers in New York City to lend their time, skills, and energy towards helping refugees.
Since the grant was made, HIAS has served about 200 clients through their programming, in-kind donations, translation and interpretation, and direct service. Excitingly, they have also onboarded 31 new direct service volunteers in New York and expect to onboard a good number more in May thanks to the efforts of Temple Emanu-El’s sponsored Avodah fellow with recruitment. Additionally, the fellow runs weekly office hours for new and potential volunteers in New York who are looking for information about how to plug into HIAS’ volunteer efforts.
Through the Avodah fellow’s leadership, volunteers come to HIAS with a range of backgrounds and skills; some are asylees themselves, some have had family helped by HIAS, and some are retired community members who have professional histories with transferrable skills such as former teachers, lawyers, etc. Some just have a general interest in supporting refugees and are willing to jump in to research projects. Many volunteers speak other languages including Spanish, French, Russian, Ukrainian, Dari, Pashto, Farsi, and Amharic. Our volunteers occupy many roles, including English language partnership (providing one-on-one English language support and building language skills), mentorship (offering career and employment support such as resume building and applications, or other arenas of navigating U.S. life such as education and healthcare), interpretation and translation (remote interpretation and translation needs that support our asylum-seeking clients’ legal case and social integration), accompaniment (transportation support) and letter writing volunteers.
“AV” was experiencing a medical emergency and with no network to lean on to pick her up and drop her off from the hospital, and checking in on her throughout her recovery. She had attended graduate school in her country of origin, and since coming to the US has been working as a nail technician, with difficult hours and low pay while awaiting her work permit. Our volunteer Robert started meeting with her this winter to help her with her job search by assisting her in editing her resume, thinking through her career goals, and creating a professional network in New York. With his support, she has identified a goal of getting a nursing certificate, and just this week he helped her arrange a meeting at CUNY Nursing School to learn about their program and her options for financial aid. They both said the meeting went really well, and she has reported feeling happy and hopeful about building a life here.
Another important component of the fellow’s work has included building relationships with local partner organizations. They are adding volunteer capacity to a number of direct service organizations who are meeting urgent needs for new arrivals including food, clothing, and language access.
“MR” had been living alone with her two young children since arriving in the US, and was spending the holidays without anyone else to celebrate with or support her. Thanks to Ella’s efforts, we were able to give her a tricycle and a doll for her to gift to her two children. She was very touched to have someone stop by her house and hand-deliver the gifts, particularly during an isolating time.
Through a number of new partnerships, made possible by Temple Emanu-El’s grant, HIAS has been able to widely distribute their resource materials to the asylum-seeking community, build critical partnerships, and have a greater impact through services that are provided to newly arrived migrants in NYC.
