WES Blog

As President of the Neighborhood Development Center (NDC), Renay Dossman oversees efforts to support sustainable community development and equitable economic opportunity for entrepreneurs and small business owners—35 percent of whom are immigrants and refugees—in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota. “Working at NDC is a mix of everything I’ve loved doing in my career—I get to […]

Over the last month, tens of thousands of Afghans have been forced to flee their homes and been hastily resettled in new countries. Communities across the U.S. are welcoming Afghan refugees and helping them get settled. To best support refugees as they look to establish new lives and pursue new opportunities in the U.S., it […]

By Monica Munn, Managing Director of Philanthropy at World Education Services (WES) Two years ago, the WES Mariam Assefa Fund made its first grants to organizations working to build more inclusive economies for immigrants and refugees. We were excited to begin our journey as a philanthropic funder and were energized by our new grantee partners, […]

Members of the National Council for Workforce Education (NCWE) will convene on October 6-7, with the timely mission of mobilizing community colleges to activate a workforce that supports the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the nation’s full economic recovery. Rallying around NCWE’s core value of “workforce education for all,” conference session […]

Last week, bipartisan legislation passed the U.S. House of Representatives, putting the United States a step closer to envisioning a workforce that works for all. First introduced in August 2020 as a stand-alone bill with bipartisan support, the Improving Opportunities for New Americans Act was reintroduced in June 2021 with six bipartisan co-sponsors. The legislation […]

When Ali Khalaf left Iraq in 2018, he had been using his master’s degree in international business to teach management, e-commerce, industrial organization, and commercial law at the University of Basrah. When he arrived in Canada, he was eager to continue doing what he loves—teaching—and planned to earn his doctoral degree. But things didn’t go […]

“The work of organizing as working-class, racialized migrants is very personal,” says Syed Hussan, executive director of Migrant Workers Alliance for Change (MWAC) in Ontario, a grantee partner of the WES Mariam Assefa Fund. An immigrant himself, Hussan began working as an organizer with MWAC in 2008. “This is collective work—it is not just about […]

World Education Services (WES) believes in the power of storytelling and shared resources. In 2019, we reached out to immigrants across North America. We asked about their reasons for leaving home, their challenges along the way, and the advice they would like to share with other newcomers. In this new blog series, we are now […]

The 2020 census revealed a trend that city leaders in Buffalo, New York, had not seen in seven decades: growth. As of last year, the city was home to 278,349 residents, a 6.5 percent increase since 2010. The growth, the first recorded in Buffalo since the 1950 census, is the result of a dedicated effort […]

Youth are the leaders and changemakers of tomorrow, the foundation of any country’s future workforce. Yet Canada’s youth—especially immigrant youth and young people of colour—face persistent barriers to employment. COVID-19 restrictions have only exacerbated this problem, causing youth unemployment rates to rise. Early in the pandemic, jobs lost by young people accounted for about a […]

Anas Farhoud remains optimistic in the face of adversity. He and his wife, Razan, left Syria and moved from one country to another for a full decade before finally settling with their two daughters in Canada in 2020. But he never lost faith that they would find a permanent home someday and prosper there. His […]

World Education Services (WES) believes in the power of storytelling and shared resources. In 2019, we reached out to immigrants across North America. We asked about their reasons for leaving home, their challenges along the way, and the advice they would like to share with other newcomers. In this new blog series, we are now […]

Immigrants and refugees have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19, with many working on the front lines of the pandemic. In the U.S., 12 million immigrants and refugees work in occupations such as health care and transportation, or in roles that have been some of the hardest hit economically, such as food and domestic services. Similarly, […]

WES Global Talent Bridge is publishing a series of blog posts that highlight the critical work and unique perspectives of IMPRINT network members. This month, WES Global Talent Bridge communications and policy consultant Sara McElmurry connected with Jina Krause-Vilmar, president and CEO of Upwardly Global, a national non-profit that eliminates employment barriers for immigrant and […]

An immigrant from France who is also the granddaughter of Jewish immigrants developed a supportive community that would help immigrant women in New York obtain meaningful employment and pursue higher education. The resulting network has since become a registered non-profit with more than 450 participants and alumni dedicated to empowering immigrant and refugee women.   […]

This week, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced a policy update that is intended to lessen the burden on those hoping to complete a change of status (COS) and enroll as international students. The new policy states that nonimmigrants do not need to file status extensions while waiting for their approved F-1 […]

On June 15, the WES Mariam Assefa Fund hosted a panel of three experts to discuss how workforce development organizations can successfully partner with employers to create programs that meet employers’ evolving talent needs and provide opportunities for immigrant and refugee workers. Marina Nuri, the Fund’s senior program manager, moderated a conversation with Judy Doidge […]

On June 17, the Welcoming Center launched a new toolkit to help employers recruit, retain, and promote immigrant and refugee workers. The Engaging Immigrant Talent toolkit shares with employers proven actions they can take to tap into the potential of immigrant talent and make their workplaces more inclusive. The resource is designed to meet employers […]

St. Louis’s Bevo Mill neighborhood—home to a corridor of immigrant-owned restaurants, markets, and salons—is known as “Little Bosnia,” a testament to the city’s revitalization by the tens of thousands of Bosnian refugees who arrived there in the 1990s, fleeing conflict in the Balkans. The newcomers made important contributions to the city, launching both businesses and […]

In honor of World Refugee Day on June 20, learn about one of our grantee partners with the WES Mariam Assefa Fund. Nada El Masry’s family fled Palestine during its vicious ethnic cleansing effort in the 1960s. Displaced to Libya, they were denied citizenship—which limited their access to basic human rights. “There were constant reminders […]