jitinnagpal1989 / hackforgood2020

HackforGood2020

In collaboration with Microsoft, USA for UNHCR is working to create solutions that connect resettled refugees in the US to nonprofits, community based organizations and/or government agencies that provide resources and services.

USA for UNHCR is the national partner of UNHCR (the UN Refugee Agency) in the U.S. We support UNHCR’s efforts around the globe through fundraising, advocacy, innovation and private sector engagement. The Hive is the innovation lab of USA for UNHCR leading the application of data science, artificial intelligence, machine learning and emerging technologies to USA for UNHCR’s programming to change the conversation around the global refugee crisis in the United States.

Problem: Recently resettled refugees often struggle to identify resources and opportunities available to them through nonprofits, community based organizations, local governments and the private sector. How might we better connect refugees to services that are created for them? In the last five years, more than 250,000 refugees have been resettled in the United States. Refugees are provided assistance by one of the nine resettlement agencies for 90 days, after which they are responsible for navigating their path to self-sufficiency and integration into American but often lacking English proficiency.

What success looks like: A prototype for refugees to have a convenient way of accessing information vital to surviving and thriving in the US, potentially using emojis to address language barriers.

• Resettled refugees are predominantly mobile first, meaning they lack access to computers and tablets so an appropriate solution would be built for a mobile device.
• Resettled refugees could use this tool to look up local services and resources in their area, preferably a tool that is language agnostic.
• The ideal tool would also allow nonprofits and other actors to input the services they provide.

We would love to expand upon the tool built at the hackathon in the coming months that is a two way communication piece between refugees and the actors that provide services.

This could possibly look like:

• A mobile app or website or tool access via mobile devices;
• A visualization that draws upon the geographical information of nonprofits;
• A survey/form that allows nonprofits to share their services;
• A plan for how to maintain the information that nonprofits provide and refugees seek.

This repo includes the following datasets:

• Scraped data from Charity Navigator (a charity assessment organization) on nonprofits that provide services and resources to resettled refugees and asylum seekers
• Crowdsourced data from HelloNeighbor on nonprofits working with resettled refugees
• Open source data from the Department of State on resettled refugees by year, country of origin, and US city