​​Refugees are forced to flee their home countries to save their lives—leaving behind homes, careers, communities, and futures in an instant. Many leave their countries on foot, bringing only the possessions they can carry on their backs, holding their children by their hands. To qualify for refugee status, they must prove real persecution and undergo intensive security vetting by eight different agencies. Refugees do not choose the country they resettle in and must begin again wherever they are placed—without language or qualifications, and in debt to the U.S. government for the cost of their flight. 

Refugees are not victims; they are survivors looking for a new future. But without access to education and career pathways, they become trapped in poverty, working multiple low-wage survival jobs. Research shows that, without intervention, refugee employability actually declines for years after arrival. 

Refugee Assistance Alliance exists to change that trajectory, supporting refugees in South Florida during the most critical years after arrival, when isolation and poverty are acute and overwhelming. With our help, refugees navigate out of crisis, learn English, earn U.S. qualifications, secure growth employment and begin to move from survival to building hopeful futures.

Our work is practical, human, and transformative. Refugees gain not only skills and employment, but confidence, connection, community, and a sense of belonging. Our mission is about restoring agency and creating the conditions for vulnerable people to imagine—and achieve—a future again.

Refugee Fact Sheet