By Laura Esnaola
Today, Care.com is standing with Tent Partnership for Refugees — a non-profit organization founded by Chobani CEO Hamdi Ulukaya that is mobilizing the private sector to improve the lives and livelihoods of men, women, and children forcibly displaced from their home countries — to announce a renewal and expansion of our commitment to refugees.
Like many of the other companies joining us during the United Nations General Assembly, we knew we had to step up when the refugee crisis hit Europe. We did not see refugees as a burden, but instead as a catalyst for growth and a chance to help ease Europe´s caregiver shortage. We are a tech company and we care. So we turned to Care.com’s mission — to be there for families — and to our entrepreneurial spirit to find a solution.
In 2017, we joined forces with the International Rescue Committee (IRC) Germany to launch Care Forward, a unique skills-training program designed to specifically focus on the needs of refugee women, help them identify and realize their potential and help them embark on career pathways in the care industry. The program both accelerates participants’ integration in Germany and strengthens their economic stability.
Why does it matter?
Germany alone faces a projected shortage of more than 500,000 nurses and 300,000 child care workers — gaps that, left unfilled, will put a heavier burden on German women to care for their children and aging parents. Some 85 percent of the 500,000 refugee women who have arrived in Germany since 2012 say they expect to work. They are highly motivated to support their families and lead self-sufficient lives, but so far, only one in four women has gained access to state funded job training. There are a number of factors at work here, from insufficient language skills, to a lack of childcare, to discrimination — or some combination of these. Our program is committed to giving these women the guidance they need to get started on a path toward integration and self-sufficiency.
But even if we train these women, will families and institutions be ready to hire them? We conducted a survey and found that most families, even refugee-friendly ones, are not ready to hire a refugee caregiver. So, with the financial support of the Rockefeller Foundation, we launched an awareness campaign to help individuals identify and break down their unconscious bias towards hiring refugees. It’s working: Families who saw our campaign are more willing to hire a refugee.
Over the past year, Care Forward has trained almost 200 women and reached over 300,000 people through our awareness campaigns. As anti-immigration movements gain momentum around the world, we need to find scalable solutions to assist refugee women find jobs and succeed.
Today, we are announcing Care.com’s commitment to train 1,000 women by 2020, to help them enter the workforce, and to continue to host awareness campaigns to help break down anti-refugee bias. Over the next year, we hope to prove that our program can be a global model — a catalyst to reach millions of women, and help governments address the growing care crisis over the next decade.
By seeing these devoted mothers and willing workers as a solution for the care crisis we are already facing, we secure the futures of not only refugee women but the German women who, lacking care options, may otherwise opt out of work and put their own and their families´ futures at risk.
At Care.com, we stand by refugee women, and we stand by their families. That´s why it matters—and that´s why we care.
Laura Esnaola is Managing Director of Care.com Europe.
