Switchboard Blog

Switchboard’s blog posts offer a wide range of insights on the newcomer experience, including practical tips for navigating the resettlement process, resource lists tailored to community needs, case studies about relevant programs, engaging stories of successful integration, and more.

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Challenging Community Conversations: Three Tips to Build Understanding and Support

Across the resettlement network, staff and partners are noticing an uptick in community questions about newcomers. Many people want clarity about who is arriving and how local services support them. These questions usually stem from uncertainty or limited information. When people have few opportunities to interact with newcomers or understand how resettlement works, conversations can…

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Switchboard’s Emerging Technology team provides training and technical assistance (TTA) on the integration of emerging technologies into resettlement programming, with a current focus on virtual reality (VR). Co-creation is at the heart of this exciting new TTA area. This blog post describes how service providers can use design thinking and the co-creative process through technology…

Describing Experience Effectively The task of documenting international work experience and education on a newcomer’s resume can be daunting, especially when assisting clients who have informal work experience or expertise in a highly technical industry. This blog is Switchboard’s second post related to resume-building. If you are new to this topic, start with our first…

Newcomer women possess valuable skills to contribute to the workforce. Service providers have the unique opportunity to leverage these capabilities and empower newcomer women to actively engage in the workplace. This blog post addresses employment barriers that women face and explores strategies for supporting newcomer women in their career development.  Understanding the Participation Gap  Recent data from…

This blog post, produced by Switchboard with assistance from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), describes how service providers can help clients prevent and report fraud, identifies common scams that often affect refugees and newcomers, and shares resources to build newcomers’ financial literacy. This blog post accompanies Switchboard’s information guide Reporting Scams and Fraud to…

During the holy month of Ramadan, many Muslims fast—that is, refrain from eating or drinking—from sunrise until sundown. This year, Ramadan occurs from March 11 to April 10, 2024.  But many newly arrived Muslims are still learning to navigate the food resources available to them, and some are living in temporary accommodation with limited cooking appliances,…

A refugee’s resettlement journey involves not only acclimating to a new environment, but also learning the intricacies of a new financial system often vastly different from that of their home country. Navigating personal finance is thus a challenging task for many newcomers. Gaining a thorough understanding of the U.S. financial system empowers newcomers with the…