Services
This section aims to provide information on different services, projects and initiatives aimed at improving asylum seekers and refugees' experience in Sheffield.
- Employment and Training
- Housing
- Education
- Health
- Integration and community development
- Capacity building and volunteering
Employment and Training
The Refugee Integration and Employment Service (RIES) is a scheme to help new refugees integrate themselves into UK society by providing individual support for refugees after their asylum claim has been accepted and helping them to employment and integration as well as by supporting them to settle in and learn more about life in the UK.
REACT (Refugees Extending Awareness through Communication and Training) is a project promoting positive images of refugees and asylum seekers and raising awareness of issues they face. They offer free training and awareness sessions to organisations such as schools, statutory and voluntary sector service providers, employers and community groups.
Housing
Refugee Housing Association in Sheffield runs a project called 'Refugee Move on', which provides self-contained accommodation and support to adult refugees, especially those who would otherwise find it difficult to manage tenancy on their own.
Sheffield City Council (SCC) also provides unfurnished accommodation under a licence agreement to Refugee Housing Association (RHA). Refugee Housing furnishes the properties and sub-lets them to an occupier identified as suitable for this accommodation. It then provides life skills training and support to the occupier until such a time (minimum 12 months) that the occupier is able to manage on their own.
South Yorkshire Housing Association has a substantial stock of both general needs and Care and Supported Housing properties, together with a large development programme.
Education
The Refugee Education & Employment Programme (REEP) provides educational support and guidance to refugees and asylum seekers to ensure that they can play an active part in the social and economic life of the community. REEP offers a safe and welcoming environment where refugees of any nationality can meet and provide mutual support to each other. REEP is a flexible organization and over the years it have developed training and services to meet the changing needs of refugees. On average 500 people per year access the services at REEP, about 90% are from the refugee communities and 10% express their interest in volunteering.
Sheffield Association for the Voluntary Teaching of English (SAVTE) provides voluntary tutors in English that will work with a learner in their home. The service is free, and is particularly useful for those who might have difficulties attending classes at Colleges, or who need to bridge the gap between the knowledge of English they have now, and the starting point of college-based English classes. Through providing opportunities to learn English, SAVTE aims to reduce isolation, encourage participation in local activities and strengthen communities.
The Refugee New Arrivals Project provides a regular sheet listing the ESOL courses available. They also do work with Refugee professionals, and provide employment advice to those newly granted refugee status, as part of the Refugee Integration and Employment Service.
Sheffield College offers English language classes for students who live in the UK and speak a language other than English at home or for refugees or are applying for asylum.
Health
Refugee Care Association provides services such as personalized help to refugees, counseling them on their rights as refugees in England, help individual refugees or families find health services and education.
The Colour of Health aims to provide health information and lifestyle tips primarily for women from a diverse range of cultural and ethnic backgrounds, religious beliefs and traditions living in the UK.
The Agency for Culture and Change Management Sheffield is an international non-governmental organization dedicated to improving the health and well-being of African women. ACCM promotes action to stop traditional practices such as female genital mutilation (FGM) and forced marriages, which violate the human rights of women and girls and increasingly affects their health and well-being.
Integration and community development
According to the latest Integration Strategy for Refugees and Asylum Seekers in Yorkshire and Humber (2009 - 2011) the vision for the region is to be a place of sanctuary for asylum seekers and refugees and to enable them to become full members of society and contribute to all aspects of life in the region.
They plan to do this through fours key startegies:
- Information and Understanding
- Service Delivery
- Co-ordination and Planning
- Participation and Contribution
The strategy uses the European Council on Refugees and Exiles definition of integration: "A long-term two-way process of change, that relates both to the conditions for and the actual participation of refugees in all aspects of life of the country of durable asylum as well as to refugees' own sense of belonging and membership of European societies".
Many communities have developed their own organisations and associations that seek to meet the social and cultural needs of particular populations, as well as their service provision requirements. Some associations were developed by labour migrants before situations in their country of origin prompted refugees to join them in Sheffield, whilst other new organisations were developed in response to the refugee arrivals.
Community organisations, particularly those that are newly constituted, are supported by the community development work of other associations such as the Northern Refugee Centre, whose development programme provides support and training to new groups, assists with fundraising and offers a community space for meetings.
Some community organisations that have been active in Sheffield over the last decade include
- The Yemeni Refugee Association
- The Chilean Sports, Culture and Development Association (CSDA)
- The Sheffield Vietnamese Community Association (SVCA)
- ISRAAC, Somali Hope, and the Somali Community Association.
- Kosovans community groups in Park Hill.
As a result of the government's dispersal policy many other associations were established, including:
- 10 established groups serving the Afghan, Angolan, Cameroonian, Congolese, Eritrean, Ethiopian, Tamil and Zimbabwean populations in Sheffield.
- The Liberians arriving as part of the Gateway Protection Programme in 2004 have also formed their own associations and have been active in organising community activities.
The City of Sanctuary movement, which originated in Sheffield in 2005, offers a chance for individuals and groups to challenge the way the asylum debate is framed in the UK, and it strives for creating creating a culture in which the virtues of welcome and hospitality are valued. (Darling et al. 2010).
Capacity building and volunteering
The Volunteer Centre Sheffield Refugee and Asylum Seeker project helps refugees and asylum seekers to get into worthwhile volunteering opportunities. They also offer help to organisations wanting to involve refugees and asylum seeker volunteers through giving advice and providing practice guidelines and translated resources
They develop and promoting training opportunities for the voluntary and community sector.
Further community organisations can be found in the Contacts section of this guide
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Last Updated: 17/02/10
