Refugee Translation Project 2021: Opening Our Borders and Our Hearts

As the US moves towards a full reopening this summer, we hope that we can also further open our borders, our communities and our hearts to people fleeing war and persecution. Our Opening Our Borders and Our Hearts campaign supports our ongoing work to provide free translation services to people seeking safety in the New York area and beyond. The funds we raise will go towards paying our translators, a growing number of whom are refugees themselves, and towards our efforts to strengthen our organization as we build collaboratively with immigration service providers to meet an unprecedented scope of need in 2021. 

The Refugee Translation Project provides free professional translation support to refugees seeking asylum in the New York metro area and beyond. Our clients have fled war and persecution in Afghanistan, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Eritrea, Guatemala, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, and Turkey. Many of them are in need of medical attention, including small children. All of them deserve to live in peace and safety. Unfortunately, most of these people have lost almost everything they own and cannot afford to pay for the speedy translation of important documents such as medical records, identity papers, personal statements, and other documents necessary for their cases for asylum and relocation. The Refugee Translation Project relieves this financial burden by providing free, professional translation services so that refugees can focus their limited resources on making a new home.

The funds raised during our Opening Our Borders and Our Hearts campaign will pay for translations and support our efforts to secure foundation funding and form new partnerships with refugee support organizations and immigration service providers to expand the scope of our impact. We will carry out these objectives simultaneously. 

We will continue providing translations and add more languages in order to accomodate needs as they arise. 

We will continue to apply to foundations for large grants to secure sustainable funding. 

We will continue to network with refugee support organizations and immigration service providers to expand our network and extend the reach of our impact.

The US Department of State anticipates 300,000 new asylum claims this year despite the Biden Administration's slow efforts to reverse the damaging policies set by his predecessor. The good news is that the US is on course for a full reopening this summer and the current administration is hiring more immigration judges to tackle the enormous backlog of cases, not to mention the anticipated new asylum claims. There is an urgent demand for accurate translated documents, without which refugees cannot share their stories to the court that will decide whether they can stay in the country. We are actively growing our capacity to meet this critical need and we invite you to join us in the process.