IRC Virginia has long sought and valued feedback about our services. Now, our new Client Voice Initiative (CVI) takes this commitment one important step further:  The program strives to ensure that our refugee families have a voice in developing the resettlement support that they need.

This past year, IRC offices in Richmond and Charlottesville were two of the very first in the entire national IRC network to launch CVI, under the direction of Coordinators Zakia Mudaqiq in Richmond and Jo Olson in Charlottesville. They explain that the program functions as a bridge between the IRC and the individuals and families it has assisted on a daily basis. CVI aims to raise up their voices, allowing the very people who have received our services to strengthen them for those who will receive this support down the road. In reality, each participant in CVI becomes a partner in the work of the IRC in Virginia.

CVI has specific and far-reaching goals: getting constructive feedback marks just the beginning. The main aim is to bring positive changes to programming. In other words, we’re not talking about just collecting data but also about using this data to improve the resettlement experience. Beyond that important goal, CVI enables the IRC to reconnect with individuals and families who no longer receive services. Finally, a long-term aim of the program is to encourage refugees—by helping them use their voices—to find opportunities to become leaders and advocates within the local community.

You might wonder: How does this program actually work? For now, both Richmond and Charlottesville follow a specific course of action that starts with surveys, which refugees complete individually as they exit certain IRC programming and after they receive an array of services. From those individual surveys, CVI moves on to multiple in-person focus groups. Coordinators pull these groups together based on country of origin, language, and, in some cases, gender (depending on country-specific culture). These groups also span a range of arrival periods, with some newer arrivals and some participants who resettled up to 5 years ago. A culminating step involves creating a Refugee Advisory Council that will provide ongoing feedback, support, and guidance in the development of future IRC programming.

One final key aspect of CVI is its commitment to compensating every participant for their time and their input. Our coordinators and staff view this as a way for IRC to truly showcase how much we value and appreciate the feedback and support of the people whom we have served.