CII-Funded Initiatives

CLINIC’s Center for Immigrant Integration, or CII, aims to transform and facilitate local community engagement and understanding around immigrant integration through engaging in capacity building efforts alongside non-profits and other entities. The CII works to identify and evaluate models and replicate successful efforts through offering flow-through funding to affiliates.

CLINIC’s Center for Immigrant Integration funds integration-related initiatives across its network. The funding opportunities vary in scope, size, and duration, but the goals are the same — increase purposeful planning for locally-based integration initiatives that center around stated newcomer and receiving community member needs.

Current and past projects are listed below.

 

National Immigrant Empowerment Project (2018-2022)

CLINIC launched the National Immigrant Empowerment Project, or NIEP, as a multi-year project to promote the empowerment of immigrant communities. The NIEP aimed to create permanent positive social change at the local level through immigrant-led grassroots organizing, promoting immigrant leadership and immigrant integration. The CII supported the community organizing efforts of eight selected affiliates. This was a continuation of CLINIC’s earlier NIEP project in the earlier 2000s. CLINIC thanks the Catholic Campaign for Human Development for its generous multi-year donation.

Community Organizer Highlights

Get to know the eight NIEP, community organizers that advocated alongside members of their community and empowered the immigrant community to take the lead in creating long-lasting, positive changes in their cities.

Project Successes

The National Immigrant Empowerment Project concluded in September 2022. CLINIC’s eight affiliates involved achieved a great deal during this time, despite working during the COVID-19 pandemic. This graphic highlights a few of the many successes of NIEP.

 

Facilitating Local Models of Welcoming Communities (2014 – present)

Since 2014, the Facilitating Local Models of Welcoming Communities program has allowed CLINIC to partner with affiliates on increasing the number and quality of the programs that foster immigrant integration in their local community. These immigrant integration partner programs had great success in planning developing integration programming that had the community’s support and buy-in, ultimately making the initiatives more successful.

One of the primary tools used to accomplish project goals are three Immigrant Integration Surveys, which are designed to provide a multi-perspective picture of immigrant integration in a community. Data collected from these surveys can help develop local immigrant integration programming that reflects the perspectives of clients, community members, and agency staff. CLINIC thanks SC Ministry for its support for this project.

Past partner programs include:

  • Catholic Charities Archdiocese of Denver (Denver, CO)
  • Catholic Charities of Central Texas (Austin, TX)
  • Catholic Charities of Central Colorado (Colorado Springs, OH)
  • Catholic Charities Diocese of Pueblo (Pueblo, CO)
  • Catholic Charities of Southwestern Ohio (Cincinnati, OH)
  • Colonias Development Council (Las Cruces, NM)
  • Sponsors Organized to Assist Refugees: Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon (Portland, OR)

Immigrant Integration Partner Highlights

Through the years, we highlighted some of the work of our Immigrant Integration Programs.