Celebrating the Launch of Arrival Advisor
The challenge: help newcomers connect to the information they need
According to the 2015 Vancouver Immigrant Survey, 1 in 3 newcomers remain unaware of the services and resources available to them. With 153,000 newcomers living in Metro Vancouver, this means thousands of people haven’t had access to the essential information they need about health care, housing, money, employment, transportation and more. While there are a lot of social services dedicated to newcomers, there has been no central repository for this information.
This reality is what lead PeaceGeeks – along with support from Affinity Bridge and numerous advisory committees comprised of immigrants, refugees, front line workers, community service providers and coordinating organizations – to create an app to improve the settlement experience in BC.
Introducing Arrival Advisor
On Thursday, March 28 we joined the PeaceGeeks team, members of the Provincial Government, and other project stakeholders, to celebrate the official launch of Arrival Advisor – a free, multilingual mobile app that helps immigrants and refugees access the information they need to settle in BC with confidence.
After two years of hard work and collaboration, we are thrilled to see the app finally go live!
Arrival Advisor team members celebrating the launch of the app.
The evening was hosted by PeaceGeeks’ design and marketing genius Cherrie Lam, alongside Mohammed Alsaleh, a Syrian refugee and longtime PeaceGeeks volunteer.
Chief Janice George of the Squamish Nation opened the night with a beautiful speech, followed by heartwarming tales and poetry from refugees who shared the struggles they faced on their journeys to Canada. Each expressed that an app like Arrival Advisor would have made their settlement experience much easier.
The launch event was so rewarding. Hearing from frontline workers and newcomers about how this app is going to make their lives easier and save them time was really inspiring.
Top L-R: The launch party attendees; PeaceGeeks' Cherrie Lam and Mohammed Alsaleh; Bottom L-R: Squamish Chief Janice George; Rebecca Konsolos from LEAP Pecaut Centre for Social Impact; Munifa Ahmed, four-time refugee and PeaceGeeks volunteer.
One woman, Munifa Ahmed – a four-time refugee from Ethiopia – spent her first six months in Canada living in a shelter, trying to figure out how to navigate the system. An app like Arrival Advisor, in her own language, could have helped her find essential services so she could get on her feet sooner.
“The launch event was so rewarding.” says Robin Puga, Affinity Bridge’s Chief Technology Officer. “Hearing from frontline workers and newcomers about how this app is going to make their lives easier and save them time was really inspiring.”
Congratulations to PeaceGeeks and everyone involved in the project. We love to empower organizations that are doing good things in the world, and Arrival Advisor is certainly going to make a difference in the lives of immigrants and refugees settling in BC.
