Meeting displaced Ukrainians at critical moments, thanks to you!

Alight is coming alongside Ukrainians on their journey, to help them process, re-orient, connect, and navigate their new reality. We’ve been listening and what we’ve learned has helped us build a human-centered response. 

Supporters Like You have stepped up to help Alight design a broad but thoughtful response for families who’ve been impacted by the war in Ukraine. Our team has been on the ground since the end of February, providing support in Poland and Ukraine. And we’ve expanded our efforts for Ukrainian families arriving in the U.S.. See below for more. But first, our team wanted to say ‘THANK YOU’!

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Guiding to Safety

Alight Guides – Ukrainians themselves – meet displaced people online, at border crossings, transit points and service hubs to help them with their next move in Poland and beyond. At Alightguides.org, we recommend the best cities to settle in Poland – currently Krakow, Lublin, and Wroclaw – based on the vetting we’ve done of housing, employment, and other services available to Ukrainians. Then we help families find and book free short-term housing accommodation thanks to amazing support from our partners @Airbnb.org, whether they remain in Poland or continue on.

Thanks to support from our partners at Airbnb.org, Alight Guides have settled thousands of Ukrainian families into 25,555 (and counting) nights of safe, secure Airbnb housing. Andriy Koziy and his family were relieved when they made it to Warsaw, Poland safely. “But there was no possibility to find an apartment,” said Andriy. “Alight found us this amazing and wonderful flat – big, cozy, lots of light and room for the children to play.” 

Doing the Doable

The size of this crisis is massive. But small actions will always make a difference. Alight has been doing the doable since our team hit the ground in February. These are just some of the quick-impact projects we’ve delivered.

• Hundreds of tons in food shipments to groups of displaced in Lviv and Kyiv, to a Ukrainian orphanage,
  to an abandoned animal shelter, and to various groups throughout Poland.
• Truckloads of medicines to Kharkiv and Sumy in Ukraine
• Providing beds, bedding, and clothing at border crossings
• Supporting first responders with wheelchairs, crutches and what they need to do their work

We’ve reached more than 526,000 people by doing the doable. That includes through partnerships with faith-based groups. We know we can make an even bigger impact amplifying the efforts of others, and there are so many actors providing amazing support for Ukrainians. Faith-based groups are already critical providers of warmth and sanctuary, and we’ve been partnering and supporting these groups across Poland to scale our efforts. We’ve worked with the Jewish Community Center in Krakow, Salam Labs in Krakow, Women on the Road and Catholic churches and sisters all over Poland and in 12 countries in Europe.

AID2ART

After housing, financial support and work opportunities are still the biggest needs families face. That’s what our AID2ART initiative is all about – we’re providing $1,000 cash transfers to Ukrainian creative professionals who’ve been dislocated from their livelihoods by war (we’ve already provided 120 transfers, and have a queue of applicants). They’re able to provide for their families for a few months AND gain the space to process their experience and express themselves through artwork they create.

AID2ART artists have already begun creating. And that art will soon be available for purchase to support these artists and Alight’s ongoing work for Ukrainians.

NEXT: GUIDING IN THE U.S.

Building both on our recent resettlement work with Afghan families and our Guiding work in Poland, Alight is launching programming to welcome Ukrainians to the U.S. (beginning in Minnesota) Our guides will provide support directly to Ukrainian families – helping them get settled, access services and information, make connections – as well as supporting and training Americans who’ve signed up to act as sponsors and advocates for newly arrived Ukrainians. Learn more here.