Community foundation funding will be available for the creation of legal service collaboratives that formalize information sharing, networking and legal relationships across both counties. Applicant organizations will have an opportunity to apply for planning or implementation grants. These grants will (1) allow the prioritization of unmet immigrant legal needs and (2) provide possible collaborative members the opportunity to build cross-county connections to assess legal staff capacities to meet difficult immigration matters. A focus of the grant process will be placed on expanding the number of BIA-accredited staff at each organization and/or legal service collaborative. As a result, the community foundation funding will help increase the availability of services and remove some of the barriers to a large population of newcomers as they proceed toward citizenship, legal status and integration into local communities.
2. Adult English Language Acquisition The dramatic growth in immigration to the United States highlights the importance of developing effective strategies to help adult newcomers acquire English skills. English is truly the language of opportunity for today’s immigrants: it opens the door to jobs that can pay family-sustaining wages and allows immigrants to communicate with their neighbors, their children’s teachers, health care providers, landlords and others with whom they must interact on a regular basis. English skills are also crucial to passing the U.S. citizenship exam, which serves as a gateway to full participation in the life of one’s community, including the ability to vote in local, state and federal elections.
The challenge of addressing the language acquisition needs of immigrant families is complicated by 1) the rise in the numbers of undocumented immigrants
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and 2) the shortage of appropriate adult English language acquisition programs. Undocumented immigrants are ineligible for most federally-funded training programs and must depend on a patchwork of local and state-funded adult education programs for English acquisition and vocational training.