Hearts You Hold is proud to welcome Jewish Family Services of Washtenaw County, Ann Arbor, MI. This organization was founded 26 years ago. The mission of Jewish Family Services is to create solutions, promote dignity and inspire humanity. Their inspiration and challenge is that Refugee Resettlement has become a political issue when it should be a humanitarian issue.
Jewish Family Services has 60 staff members and serves 10,000 clients. When Bridget Clough, Refugee Services Case Manager, was asked about about the challenges of her work, she writes, "As an agency some of our biggest barriers are lack of funding, resources, and language access." She is inspired by the communities involvement and the impact that JFS has.
She shared one of the many success stories that exemplifies their mission in one of their clients. "In 2017 we resettled a single mother and her 4 children. Within our agency programs, we were able to help the family become established in the community including enrolling all her children into school. The children are now thriving and part of extracurricular activities. The mother of this family worked with our employment team, and was able to obtain full time employment as a CNA, obtain her driver’s license, and save money to purchase a vehicle for her family."