The Center for Refugee and Immigrant Success: Management for a Better World

In the Summer of 2016, a team of Management Department researchers began a project researching the employment-related dynamics of refugee resettlement. Their subsequent research, which included close collaboration and data collection with three of Northeast Ohio’s largest refugee assistance organizations, demonstrated that:

• In the United States, employment is central to refugees' self-sufficiency.
• Refugees and immigrants experience many types of job-search adversity.
• Some adversity stems from unmet expectations and psychological contract violations.
• Refugees get some instrumental support, yet need and seek social support elsewhere.
• Underemployment coincides with job dissatisfaction and disillusionment.

These findings appeared in an article titled, “Survival, expectations, and employment: An inquiry of refugees and immigrants to the United States,” which published in the Journal of Vocational Behavior in 2017.

Given the team’s passion for the topic and the relationships they built with Cleveland-area organizations through their research, they decided in the Summer of 2018 to title their efforts, “Collaborative for Refugee and Immigrant Success: Management for a Better World.”

Shortly thereafter, the "Collaborative" became the Center for Refugee and Immigrant Success. To date, Cleveland State University has supported research by the CRIS team with more than $60,000 in grants and a Fulbright Scholarship to study the refugee crisis in Spain. Their work continues with partner organizations in Northeast Ohio and beyond.