Safia’s family was doing well in Afghanistan. She earned a college degree and taught math at an elementary school in Kabul. Her husband worked as an electrical engineer. They had three children.1
But her husband’s job for 17 years had been with the United States, specifically, USAID. When the Taliban retook control of the Afghan government in 2021, he was placed on a death list, putting his entire family in danger.
Safia’s family eventually found safety in Houston. They are among the 50,500 Afghan refugees who have received the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV), a program created by Congress to help Afghans who worked for the U.S. government abroad.2
While the family is now safe, they are no longer economically secure. Attaining the licensure to work in their professions in the United States will take years. While he works at a lower-level job at an electronics company, the only childcare job she was able to find was as a low-paid helper at a center far from home. Without transportation, it took her too long to get to work.
“I worked one year in pre-K in Afghanistan,” Safia said. “I love working with children.” She found a free childcare training and licensing class at ECDC – Houston Multicultural Center, a nonprofit that supports refugees and immigrants. But under current funding requirements, the course was only open to Afghan refugees who arrived in the United States between 2021 and 2023. Safia arrived in 2024.
Earlene Leverett, a childcare entrepreneur, managed the ECDC childcare training program for 10 years, when it was operated by its affiliate The Alliance for Multicultural Community Services. She has seen the profound difference it can make, not only for refugees but for the broader community, as well.
“Childcare is in crisis,” she said. “Employers are finally realizing the impact that childcare has on the economy. Businesses have jobs, they need employees to fill those jobs, those employees need childcare.”
Leverett estimates that 350 to 400 immigrants graduated from the one-year program during her tenure. Some opened their own childcare businesses, creating options for parents who might not otherwise be able to find care. Most graduates used their licenses to secure employment at existing daycare centers, which often struggle to expand due to staffing shortages.
It’s a win for everyone, Leverett said. Parents who are already home with young children—most often mothers—can “add substantially to the household income.” So, too, can other mothers who need to take jobs outside the home and, in the case of immigrants, may prefer providers with a familiar cultural background. Employers—particularly in industries more heavily reliant on immigrant labor, like hospitality and healthcare—can access the workers they need.
The U.S. government provides some financial assistance to refugees when they first arrive in the country, but that assistance comes to a halt rather quickly. Nonprofits and others step in with language classes and job training with a single purpose: refugees must be able to support themselves within six months.
“In order to speed up this self-sufficiency goal, it takes everyone in the household working,” said Leverett. “When there is no childcare available to the employees then it becomes a huge economic issue.”
Leverett ran her own day care centers in Texas for 16 years. Immigrants, she said, have always filled “a big part of the industry as employees.”
Providing training for refugees like Safia to secure childcare licenses works, she said. “We saw that happen, the difference that it made in the community. Because that was one thing people needed was employment.”
Currently, Safia is working to improve her English and find another affordable program that will help her get a license to open a childcare facility. “I like children, I’m patient with children,” she said. “I really want to improve in this field and work with children.”