Peer-led active citizenship for refugee women in Amsterdam

Why WISE

Refugee women's contact with Dutch society often stays shallow and rarely turns into real relationships.

Source: SCP, 2021

Municipal guidance often starts with the man, so women can drop out of view.

Source: KIS, 2018

The plan

Five refugee women will be employed as paid peer leaders.

They will bring 60 to 80 women together in weekly groups.

The groups will connect them to organisations and institutions in Amsterdam.

Co-designed: the programme will be shaped together with refugee women, using design thinking.

Participants will be matched with peer leaders using FSAI, a peer-matching tool developed as a separate CBB project.

Planned timeline

PHASE 1 · MONTHS 1 TO 4

Co-design and training

PHASE 2 · MONTHS 5 TO 10

Community activation

PHASE 3 · MONTHS 11 TO 12

Consolidation

A shared knowledge base will be published, and the network will continue on a voluntary basis.

Month 1 begins once funding is confirmed.

The peer leaders

Five peer leaders will be recruited from refugee communities.

They will work in teams of 2 to 3 per session.

PLANNED LANGUAGE MIX

Arabic

Ukrainian

Tigrinya

Turkish

The gap we are addressing

Refugee and asylum seeker women in Amsterdam face compounding barriers that existing support systems are not built to resolve. Limited professional networks, exclusion from civic life, and a labour market that consistently places people below their actual qualifications create a cycle that is difficult to break alone.

Read our occupational downgrading research →

work in roles below
their qualifications

0 %

Women to reach
in 12 months

0 +

What Project WISE is building

Project WISE is a peer-led empowerment programme for refugee and asylum seeker women in Amsterdam. It is designed around a simple but important principle: real change happens when people are active participants in solutions, not passive recipients of services.

The programme supports women across four areas:

Civic participation

engaging with local institutions, municipalities, and community organisations

Social inclusion

building networks and reducing isolation

Education and skills

language support, digital literacy, and career orientation

Employment pathways

job readiness, internships, and referrals

A peer leadership network of high-skilled refugee women will be recruited, trained, and employed part-time to guide and mentor other participants. Over 12 months, the programme aims to reach at least 250 women in Amsterdam.

Where we are now

Project WISE is currently in its validation phase. We are testing our approach with a small group of participants, refining the model in collaboration with community members and partners, and building the institutional foundations needed to scale responsibly.

We are actively seeking funding partners and foundations that share our belief that meaningful integration starts with empowerment.

Our Partners

Support Project WISE

We are looking to collaborate with funders, academic institutions, community organisations, and public bodies interested in early-stage social innovation.