Northpine Foundation is pleased to announce our joint investment in Embark, a refugee sponsorship platform that streamlines the private sponsorship process and makes it more efficient and effective.

Embark was developed by IslamicFamily (IFSSA) and has already been used to submit around 200 refugee sponsorship applications, saving the organization 2000+ hours of administrative work. The platform uses thoughtful design, a sponsor centered approach, accessible language and video content to increase accessibility and creates workflows and automation to reduce repetitiveness and make the process less bureaucratic.

IslamicFamily were the winners of a design sprint hosted by The World Education Services (WES) Mariam Assefa Fund, the Northpine Foundation and the Canadian Refugee Sponsorship Agreement Holders (SAH) Association, to develop innovative concepts that will increase private refugee sponsorship capacity.

This investment will be used to scale Embark beyond IslamicFamily to other Sponsorship Agreement Holders (SAHs), allowing them to better meet allocations and redirect resources to providing direct support to refugees.

“Canada’s private sponsorship program is close to my heart as my own family arrived here through private sponsorship over 30 years ago,” said Bayan Khatib, Impact Director – Refugees at the Northpine Foundation. “I’m thrilled to be able to support a solution to making the difficult process of private sponsorship easier for the amazing people who put so much time and effort into making it happen.”

“Northpine is bringing life to the innovation desert in refugee sponsorship. Although we have remarkable ingenuity at our frontlines, the systems we use to support sponsorship are tedious, and not designed around trauma, education, transparency, or reducing frontline worker burnout,” said Omar Yaqub of IslamicFamily. “Northpine’s investment will allow Embark to scale – meaning under resourced organizations will be able to better support those they sponsor & ultimately help more families heal and become whole.”

Embark has already garnered significant interest from SAHs, with 83% of Canada’s top 120 Sponsorship Agreement Holders expressing interest in adopting the platform. The investment from Northpine Foundation will help Embark meet this demand and make a difference in the lives of refugees across Canada.

Learn more about Islamic Family & Social Services Association (IFSSA) here and see the Northpine Foundation’s investments in Refugee support initiatives here.