Employment

Changemakers: Mursal Hedayat's Chatterbox is transforming refugee employment

Chatterbox connects underutilised talent with the growing demand for language skills

This week’s Changemakers Top 100 special edition features the world’s leading thinkers, shakers and agitators. Throughout the week we’ll be highlighting just a few online.

Hedayat came to the UK from Afghanistan as a refugee in 1994. Her mother, a civil engineer fluent in four languages, struggled to find work in her field after obtaining refugee status.

Hers is not a unique problem. A Deloitte report from 2017 found 38 per cent of Syrian refugees in Britain had a university education, yet the refugee unemployment rate sits at around 70 per cent. Hedayat set up Chatterbox, an organisation connecting underutilised talent with a growing demand for language skills by training and employing displaced people to teach their native language using an online platform, transforming their employment prospects.

wearechatterbox.org

Read the full article in this week's Big Issue.
Find your vendor
Summer music special

Image: YouTube/Chatterbox

Support the Big Issue

For over 30 years, the Big Issue has been committed to ending poverty in the UK. In 2024, our work is needed more than ever. Find out how you can support the Big Issue today.
Vendor martin Hawes

Recommended for you

View all
Train strikes: Rail passengers weigh in as Aslef drivers 'grind services to a halt'
train strikes

Train strikes: Rail passengers weigh in as Aslef drivers 'grind services to a halt'

Labour's workers' rights plan slammed as 'unrecognisable' and a 'betrayal' by Unite union boss
Keir Starmer Labour Levelling Up
Workers' rights

Labour's workers' rights plan slammed as 'unrecognisable' and a 'betrayal' by Unite union boss

May 2024 train strikes: Disruption as Aslef drivers walk out – here's everything you need to know
Train strikes

May 2024 train strikes: Disruption as Aslef drivers walk out – here's everything you need to know

Aslef boss Mick Whelan on train strikes, hope with Labour and why Brits must reject 'politics of envy'
Train strikes

Aslef boss Mick Whelan on train strikes, hope with Labour and why Brits must reject 'politics of envy'

Most Popular

Read All
Renters pay their landlords' buy-to-let mortgages, so they should get a share of the profits
Renters: A mortgage lender's window advertising buy-to-let products
1.

Renters pay their landlords' buy-to-let mortgages, so they should get a share of the profits

Exclusive: Disabled people are 'set up to fail' by the DWP in target-driven disability benefits system, whistleblowers reveal
Pound coins on a piece of paper with disability living allowancve
2.

Exclusive: Disabled people are 'set up to fail' by the DWP in target-driven disability benefits system, whistleblowers reveal

Cost of living payment 2024: Where to get help now the scheme is over
next dwp cost of living payment 2023
3.

Cost of living payment 2024: Where to get help now the scheme is over

Strike dates 2023: From train drivers to NHS doctors, here are the dates to know
4.

Strike dates 2023: From train drivers to NHS doctors, here are the dates to know