NaTakallam ("We Speak" in Arabic)

Your bio:

Born and raised in New York to Lebanese parents, who left their country due to civil war, Sara completed her French baccalaureate at the French school in NY and graduated in psychology from Tufts University in 2006. After a year with NY-based conflict resolution organization Seeds of Peace, she moved to Beirut, where she pursued further studies and work in human rights before transitioning to journalism, covering the Arab Uprisings. In 2012, Sara completed her Master’s in International Affairs at Columbia University, thereafter founding NaTakallam, a social enterprise that hires refugees as online tutors, teachers and translators. Sara has overseen the growth of NaTakallam from a small startup to a globally recognized social enterprise that has provided $800,000+ in self-earned income to refugees, delivering services to 9000+ individuals and organizations worldwide, including Ivy League schools, corporations, UN agencies and major NGOs like the IRC, Save the Children and more.

Project name:

NaTakallam ("We Speak" in Arabic)

One-line project summary:

High-quality curated language services delivered by refugees & displaced persons through the digital economy

Present your project.

Only 1% of 79.5 million refugees worldwide get formally resettled to countries in Europe or North America, given a work permit and chance to restart their lives. Even when resettled to such countries, they face linguistic and cultural barriers to employment.

NaTakallam leverages technology to solve the challenge of millions of highly educated displaced persons with no income access, hiring them as online tutors, teachers, cultural exchange partners and translators, providing customers with high-quality language services that are often a lifeline to those delivering them. 

Our market-based solution elevates humanity by providing:

1. Income to refugees, often cutoff from local labor markets

2. Purpose, dignity, human connection to refugees who’ve been robbed from a future and lost their social network due to war

3. Hope, building bridges and giving refugees a voice, beyond media/political spheres

To date, NaTakallam has disbursed $800,000+ income to 200+ refugees and displaced persons worldwide.

Submit a video.

What specific problem are you solving?

The topic of refugees exploded in 2015, when the photo of 2-year-old Aylan Kurdi’s dead body on the Turkish shores went viral. Since, global displacement (nearly 80 million people) continues to rise. Covid19 has exacerbated the situation, and with climate change, another 150 million people will become refugees by 2050 (World Bank). Millions today have crossed borders yet remain stuck in limbo--in camps, border detention, host countries that don’t give them legal residency, barring them from the local economy with little hope on the horizon. Even when formally resettled, refugees face linguistic or cultural barriers to entering a new labor market, in addition to social isolation and stigmatization. But sadly, poplusism runs high, and the response from influential global actors dwindles at best, neglecting the needs of those fleeing conflict. 

NaTakallam tackles the primary necessity of displaced communities to access an income by leveraging the digital economy and refugees’ language skills, hiring them as online tutors, cultural exchange partners and translators, giving them income, a restored sense of dignity and purpose as well as soft skills. Our work inherently gives conflict-affected individuals a voice that in turn, helps change the narrative around migrants all while showcasing their quality work.

What is your project?

NaTakallam operates virtually, leveraging the era of the "connected refugee" to provide income opportunities to displaced persons, regardless of their location and status, through a commission-based model split between NaTakallam and the refugees delivering the services.

Refugees apply to our organization, and if accepted, earn income by provdiging one of three online services: language classes, translation/interpretation services and cultural exchange programs in schools, universities and companies worldwide. 

While many find and apply to NaTakallam on their own, our robust network of NGO partners and agencies on the ground helps us with recruitment and, based on the country, serve as payment partners to transfer cash payments to refugees. We also use various fintech/online payment solutions to send refugees' monthly income.

After being interviewed and vetted, onboarded tutors and translators are trained by NaTakallam's staff, senior refugee tutors and education consultants based on the programs they will join.

We are not a marketplace and curate programs based on both sides of the market. We match students based on the learners needs, interests, schedules, leveraging technology to systematize the matchmaking/ensure compatability. For school, university and company programs, we offer various themes and options. All of our programs are curated to fit various interests.

Who does your project serve, and in what ways is the project impacting their lives?

As a double-sided market, NaTakallam serves: 

(1) Refugees/displaced persons, providing them with income for delivering online language services. They also gain soft skills, our staff’s support and training, and a rekindled social network from the many students and clients they work with. 

Beyond income, refugees feel a restored sense of dignity and purpose, lifted out of isolation, especially during times of confinement. 

(2) Paying clients who seek high quality language learning, cultural exchange and translation services; including
              (a) individual users who get impactful language practice while directly contributing to their tutor's livelihood
              (b) academics and their students with NaTakallam being a unique addition to their classroom, fostering empathy and building bridges, unlike any other classroom experience
              (c) organizational clients-- NGOs and Corporates who use NaTakallam for language services with impact

With a multicultural team who has grown up learning languages and working in international organizations, we have a solid understanding of the needs of our paying users. As founders from war-torn countries, with economic and political development expertise, we are particularly well-versed to understand refugee needs, the global humanatarian context, and have created upwards mobility for our refugee workers who join our core staff as advisors with lived experience.

Which dimension of The Elevate Prize does your project most closely address?

Explain how your project relates to The Elevate Prize and your selected dimension.

Through NaTakallam, refugees and displaced people, traditionally left behind or marginalized, often seen as a burden and passive recipients of aid, become online tutors and translators, regaining access to income, regardless of location and status, instilling in them a restored sense of dignity and purpose.

On the other end, beyond refugee income, our work dramatically changes people's attitudes towards migrants, creating opportunities for individuals who might never meet a refugee to learn their language, culture, and hear their story, thus building bridges, impacting people's beliefs and attitudes around a topic so often misrepresented in the media and political spheres.  

How did you come up with your project?

I founded NaTakallam in 2015, in the midst of the Syrian war, as a first-generation American, born to Lebanese immigrants, in response to two simultaneously occurring events: the height of the Syrian refugee crisis, highly visible in the media and close to home, as my family left the war in Lebanon in the 80s; and the realization that there were no viable options for me, to practice and learn colloquial Arabic on a budget in New York. With a background in psychology, human rights and conflict resolution, I was highly aware of the danger of leaving so many displaced people in a volatile context, with no hope/future ahead, as is the case for millions of refugees today, who mostly live in dire situations in developing countries.

Seeing how these two problems could combine to create a positive impact, connecting livelihood generation with meaningful language learning and cultural exchange, I founded NaTakallam, originally, as an Arabic language platform for displaced Syrians in Lebanon to teach language learners worldwide. My co-founder, Reza Rahnema shares a similar background with parents who left Iran for France after the Iranian Revolution and a Masters in InternationalSecurity and Economic Development from Sciences Po/ Columbia University.

Why are you passionate about your project?

I grew up in NY because of the civil war taking place in my homeland, Lebanon. The war started in the 1970s and lasted until 1990, varying in its intensity. Every morning, my father would drive me and my brothers to school and share his stories of survival, working with the Red Cross, where he'd tend to the medical needs of his countrymen, children, women and“enemies” alike. The dichotomy of watching my cousins living in violence, growing up in war and uncertainty, and me living in the US struck me. 

Today, millions of refugees are fleeing violence and should have the luck that my family and I had when we were accepted as immigrants to the US in the early 80s. I am passionate about the work I do, because it is not only supporting   people   who’ve   lost   everything   and   are   being   met   with discrimination and rejection by the rest of the world, but it also contributes to building bridges and connecting people from different cultures. While providing livelihoods to refugees is important, ending the root cause of displacement, related to war, is critical too. By creating dialogue and changing the narrative around refugees, NaTakallam operates on multiple levels.

Why are you well-positioned to deliver this project?

As a Lebanese, born and raised in New York, where I studied at a French school, I’ve always been immersed in multilingualism and multiculturalism, passionate about travel and diversity. I connect with individuals from across the world, having lived in the US, Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, Europe and the MiddleEast.

Growing up between Beirut and NY, traveling even during the war’s brief moments of respite, I’ve seen conflict’s destruction on a country and its people, up close and personally, with my Lebanese family and through my work as a journalist, during the Arab Uprisings. I worked in conflict resolution and human rights with organizations like Human Rights Watch and the UN, gaining a solid understanding of the international humanitarian space from within, complementing my experience with academic studies, during my masters’ in International Affairs, a practical degree that helped understand inner workings of major international organizations, from managing budgets to dealing with political risk.

From a leadership perspective, over the years, I led the Arab Associations and Arab-Israeli dialogue groups on campus, students theater groups and council organizations, guiding teams and enrolling them in these activities. Today, I oversee a team of 100+ refugee tutors and translators in 25 different countries and staff across five continents.

Since co-founding NaTakallam, I’ve had the honor of speaking at UN and World Bank gatherings on social entrepreneurship and technology in the refugee space, seeing my role not only as an enterprise leader, but a true advocate for peace, justice and the refugee cause.

Provide an example of your ability to overcome adversity.

In 2014, I graduated from my masters with no job ligned up. I spent a year of unsuccesful job hunting, living off of journalism side gigs, including work on NaTakallam-back then, only an idea.

Months later, I decided to apply the concept to Columbia’s startup competition. I made the second round, but it stopped there. 

In July, after reaching the semifinals in a World Bank competition, NaTakallam launched a pilot study with 10 refugee tutors in Beirut and 20 language learners-- a necessary step to be considered for the winning prize.

But we lost. This came after a year of joblessess, and I felt quite hopeless. In that moment, I chose to flip things around: rather than losing a World Bank competition, I decided to focus on being a semi-finalist as an incredible win-- the top 10 among 200 startups. I chose to continue working on and sharing about NaTakallam on social media, and in a week, out of nowhere, it went viral.

Since that moment, NaTakallam has helped refugees earn $800,000+. In fact, I reapplied to that same competition 2 years later, and won the prize, adequately showing that mindset is everything, and one should never give up.

Describe a past experience that demonstrates your leadership ability.

NaTakallam’s team is mostly from the non-profit space. 

As humanitarians, running an enterprise, we are constantly learning how to proudly enroll others in our work that generates real impact by selling refugee-powered language services. 

Every experience and program helps build my confidence as a spokesperson and salesperson, and I strive to pass it on to my team. 

Recently, our Translation Department had an issue with a client, a company that wasn’t compensating our work fairly and being dismissive of our protocols, processes and pricing. I stepped in, called the client with the department head by my side, explained I could not sit idly while this client spoke unfairly to my colleague. I then handed my colleague the phone to encourage her to find a fair path forward for all, which she successfully did. The client was in fact, in the end, understanding, and my colleauge later shared it was a learning experience as she watched me lead the call but also encourage her to do the final "negotiation."  This was leadership that my colleague said helped her learn, not by “words” but also by action, which she said was fundamental to helping her grow in her role and that skill.

How long have you been working on your project?

Since 2015

Where are you headquartered?

What type of organization is your project?

If you selected Other, please explain here.

NaTakallam is a firm believer in the power of collaboration. Having won smaller prizes, through MIT's Innovate for Refugees and Inclusive Innovation Challenges, we are aware of MIT's incredible network.
We are keen on not reinventing the wheel but leveraging various stakeholders to generate deep sustainable impact with organizations within MITs network, especially INGOs and UN agencies.
We would also look forward to hopefully getting invaluable technical assistance, currently critical to NaTakallam, who as a social enterprises, is at a clear tipping point that requires significant and strategic investment in technology to take things to the next level.