Integreat

While fleeing, refugees are surrounded by rumors and false information. Social inclusion, all the more, is dependent on information that is provided via sharing through trusted authorities who assist with navigating the information landscape through visual sources. With Integreat we’ve built a scalable mobile platform for municipalities to address refugees directly in their own language. The local content is updated decentrally by currently around 500 trustworthy authorities to ensure information correctness. This not only significantly improves the information transparency for refugees, but also brings municipalities one step closer to the goal of becoming a smart city. Integreat is built in Germany, but designed for the whole world. Thanks to the decentralized structure through direct cooperation with the municipalities, we not only dramatically increase the credibility of the information, but also enable almost unlimited scalability.

According to the UNHCR, there were 67.3 million refugees and 3.5 million asylum-seekers worldwide at the end of 2018. In Germany alone, more than 1.5 million have applied for asylum since 2015, reports the German Federal Office for Migration and Refugees. The integration of these refugees in the country of arrival is a difficult process. It takes between 7 and 10 years from the arrival to their integration into the labour market. Canadian studies have shown that in this integration phase a lack of information increases social exclusion. Without access to relevant information, social inclusion is extremely difficult in relation to the participation in educational and cultural activities. The problem of obtaining information is not so much that information is not available at all as that it is not accessible to the heterogeneous target group of refugees. Information is often too complex, not centralised, not trustworthy and not accessible without barriers. This lack of information slows down the process of integration tremendously. An additional problem is that in many regional authorities it is not transparent what offers there are for refugees because they are decentralised organised: by individuals, charity organisations, voluntary initiatives, and of course by the government.

Refugees come from different countries, speak various languages and have all different levels of education. Often, the only thing they have in common is that they flee poverty, war, violence or climate catastrophes and are new to a country. Regional authorities do not reach all of the refugees in their area. They have difficulties keeping their information materials up to date and managing translations. In order to achieve our main goal of reducing information poverty, we need to know both the needs of refugees and those of the authorities.That is why our main workplace is in a counselling centre for asylum seekers, so that we never lose touch with their problems. We organise regularly feedback workshops with refugees in order to integrate their opinions directly into our development and we offer internships without previous training. With the authorities we work together as direct partners. In order to meet the needs of both target groups, we have developed a platform whose content can be easily maintained by the municipalities and which at the same time provides refugees with trustworthy and relevant information in their native language.

Digital technologies nowadays play an important role for new immigrants as the smartphone oftentimes is the only way to communicate with family and friends as well as to gather information during the flight and afterwards. Integreat builds a digital bridge between the individuals' smartphone and local municipalities to facilitate integration processes. The first step for integration is access to information that is relevant to the target group and applicable to everyday life. Therefore, it needs to be multilingual, offline available and locally specific. In close cooperation with local municipalities Integreat can fulfill these criteria. By providing an easy-to-use digital information platform as well as the technological support municipalities are enabled to communicate all relevant information to newcomers through a channel that is familiar and easily accessible to the newcomers. Integreat is an information platform that includes an app and website tailored to the specific needs of both newcomers as the users of the app and municipal administrations as the content providers. We are convinced to add value to the process of integration by facilitating the flow of information from municipalities to newcomers using the medium most natural to them – the smartphone. However, we are aware that there are some newcomers without smartphones. In this case the newcomers as well as counsellors can access all information through our web app on a computer and print out relevant topics easily through the PDF export function. The Web App also has the advantage that multilingual content on local topics can be indexed by the search engines. For example, information on local public transport can be found in Arabic in the regions that use the Integreat-platform. Content is managed by the municipalities. We combine the app (frontend) with an intuitive content management system (backend). When a municipality decides to use Integreat they get their own instance within the app to fill with locally relevant information. The whole process is supported by the experienced Integreat team through an advanced workshop concept and annual nationwide conferences with the opportunity to exchange experiences and best practices with other municipalities. The Integreat team consists mainly of developers, account managers and social impact experts. In addition, there are many volunteers who are passionate about the topic.

Integreat does not only enable newcomers gaining the security to make informed decisions but also provide a transparent platform to municipalities for all their integration efforts. Most importantly, we absolutely respect data privacy of Integreat’s users which makes us a reliable partner. Integreat has been developed under an irreversible open source licence (http://github.com/integreat) and has convinced all contributing municipalities to publish their content under a creative commons licence. This concept of collaborative work has so far been an absolute novelty for local authorities. The community we are building in this way not only improves integration work throughout Germany through synergy effects, it also saves taxpayers' money for all German residents. And the most important thing: transmitting information alone is not innovative, but depending on the situation it may be pioneering. The Integreat platform provides people with important information on everyday life in the new country, on legislation, on education and job search and on relevant events for connecting with locals. And all this in their own language.

The Integreat platform consists of a mobile multilingual app which is also offline usable and a Web-App which makes it possible for our content to be indexed multilingually on Google. Our solution is open source, free for users and non-profit. The core of the solution is a mobile application (frontend) in combination with an intuitive information management system (backend). If a municipality, county or association decides to use Integreat, they will receive their own space within the mobile app, which, if desired, already contains an information template in several languages, which the municipality can then supplement with local information. To translate content, we currently use a hybrid system consisting of an initial AI-supported translation, corrected by official translation agencies. This allows us to guarantee the high quality required by local authorities. 

We have brought in technology which can be used immediately by beneficiaries and service providers/customers. Smartphones are the most common digital device owned by everyone, including migrants and refugees who can access the information on Integreat. Municipalities, usually way behind in digital advancement, can access the backend via their browser and are able to use this new digital tool with neglectable digital skills. Automated services such as AI translations or interfaces to other digital platforms are implemented by us making them accessible for our users.

The latest refugee movement to Europe and especially Germany starting in 2015 has shown that the integration infrastructure in Germany was in fairly good shape. Integration tasks have been thoughtfully divided between local authorities and NGOs and have grown and developed well over time with Germany always having been an immigration country. However, the latest refugee movement revealed a fatal flaw within the system. Knowledge has remained within each organization or even within the brains of certain experts - not by choice but by lacking means and ways to document and share it. 

Integreat was able to be the connecting tool between all local integration actors achieving not only a transparent overview about all offers open to newcomers but providing it directly to them in an understandable way through a multilingual and intuitively usable information app. Integreat answers the small questions of newcomers immediately and builds a digital bridge to the local integration infrastructure for the complex ones. 

User feedback enables municipalities to adjust either their content on Integreat if it is only missing their or adjust their integration offers if certain demanded support functions are missing. Additionally, Integreat connects all municipalities letting them learn from each other and improving each local integration efforts to match newcomers’ needs. 

These processes are critically analyzed by us and research partners (https://tuerantuer.de/digitalfabrik/publikationen/) and documented yearly in our social impact report (https://integreat-app.de/en/concept/).

In the last few years we have reached 700,000 people seeking information with the Integreat platform. This results from the download figures of our mobile app as well as from the hits on our web app. We expect a total of 1 million people in one year and a total of 2.2 million users in 5 years. We assume that we will be able to register 300,000 more users per year. This is based on the percentage growth that we have been able to record so far through the acquisition of German municipalities. However, these figures may differ depending on how successful our European expansion proceeds.

Our goal is to reduce information poverty in order to reduce inequality of opportunity for newcomers. As more users can benefit from the Integreat Platform, we are preparing an expansion across German borders this year. We hope that this expansion strategy, which is not limited to Europe, will not only improve the situation for refugees, but also have a political influence on public authorities. By addressing the needs of newcomers, they will become more aware and more important to the public. Awareness can also be created by public reporting about Integreat.

International expansion is the major goal within the next year bringing some significant barriers into play we need to overcome. Integration efforts are organized differently in each country. While Austria is a new country with not only the same language as in Germany but also a very similar in its municipal structure and division of integration tasks between local authorities and other organizations most other countries differ heavily. Taking France as an example where the responsibility for integration tasks lies within the local authorities of the 101 ‘departements’ the actual integration tasks are covered within cities without real coordination of needs and solutions. Facing more chaotic or improvised integration efforts in different countries and oftentimes within the same country is certainly a major challenge for the expansion plans of Integreat. 

In the years beyond the next one the organization and management of a hopefully big international network of Integreat implementers becomes a crucial part of our daily business. We will have to evaluate this situation over time whether we will be cooperating with municipalities directly or rather with organizations responsible for the dissemination of local Integreat implementations.

We will combine our knowledge and experience from the expansion phase within Germany with improvisation and adaptation to locally specific needs. In the first phase we will look for well-connected non-governmental organization in the local field of integration who have the capability to coordinate the gathering of all locally specific integration content. Choosing an organization over the local authorities is due to very slow decision processes in these institutions. It is most important to show that the idea of Integreat will work and impact the lives of newcomers positively in other places of this world rather than trying to build cooperations with other municipalities over long distances. Once pilots have shown to be successful there will be a reasonable chance to scale within those countries even with local authorities as the leading coordinator within that region. 

In Germany we were able to convince a department of our pilot city at very early stage of the project while it was still only an idea. After successfully launching a prototype, other municipalities became interested very quickly having seen that the idea was actually working. From then own the idea spread by mostly word-of-mouth which is the effect we aim for in our cross-border expansion plans.

Integreat has grown from a fully volunteering team at the prototyping stage to a professional non-profit where volunteering still remains in its DNA. Currently Integreat employs 11 people adding up to 5 FTEs. In addition to them around 15 volunteers are contributors to the project on a weekly basis. An expert for public relations is brought on board for specific tasks and is the only contractor in this project.

The team behind the Integreat Platform is unique, as absolutely all team members can identify 100% with the project. They all see equal opportunities as one of the most important criteria for a good start in life. They all want to break down prejudices against newcomers. They all are involved in Integreat not only on a salaried basis, but also on a voluntary basis. 

In addition to the immense intrinsic motivation of the employees, Integreat employs people from many different fields. This diversity makes us flexible and innovative. While the majority of the team consists of dedicated developers, there are also intercultural experts, project managers and people with years of experience in integration work. Not to forget the many refugees and migrants who do internships with us or volunteer their time to complement us.

First and foremost, we work closely with the municipalities, as they create the basis for the integration and acceptance of newcomers on site. In addition, we work from the beginning closely with the TU Munich to scientifically legitimize our steps and with the association "Tür an Tür" (door to door). This non-profit association can meanwhile look back on almost 30 years of successful integration work in Augsburg and ensures the important practical relevance.

The wider network includes the German chambers for commerce and industry and the chamber of crafts to whom we built interfaces within Integreat in a collaboration effort enabling our users to directly search for apprenticeships and internships.

Intereat’s key customers currently are German municipalities. They are the main revenue source for the sustainability of the whole project but also the key actor to bring each local Integreat app to life. By implementing Integreat they are enabled to organize the local integration efforts more effectively by establishing a local integration network around Integreat since all integration actors are part of the implementation, identify missing or redundant offers for newcomers and making the integration challenge for newcomers a lot easier. Thinking ahead municipalities using Integreat may attract foreign workers for their region which is a heavy challenge in all German companies and therefore all municipalities as well due to the demographic development. 

Newcomers and integration actors on the operational level (e.g. counsellors and volunteers) are the beneficiaries of the implementation of Integreat. Newcomers are empowered to make own decisions about their next steps based on the extensive information they receive through Integreat resulting in a faster passing through their integration path. Counsellors and volunteers can rely on proven information to support each newcomer they advise and are able to identify other experts to deal with specific challenges. 

In a nutshell both the customers and beneficiaries benefit from the improved efficiency of the local integration work gained by implementing Integreat as the main and easily accessible information source for everyone.

Integreat wants to depend on a semi-commercial business model and to establish a revenue

model in countries where local or national governments are funding integration efforts while

providing Integreat for free to NGOs in those countries where public or private funding are

too limited. In Germany Integreat has been implemented in 53 municipalities of which 45 have signed a cooperation agreement resulting in a total revenue of 115.000 Euros per year leaving a yearly gap of 70.000 Euros to be covered from other funding sources, ideally public or private funding. As a non-profit organization it’s not allowed to make any profits so prices for municipalities cover costs only.

Other countries may not provide a landscape in the field of integration where public money is

(significantly) used to help refugees and established NGOs may lack financial resources to

invest in a digital support tool. In those circumstances refugees shall still profit from Integreat’s impact which is why the project team from Germany would be providing support of any kind for free. In the long run, however, it is of course our goal to have the Integreat platform paid for by all official partners as a software-as-a-service model in order to make the offer available to as many newcomers as possible at the same time as to ensure our long-term existence.

Scaling our integration platform to other countries to support more refugees upon their arrival in a new country and culture holds its own set of challenges. In each country the ‘integration sector’ is organized quite differently as we explained above. This might also result in organizations’ or municipalities’ of other countries belief that a successful solution from Germany would not apply to their country specific characteristics. 

Getting access to Solve’s network’s international organizations with connections to national NGOs working in the field of integration might be the crucial opening for Integreat breaking up information barriers for refugees all over the world. The Andan Foundation states in its mission statement: 'For this reason, we facilitate and propel partnership between the private sector and UN agencies, NGOs, and academic institutions concerned with the refugee cause’. Becoming part of this network and one of these partners would provide Integreat with a foundation to successfully take root in new countries. 

We want to apply the same approach to our international expansion as we did to the national expansion within Germany. The experts are already present within the German municipalities which is why they gather their content with us providing organizational help and connecting local authorities with each other. To put this into an international perspective, there are already very capable NGOs in other countries who know the national integration landscape much better as we ever could from a far. Providing them with Integreat and having them disseminating it nationally would be our ultimate goal.

There are three types of institutions we would like to partner with. Firstly, NGOs with a nationwide structure or network could be the crucial implementation partner for Integreat. Since our solution thrives in a local environment and not with nationwide information which do not really support refugees in their daily struggles one organization with this structure or network could overcome this barrier. Comparing this to Germany, there would have been different organisations with the desired structure such as Caritas, Diakonie or the Red Cross. However, we were able to address the municipalities directly and involve the local employees of the above mentioned organizations on the local implementation level. 

Having this in mind there is another opportunity to scale on a European level. There are different city alliances for integration purposes: European Coalition of Cities Against Racism, Solidarity Cities, the Euro-cities project ‘integrating cities VALUES’ or the Intercultural cities programme. We were able to be introduced to the latter two but may have lacked the backing of influencing advocates. 

The third option would be to scale internationally from the same root as we did in Germany. At the time Integreat was prototyped the project team only consisted of students who got initial support from the Chair for Information Systems from the Technical University in Munich. The chair later became shareholder in our Non-profit and still supports Integreat in various ways both financially and as a research partner. One would not even necessarily need development resources but rather humanities and economics students. 

With over 50 of Germany’s 402 municipalities having already implemented Integreat reaching 700,000 people we are confident that Integreat has proven itself as heavily useful tool to help newcomers including refugees with their challenge coming to a new country with a different culture. Having Integreat designed to be used everywhere in the world with its open source license from the start we have come to the conclusion we also need some men- and womenpower behind it to facilitate the dissemination across German borders. Implementation partners need to be found since we might encounter different settings in each country with different divisions of integration tasks. Different implementation strategies need to be developed for different countries which is why establishing an own department within our organization is inevitable at this point to really give Integreat’s international expansion a real shot a success.