AUSTIN'S STORY AND THE FORMATION OF AFRICAN LEADERS COUNCIL (ALC)

I had the opportunity to come to the United States as an immigrant in 2009. Like many immigrants, I was faced with some challenges. Back in Nigeria, I studied Computer Engineering; however, I couldn’t immediately get into the workforce because I had no US experience event though I had a lot of work experience back in Nigeria. To face this challenge, I had to get a student loan with my brother risking it all as co-signer. I enrolled in an IT training school to learn what I knew already and while doing that, I offered to be an unpaid intern and helped with some school projects and external projects they had with the military. I used this to build my resume to land my first contract job at the University of Central Florida technology department. My previous exposure to the English language and my technology background made it a little easier to get started.

After leaving the University of Central Florida technology department, I got a job as an enterprise Storage support engineer, where I got to support corporations on a global scale. I also got to provide technology support work in the education software, healthcare and civil engineering industries.

While I had my work-life going, I also was having encounters with fellow African immigrants from all over the Continent and I never lost the opportunity to learn about their immigrant story and participate in their community activities while getting them also to collaborate with me for a better quality of life here in the state of Florida. While our immigrant stories were slightly different, like I didn’t have to learn English like some had to do because they are from a none English-speaking country, we all had a common experience of being under-served or not served at all with resources to foster integration and build prosperity. We started connecting socially while at the same time, i was learning very fast about the systems and opportunities in the United States that could solve these challenges that we face daily.

We have challenges like available financial resources that are needful for successful integration not being readily accessible to the African immigrant community. Advertised information about government programs to help achieve the American dream but nothing to help us readily access them. Due to my passion of leveling the playing field, many African Immigrants have reached out to me with their questions not only about the issues aforementioned but about others they face in trying to integrate into the American culture. Things like education, legal, business, family, health, etc. I would help them out the best I could with the information I have but this helped a few and the rest couldn’t find resources and support tailored to meet their pain-points and hence gave up. At this point I had to create something outside of my individual effort and because there were no other entities/organizations that completely focused on helping skilled African immigrants integrate and prosper here in Florida. In 2013 I began engaging the community about a broader and more focused platform to face our challenges. In 2015, the African Leaders Council was formed to put more emphasis and effort towards resolving these issues faced by African immigrants in Florida.

How We Got Started
Since we began this work, ALC has put together multiple community events, engagements, collaborations and discussions with programs focused on key issues, such as education, career and job opportunities, Business Development, Immigration, Community involvement, and many other activities regularly reaching individuals in the local community.

ALC advocates for the entire African Immigrant Community – across national origin, tribes, and language – to ensure continuous improvement to immigrants’ quality of life.