Arelis Valerio knows firsthand the frustration immigrants feel when they move to the United States with professional degrees and years of experience, only to find themselves working in factories, cleaning houses or driving trucks.
She practiced medicine for 20 years in the Dominican Republic before moving to Providence in 1997. Valerio worked for the U.S. Postal Service when she arrived, more worried about paying the rent than about getting back into her field.
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But as time passed, she started volunteering at various places, such as Progreso Latino, the Center for Hispanic Policy and Advocacy, the Urban League of Rhode Island, Edmund W. Flynn Elementary School and Rhode Island Hospital. She took English classes at Dorcas Place. And eventually, she got partial recognition for her medical credentials and earned certification as an asthma educator. She now coordinates community asthma programs at Hasbro Children’s Hospital.
Valerio said she was able to find her own way through the system, but she wants to help others find their way more easily.
So, five months ago, she started the R.I. Association of Latino Professionals with partner Antonio Aquino. It already has 125 members.
The group’s mission is to provide information to professionals from other countries who want to acquire a license or qualifications to work in their field in the United States, Valerio said.
“When I moved here, I didn’t have any orientation,” she said.
Valerio said the initial challenge professionals face upon moving here is overcoming frustration, because “you had the experience in your country.”
“You had the respect,” she said. “When you move here, you have nothing.”
Another early challenge is the language barrier. Aquino had practiced law for 14 years in the Dominican Republic before moving to the United States two years ago. But before he can become a working attorney here, he will have to become proficient in English.
After that, he will need to learn how to practice law in the United States, because it is different than in the Dominican Republic, he said. In the meantime, he’s working for the New England Dominican Social Service Churches in Providence.
Valerio said their new group will connect members to English classes around the state, because they’ll need the language to earn their credentials and practice their professions. But money continues to be a problem, Aquino said, because many immigrants earn $7 or less per hour, working in factories.
Another goal of the association, he said, is to raise awareness of the fact that there are many doctors, nurses, lawyers, human resource professionals, teachers, professors and engineers who come from other countries. They are living in the United States but not working in their fields because they lack the language skills and the U.S. licenses.
“The professional association wants to let people know the great resources which come with professionals from other countries,” Aquino said.
Adriana Dawson, a regional director for the R.I. Small Business Development Center, said it’s not unusual, at SBDC workshops conducted in Spanish, to have half the participants be foreign professionals now “working in minimum-wage jobs.”
One man whom Dawson met had been a marketing professor in Colombia but now drives trucks for a living. Dawson said he impressed her so much, she asked him to develop a curriculum and teach some of the SBDC’s workshops, which he’s been doing for four years now.
Though helping individuals to find work in their professions is outside the SBDC’s scope, Dawson said she is happy to hear there is an organization focusing specifically on that issue.
Learning English is a huge barrier for immigrants, Dawson said. But helping them “navigate the system” is just as important, because “at some point, there is a level of frustration that sets in.” By the time they master English, they may have settled into a new career.
That’s what happened to Valerio. She’s not working as a doctor, but she’s come to love her job as an asthma educator, “because every year, I touch the lives of 700 or 800 children.”
As an immigrant and a mother, she can also relate well to the families she helps, she said. And she’s proud to be the state’s first Latina to be certified as an asthma educator.
Valerio said she encourages all 125 members of the association to volunteer, especially in their fields, because that will help prepare them to enter the work force.
“It gives them experience,” she said. “They learn about how things work here.”
But perhaps more important is the networking that takes place, Valerio said. They get to know people who might later become a personal reference and write recommendation letters.
“It’s very difficult,” Aquino said of getting licensed in a profession here. “But it’s not impossible.”
