Providing insights about NC’s immigrant community

Dr. Krista Perreira is a health economist who studies disparities in health, education, and economic well-being. In collaboration with the Urban Institute, she recently co-led a study funded by the Kate B. Reynolds Foundation to study barriers to access to the safety net for eligible immigrants and mixed-status families in North Carolina and identify promising strategies to increase access.

Dr. Perreira, a faculty fellow at the Carolina Population center and longtime collaborator with Carolina Demography, asked us to assist with demographic analysis and communicating findings to community leaders and funders.

What we did

We identified key data indicators that would paint a picture of North Carolina’s immigration populations overall, and and Hispanic/Latinx, and Asian populations. We then compiled data related to the characteristics of NC’s foreign-born population at state, PUMA, and county-levels.

It’s important to note that this project was a true partnership – we collaborated with community leaders and researchers to prepare the data in a way that followed best practices in community-engaged research.

As part of the work, we created a slide deck that was presented to researchers and community leaders.

Impact

The work that we’ve done is being shared with community leaders and funders across North Carolina.

One participant who attended the presentation said “This is very interesting and helpful information [and we love] that your slide deck focuses on the big data points/facts  It’s really exciting to be able to share the research in real time and we will continue to provide copies to other close partners and grantees.”