About CARA

CARA was established in 1933 by leading British academics and scientists of the day to provide refuge and support for academic colleagues who were being forced by Nazi discrimination and violence to leave Germany and Austria. Sadly, the need to protect science and learning did not end with Hitler’s defeat and our work is as important today as ever.

UK Programme

CARAs UK Programme has 80 years’ experience of supporting refugee academics to access training and employment in higher education.
The programme objective is to help academics with refugee status or the equivalent to rebuild their lives and careers in academia or allied professions, at a level commensurate with their experience and expertise. The UK Programme can provide education, training and employment advice; financial grants; support with extra costs such as travel and child care; and assistance through work placement/shadowing opportunities, mentoring programmes etc.

 Iraq Programme

The Iraq Programme was launched in late 2006 in response to a targeted campaign of assassination and kidnap against Iraq's academics.
The Iraq programme aims to mitigate the catastrophic loss of much of Iraq’s intellectual capital and to support academics in country, and in exile, to enable continued academic engagement. Further, the programme addresses widespread skills deficits and academic isolation, by facilitating engagement across Iraq’s fractured academic community and with the wider regional and international academic communities.

Zimbabwe Programme

The Zimbabwe Programme was launched in 2009, in response to a marked increase in the number of academics fleeing Zimbabwe and reports of the dramatic decline in the quality of the higher education sector.
The Zimbabwe Programme aims to support the resurgence of Zimbabwe’s higher education sector as a beacon in southern Africa, central to which is the mitigation against the permanent and catastrophic loss to Zimbabwe of a major part of its academic capital that has been deprived of an academic future in country.

 

‘to prevent the waste of exceptional abilities exceptionally trained’.

The Vision of CARA’s Founders.