Its broad program of services included assistance during the process of immigration and meeting the requirements of immigration laws; legal work on behalf of immigrants at risk for deportation; relief, or temporary financial assistance; medical aid case work; vocational guidance and job placement services; retraining; loans for the establishment of small businesses; special assistance for those with specific professional backgrounds, including rabbis, musicians, and physicians; and social and cultural adjustment to American life.[2]57−58[1]p.
367-368 Building on the resettlement program that had been established under the NCC, the National Refugee Service within its first year expanded the network of cooperating organizations to an additional 200 communities.[1]p.
53 The National Refugee Service also produced reports and statistical studies that documented its own work and the work of cooperating agencies; and disseminated factual information about United States immigration during the period, and the changing character and situation of the refugee population in the United States.
Beginning in late 1941, the National Refugee Service also had a Community Relations department, which took the lead in soliciting the participation of lay leaders in the agency's work by forming a number of advisory committees; oversaw relationships with local communities across the country; and directed promotional mailings and maintained a speakers bureau.
400 Additional outside organizations to which the National Refugee Service granted subventions at various times included: the Committee for the Study of Recent Immigration from Europe; the Committee for Refugee Education; the National Committee on Post-War Immigration Policy; the Common Council for American Unity; the Central Location Index (established in 1944 by six member agencies, including the National Refugee Service, to centralize the work of locating friends and relatives in Europe in response to inquiries); the Westchester County Coordinating Committee for Émigrés; the Jewish Vacation Association (a clearing bureau for summer camps for young people); and the Selfhelp of Émigrés from Central Europe (a volunteer organization that advised and assisted refugees in various ways, including job placement).[2]p.