Introducing Jacob Gaugert: IISMO’s New Executive Director

By Marisa Tesoro

After more than 8 years serving refugees and immigrants in the Springfield Community, Rebekah Thomas stepped down from her role as the Executive Director of the International Institute of Southwest Missouri (IISMO). During her time at IISMO, she built relationships with community partners and local government officials, led the organization as they resettled hundreds of refugees, and even helped establish CultureFest! 

Jacob Gaugert, former Director of Workforce Solutions, has now taken on the role of leading IISMO. Amidst a flurry of policy changes, Gaugert sees signs of hope in the Springfield community through continued donations, dedicated volunteers, and staff willing to go above and beyond. 

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Gaugert lights up describing a scene he witnessed a couple months after starting with the International Institute of Southwest Missouri (IISMO) more than two years ago.  

He was visiting a nearby housing complex where IISMO had recently resettled Rohingya families as well as refugees from the Central African Republic and Afghanistan. While there, he was speaking with some of the parents when he noticed a bunch of children playing soccer. Children from all different backgrounds who had only arrived 2-3 months earlier were playing and speaking English with one another.  

“Their minds are just like sponges,” he says. “To see how quickly that integration and that involvement [happened] among the clients and in the wider community was so neat to see.”  

Gaugert has experienced many moments like this during his him with IISMO. As the former Manager of Workforce Solutions, he was responsible for overseeing several programs, including Refugee Support Services, Refugee Cash Assistance, and the MO-RTAC Program. Through that experience, he learned the ins and outs of documentation requirements, federal guidelines, and case management. Later, he oversaw additional programs, including Refugee Health Promotion, Refugee School Impact, and Youth Mentoring before being promoted to Director of Workforce Solutions.  

And then came the executive orders and subsequent stop-work order that continue to impact refugee resettlement programs across the country.  

As national resettlement agencies shrank in response to a sudden lack of federal funding, so did their local affiliates. IISMO was not immune. The majority of their staff was furloughed as they went from 24 to four staff members.  

Still, thanks to community partnerships, dedicated volunteers, and generous donations, some staff were able to return, Gaugert being one of them.  

Now, he’s looking to the future and grateful to everyone who has helped fill the gaps along the way, especially to the volunteers who have served over 550-600 hours since April 1, he says.  

And the gratitude doesn’t end there.  

"One of the cool things about this is to have staff members who have been here longer than that I have who can really bring in a lot of their skill set and their experiences with the community,” he says. " I definitely lean on and depend on a lot of them as a really good foundation of what goes on here as well as some more recent hires who are going above and beyond for the sake of our clients.” 

This strong team has been made that much more effective by a recent move to a new office. Now located in the Fairbanks, IISMO is housed among other community organizations, including the Springfield Community Gardens and the Blue House Project.  

Their new location represents this new chapter for IISMO with Gaugert ready to focus on vocational training, recertification, English classes, and immigration services for clients.  

“There’s so much more that we can do, especially now as people get to stability and we’re not having to do so much job placement for first arrivals,” he says. Although they are hiring a Job Developer to help them stay on top of this.  

While the refugee admissions program is paused, they have a chance to think about getting families to the next level rather than just trying to get them to the first level, he says.  

This same optimism carries over to planning for CultureFest this fall.

CultureFest 2024 was the most profitable day C-Street experienced the entire year. The planning team hopes to continue to raise the bar and increase the attendance to 8,000-10,000 people at this year’s event.

‘This is a testament to our partnerships here. We have people in business that are our main partners for that endeavor that see and inherently understand the value of the immigrant community for the economic vitality and the quality of life of our community,” he says. “That’s something that can’t easily be replicated. It’s just a testament to the goodwill and character of so many of the people who support us here.”

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IISMO has invited their partners to their new space for an Open House on June 27.

Also, stay tuned for more updates about Springfield’s CultureFest happening this fall!