Namrata Unadkat - EARN Maryland Program - Asian American Center of Frederick (AACF) – Success Story - Workforce Development and Adult Learning

Namrata Unadkat is a 42 year-old mother of two who arrived in the United States 12 years ago from India. After spending a few years raising her children, she was ready to return to work, but her job search was not yielding results. She heard about training and career services available through the Asian American Center of Frederick (AACF) while at a community job fair. She applied to participate in the AACF’s entry-level training for Community Health Workers (CHW) and was delighted to be accepted into the program. Namrata was highly active during the training and soon began volunteering to help AACF staff and incumbent CHWs. In 2019, she was employed as the CHW Outreach Coordinator for AACF.

In this role, Namrata worked with new CHW cohorts to help them conduct meetings with community members and provide health care information. She was invited to serve as a Maryland Delegate at the National CHW Conference in April 2019. Two months later, she successfully ran the S2M2 Project for Frederick high school students planning to pursue a career in healthcare. Namrata was soon offered the position of AACF Language Resource Specialist with a salary raise. Last year, she finished her CHW training and was hired for a full-time CHW position at the Frederick Health Hospital (FHH). Reflecting on her journey and accomplishments, Namrata says: “I am happy to provide additional income for my family and do the work that I like, and all of this was made possible because of the EARN Maryland grant program.”