(On the photo, from l to r: Khaola Al Rifai (IRMO), Frederik Smets (UNHCR) and Rica Ciriaco (M&O))
The United Nations want to increase the number of refugee students in higher education from 3% to 15% by 2030. To raise the chances of success of these students, extra support is needed. The VUB has joined forces with the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) and four European universities to develop a training programme for university staff. Professors, lecturers and students lined up to put the training to the test: a fine example of international cooperation and commitment!
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The training programme is named UNISTAR, which stands for 'UNIversity STAff for Refugees'. It consists of an online course aimed at training and guiding university staff on how to work with refugee students, taking into account their specific psycho-social concerns and needs. The programme is a textbook example of a successful international cooperation between several European universities and the UN Refugee Agency UNHCR.
We spoke about the partnership with Khaola Al Rifai of the VUB International Relations Office (IRMO), Rica Ciriaco of People & Organisation and Education Officer Frederik Smets of UNHCR.
Khaola: "UNISTAR has a long history. I took over the project from Marie Aurousseau. My predecessor in the International Relations Office met Frederik Smets during a VUB event in the Flagey building on the role of higher education institutions in refugee and migration politics. That was in 2017, and Frederik was one of the speakers there. During their conversation, Frederik told Marie about the toolkit that UNHCR had developed, aimed at sensitising primary and secondary school teachers to the needs of refugee children. They quickly saw the potential of upgrading this idea of teacher training to the reality of higher education."
Frederik: "Afterwards, Marie and I tried to put together the Erasmus+ puzzle for funding, but we missed the deadline."
Khaola: "Meanwhile, Marie had approached Rica for help in providing and setting up training. People & Organisation has a lot of expertise in this domain. They know how many hours a new training course should take and how it should be organised. We then transformed the idea into another proposal that focused more on the need for a policy change in order to facilitate the integration of refugees within higher education. We kept the idea of a mix of an online toolkit with physical presence at the training, which was already in the first proposal. But that second proposal did not get finished in time either. Then, in a record time of 20 days, once again, we adapted the project and submitted it as a strategic partnership action.”
One that involved other universities then?
Khaola: "Indeed. That is a requirement of a strategic partnership. You cannot submit a proposal as a single university in that framework."
How was it decided which universities should be involved? On what criteria was the decision based?
Khaola: "The choice was based on their special expertise. Each university focuses on a different aspect of the training. Universidad Alcala from Spain, for example, is in charge of analysing the data and the feedback we will get from the training. Vilnius University (Lithuania) is subjecting the project to various tests in order to adjust it later, if necessary. The Hogeschool Utrecht (Netherlands) is a world expert in online learning, and the Alice Salomon University of Applied Sciences (Germany) is known for its expertise in the social field, public health and child education. VUB, as one of the first universities in Europe with a refugee welcome programme, brings in a lot of experience with refugee students. That is not the case for all UNISTAR universities. The universities of Vilnius and Alcala do not even have refugee students. But in this case, that is a good thing. In order to properly assess the added value of our programme, it is important to also test it at universities that do not yet have experience with refugee students."
And what is UNHCR's contribution to the programme?
Frederik: "Our contribution is part of our effort to provide maximum support to refugees in their access to education, both in primary and secondary schools and in universities and colleges. We at UNHCR have a strategic ambition to increase the number of refugee students in higher education worldwide from the current 3% to 15% by 2030. Above all, we want to see those students succeed, which means getting a degree. This requires an educational framework that takes into account their specific needs and requirements. This is exactly what UNISTAR aims for. As mentioned, we have a lot of experience in training primary and secondary school teachers. We learned that such training is very important to prevent school drop-out among refugee pupils, who are already at great risk of dropping out for various socio-economic reasons. As a rule, children who are old enough are immediately enrolled in secondary education upon arrival in Europe. That gives them a relatively higher chance of going on to higher education than if they had stayed in difficult circumstances in an unsafe situation. The children who arrived in Europe in 2015-2016 are now approaching the age to start a higher education. A conservative estimate, based on the asylum figures of recent years for the whole of Europe, easily amounts to hundreds of thousands of potential refugee students who will potentially enter higher education. That is why UNISTAR is of such importance to us: it completes the entire education chain.”
Khaola: "For the VUB, the first objective of the programme is not to increase the number of refugee students, at least not in a direct way. But it is true that refugee students who have a good experience and feel welcome at our university are good recruiters. They pass it on to friends and family.”
How many volunteers have already signed up for UNISTAR?
Ricay: "A lot! We were aiming for 50 volunteers, but we already have 86 of them, divided among the different universities. Each university made a real effort to invite people who were relevant to the testing phase. Needless to say, we are very happy with the many positive reactions."
85 volunteers volunteered to test the training programme
Khaola: "The success is all the more remarkable because the programme is quite demanding.”
Frederik: "That is true. Each module - and there are four of them – requires one or two days to finish. I am saying this based on the experience I had with similar programmes in secondary education in which I took part. For UNISTAR, I will be leading the first module and will also moderate the online sessions. The advantage of a blended learning project like UNISTAR is that you can spread it out over several weeks. This gives participants the flexibility to interact or study the material when they want to and feel like it: during lunch, for example, or in between classes. That's also why I will be checking the message boards in the morning and in the evening."
What is the profile of the volunteers?
Khaola: "Very diverse. Quite a few professors and lecturers, which was a pleasant surprise. I expected that they wouldn’t have the time for it, but no. As far as the VUB is concerned, there are also many people from VUB Study Guidance and from our international student desks. Rica has also contacted many of our services, such as BRUCC, our centre for psychological services, which also resulted in volunteers. A surprising number of students have volunteered as well, from the VUBuddies, the student associations and the student council. Even refugee students are taking part in the lessons. That's a good thing, because after all it's all about them and they have to agree with what's being said in the course."
Professors and lecturers as well as students applied as volunteers.
Frederik: "I also took the liberty of enrolling several colleagues from the national departments of UNHCR, because they too can learn a lot from UNISTAR."
What will happen to the project after it is completed?
Khaola: "Nothing has been decided yet. But we are already looking at how we can extend the project. Considering the huge interest, I think there is definitely a need for this. If you ask me, it will not stop with this first edition."
Frederik: "Of course, we definitely want UNISTAR to have a sequel. But what is important for now, is that we will have a record of the lessons learned: once all the modules have been completed and the feedback has been processed, we will make a final version of the training. Then itcan be translated for use in other circumstances. Other universities will be able to apply the programme as well, for a very limited licence fee. So sustainability is already ingrained."