Promising Practices in Refugee Education: Synthesis Report

"Whilst the challenges of providing education to the world's refugee children are contextual, multiple and varied, with sustained attention, sufficient political will, and a commitment to creativity and innovation, they can, and must, be overcome."

In March 2017, a joint initiative of Save the Children, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and Pearson set out to identify, document, and promote innovative ways to effectively reach refugee children and young people with quality educational opportunities. Collaborators were brought together by their concern that refugee children are 5 times more likely to be out of school than non-refugee children and that only: 50% have access to primary education; 22% have the chance to attend secondary school; and 1% attend university. This report synthesises the key findings and lessons learned from across more than 20 projects that were selected as part of Promising Practices in Refugee Education. It also features "personal impact stories". (Brief summaries of all the case studies are available in the Annex to the report, and detailed case studies are available on the Promising Practices in Refugee Education website.)

Projects have been grouped under one or more of 6 themes:

1. Equity - example: Relief International's Social Innovation Labs (SIL) is a Jordanian programme of creative hang-out space for adolescents that enables them to propose and implement solutions for social issues in camps. Taking a broad definition of education, with a focus on building competences such as real-life problem-solving, teamwork, and creative trouble-shooting, the SIL approach has provided an equitable platform for young people to apply both formal education skills and those they have developed outside of the school environment.
2. Access - example: Mercy Corps' Learning and Empowerment for Adolescents in their Neighbourhoods (LEARN) aims to meet out-of-school refugee youth in Turkey "where they are at", both in terms of work schedule and isolation. The intervention consists of 4 central components: i) individual instruction, ii) peer groups, iii) tablets with curated software, and iv) caregiver information sessions.
3. Learning - example: In Lebanon, Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) provided non-formal education programming to Syrian refugee and host community children over a 4-year period, using a 3-phased approach. Assessment data following the implementation of Basic Literacy and Numeracy in the South of Lebanon in 2016 showed that 76% of the children who attended classes successfully enrolled in formal public education.
4. Well-being - example: In Doro camp, Maban, South Sudan, and urban Cairo, Egypt, Save the Children's intervention Learning and Well-being in Emergencies (LWiE) aims to improve refugee children's foundational learning, reading, literacy, and social and emotional skills and knowledge, as well as to strengthen teacher capacity to promote social and emotional learning and to engage the local community in activities that promote literacy and well-being outside of the school.
5. Technology - example: The Vodafone Foundation's Instant Network Schools (INS) in Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo), Kenya, South Sudan, and Tanzania are designed to provide a holistic solution to transform an existing classroom into an innovation hub for learning – complete with Internet connectivity, sustainable solar power, an Instant Classroom (digital classroom in-a-box specially created for the INS programme which includes 25 tablets, a laptop, a projector and speaker, a 3G modem and batteries to run the kit for a day of class), localised digital content, and a teacher training programme.
6. System strengthening - example: The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA)'s Education in Emergencies (EiE) programme uses a multi-stranded, integrated approach in Syria that includes introducing safety and security training for parents, teachers, school principals, and students.

The experience of implementing partners led Promising Practices in Refugee Education to identify 10 recommendations, grouped under 3 overarching pillars, meant to improve refugee education policy and practice. In brief, they are:

• Strengthen inclusive national systems - Several of the case studies illustrate the important ways in which non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and civil society organisations (CSOs) can play a critical role in supporting inclusive national systems by providing non-formal education programmes that meet the needs and gaps not met by the government system.
• Commit to predictable multi-year funding for education programming and research in refugee responses.
• Improve collaboration (e.g., between host country governments, donors, United Nations (UN) agencies, NGOs, private sector partners, and community-based organisations) and develop innovative partnerships in order to: deliver accredited learning opportunities, deliver coherence and quality, deliver innovation and new resources, and build the evidence of what works.
• Adopt user-centred design and empowering approaches - "Ultimately, communities understand their needs better than external actors that are often providing the intervention. It is critical to build in time and space to learn about the local setting and to conduct needs assessments that ensure any objectives and interventions are meaningful."
• Establish diverse pathways that meet distinct needs - Providing a school space is not enough; children who have experienced the impact of displacement may need additional assistance such as language support, remedial education and curriculum catch up, psychosocial support, and life skills pertinent to their new environment.
• Use space and infrastructure creatively - For example, a unique feature of the We Love Reading programme in Jordan and Ethiopia is the utilisation of community spaces, such as mosques and churches, which are adapted for non-religious activities. We Love Reading trains adults to read aloud to children in public spaces with relevant and meaningful stories to encourage a love of reading. Local volunteers organise read aloud sessions in public spaces in their neighbourhoods and books are exchanged amongst children. The project is managed and owned by local volunteers who are part of the community, and know when and where is best to read to children.
• Support teachers to help ensure quality - There is, for instance, a need to develop an innovative model that allows refugee and host country teachers to co-teach with specific methods to support the transition from one language to another, allowing for participants to gain literacy skills in both languages.
• Prioritise both learning and well-being - Many of the case studies illustrate the need to do more to ensure that refugee children in schools can begin to heal and learn again.
• Use technology as an enabling tool in pursuit of education outcomes - Technology for learning must use local content which appeals to learners and is easy to use. It must use the appropriate language us local cultural references. Technology by itself will not transform children's learning.
• Build a robust evidence base - "There is clearly a need for a more robust evidence base for education in emergencies and refugee education specifically - and an effective, collaborative approach to achieving this."