Refugee Students in U.S. and Australian Schools: Education Challenges

Introduction

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the number of refugees at the end of 2005 had reached an estimated 8.4 million people worldwide. In Africa, at least half of these refugees are under 18 years of age. Young children have very specific needs in terms of nurture, development, and education. However, the refugee status of this population makes it difficult or impossible to adequately meet these needs. For this reason, many young refugees who enter democratic countries such as the United States and Australia are ill-prepared to enter established education systems.

The purpose of this research is to investigate the plight of refugees in Western schools, with particular focus on examples from the United States and Australia. In addition to the challenge of increasing diversity in schools — diversity relating to culture, language, and learning as a result of immigration and individual differences — schools and teachers are also faced with children arriving as a result of their refugee status. While bringing with them all of the above-mentioned differences, these children are also challenged by disrupted years of schooling and socialization, as well as potential emotional and mental difficulties arising from the experiences they underwent during their flight from their home countries. Many of these students receive little or no education and very limited "normal" socialization as a result.

Hence, multiple facets need to be addressed when considering effective education for these students. A secondary purpose of this research is to investigate and compare strategies for helping these students not only cope with the effects of their former situation, but also obtain an effective education to a degree at which they can become productive citizens in their new society. To fulfill these purposes, a comparison will be made of programs implemented to target older students at the secondary or post-secondary level who have received minimal education in their home countries. These students arrive in their target countries with minimal educational and language abilities, along with potentially significant emotional scars from their experiences as refugees. It is therefore important to address and meet the needs of these students to ensure that they become productive members of their target societies, rather than unnecessary burdens upon the economy.

The significance of this research extends to both the requirements of humanity and the general values of living as citizens of the world and of Western society — including ensuring that all citizens in the democratic world receive the tools they need to pursue their own independence and lives. One of the core values of democratic society today is the right to pursue gainful employment that allows the individual to make a living and contribute to society in a way that fits their talents and interests. To this end, the research aims to investigate effective strategies and make significant suggestions for future directions.

The two countries targeted for this investigation are the United States and Australia. According to the country's Department of Education and Early Childhood Development (2008), there were more than 1,600 refugee students enrolled in government schools in Victoria. It is therefore vital that this demographic and its needs be addressed to ensure that the citizens who arrive in this way become significant contributors to the country's economy. As the new decade progresses, the influx of refugee students into Victorian schools has grown to more than a third of all recently arrived students. This growing population emphasizes the importance of addressing not only their existing plight, but also the educational needs that accompany it.

The same situation exists in the United States, where refugee children below the age of 18 have the right to enter American schools free of charge (Refugee Council USA, 2012). While attempting to be free from discrimination at any level, this policy nonetheless creates an unintended divide between refugee children and those in general public schools. Refugee children have specific needs that will not necessarily be addressed by the general school system.

A case in point emerges from the complaints of refugees themselves, as cited by Garrett (2006, p. 7). While refugees tend to value education for their children highly, they find the system in the United States intensely frustrating. Despite efforts to place their children in what are perceived to be the best schools — even at personal expense — refugee parents become frustrated when their children fall behind. One major obstacle is the language barrier, as is also the case in Australia. Children are placed in the same classrooms as their American peers but fail to understand either the culture or the material, due to both the language and the vast cultural and ethnic differences from those they grew up with. This is a particularly difficult issue for older children. Many who suffer from a sense of displacement cope by joining gangs or engaging in other illegal or harmful activities, since these provide a sense of acceptance they cannot find among the mainstream school population.

On an emotional level, refugee students often come from environments where they were subjected to significant hardships — years in refugee camps, torture and trauma, and loss of family members. This is certainly not an environment conducive to effective schooling. Simply integrating such students into government schools, where programs mainly cater to mainstream children and non-refugee immigrants, is not an effective strategy.

This is a major concern in the United States as well, where authors such as Morse (2006) use the term "newcomers" to group immigrants and refugees in the same status category. Other reports, such as that by Ruiz, Kabler, and Sugarman (2011), often consider both refugees and immigrants together, with only brief distinctions between them. This does not mean there are no merits to the suggestions made; the danger, however, is that refugee students will simply drift through their school years without truly benefiting in the way intended. This is particularly troubling in the case of older students, who by rights should have completed their school career and gone on to choosing careers and universities for themselves.

To address this concern, the Australian government has implemented several programs — from simple ESL to more intensive schooling efforts — to help refugee students become part of Australian society. These are part of the Victorian Government policy known as A Fairer Victoria (Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, 2008, p. 6). The primary aim of this policy is to improve access to services, reduce barriers that students might face, and ensure that all people in the country receive the assistance they need at critical times in their lives. In addition to the numerous programs available for younger children at the primary level, the policy also includes programs to address the transitional needs of older children at the secondary or post-secondary level.

Limitations and Ethical Considerations

One significant factor is that the situation for children from refugee camps is often such that they do not attend a formal school system, even if one is offered at the camp. Furthermore, secondary — and much less tertiary — education is seldom available at such sites. Hence, children who enter the government education system are ill-prepared to face the rigors of an organized classroom, such as concentrating for extended periods, socializing with classmates, and even the simple practice of sitting still and listening (Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, 2008, p. 9).

For older learners, the A Fairer Victoria policy includes programs such as the Victorian Certificate of Applied Learning (VCAL). This program caters specifically to refugee young people aged 15 or older whose schooling has been severely disrupted (Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, 2008, p. 20). As an alternative to the standard educational pathway followed by students to complete a Victorian Certificate of Education, VCAL offers the opportunity to help students establish the skills they need to enter standard tertiary education and ultimately become gainfully employed. Specifically, several schools have established transitional VCAL programs for their refugee students. These programs were implemented to target both English proficiency and the level of educational disruption each group of students faced; students at similar levels in both categories were grouped together to ensure optimal benefits for all participants.

When evaluated on a practical level, it was found that communicating the benefits of the program to refugee communities was critical to success. Parents in these communities needed to understand that the program offers a pathway for their children toward success and employment, as well as an effective future in the country. Specifically, the program offers a "hands-on" learning opportunity for students in Years 11 and 12 of their secondary schooling. While it is a recognized senior qualification, its focus is on practical learning, helping students to enter apprenticeships, training at TAFE, or the workforce after completing their schooling. The program is sufficiently flexible to allow students to design study programs that suit their needs and interests on a very practical level, creating a platform to help young people with a severe shortage of educational background nevertheless enter the Australian workforce and become productive citizens.

In the United States, the LEAP English Academy in St. Paul offers educational services to immigrant and refugee students who entered school after age 15 and have been in the United States for less than two years. Similar to the program in Australia, these students have had little opportunity to gain the language and skills necessary to graduate from a traditional institution. The Academy offers a four-year program to help students develop English proficiency, obtain a diploma, and prepare for vocational training, work, or college (Morse, 2006).

In a study of this sort — where an entire community and its education system is compared to another — there will be some limitations. One of these is the scope of the study. To make the findings clearer and more manageable, two schools at the secondary level were chosen, both offering programs specifically for refugee students of secondary school age with very little formal educational background. All other levels of education for this sector have therefore been excluded from the study. The limitations include, then, the number of schools being compared, the age group of the students, the refugee status of the students, and the countries included in the investigation. Different countries might be compared, for example, or similar programs in developing but democratic countries. Larger studies with more scope might also provide a wider range of results for further clarity on the issue of refugee students and their needs.

Discrimination and Language Barriers

Ethical considerations are always an important component of academic study. In this study particularly, it is important to protect the identity of all individuals involved, and especially those with refugee status. Hence, all names and specific identities should be kept completely confidential. In the case of interviews or questionnaires, such information should be kept confidential as well. Since the scope of this study does not call for contact with any specific students or teachers, this consideration is currently somewhat limited in practical relevance. However, it is an important consideration in similar future studies where the scale of investigation might be larger or more personally involved with persons at certain institutions. In general, the privacy and confidentiality rights of individuals are at the core of ethical considerations when involving persons in academic study.

In a more theoretical study like the current document, ethical considerations may also be applied to the topic itself. In terms of the refugee situation worldwide, and particularly in the schools setting, the issue of discrimination remains prominent. Students from refugee backgrounds may be discriminated against in terms of their ethnic heritage, language, or educational background. Hence, when implementing programs to help such students achieve their goals in society, it is important to put support structures in place to ensure that refugees do not experience further discrimination beyond what they have already endured.

The state of Victoria has several measures in place to address discrimination, one of the most important being its Guidelines for Managing Cultural and Linguistic Diversity in Schools (Department of Education, Employment, and Training, 2001). According to this document, the guidelines were necessitated by the sheer expanse of diversity in the state. Victoria has representatives from 208 countries and speakers of 151 languages among its citizens, with some 20% of residents coming from countries where a language other than English dominates. This means a significant number of non-first-language speakers in both the workplace and schools — both settings that can become breeding grounds for discrimination if guidelines are not in place or enforced.

In addition to immigrants and Aboriginal peoples, refugees often originate from countries where English is not their first language. This creates for them not only a challenge in terms of education, but also potential discrimination. Teachers should therefore be careful that enrolling students in specifically tailored programs such as the VCAL does not create further grounds for discrimination. Indeed, discrimination at school carries significant dangers that can undermine the ultimate success of such students. On the one hand, it can damage the self-respect that schooling seeks to provide. On the other, discrimination at school all too easily translates into discrimination in the workplace. A hostile work environment for refugees who have completed a suitable qualification may make continued employment difficult, which is ultimately to the detriment of the country's economy as a whole.

Discrimination against refugees in schools is also a significant issue in the United States. According to Garrett (2006, p. 8), specific nationalities and ethnicities are targets for discrimination not only from other children, but also from teachers themselves. In particular, Muslim and Arab children suffer as a result of widespread national prejudice against these groups. There does not appear to be a specific policy guideline related to racism in American schools comparable to the one that exists in Australia — a situation that is damaging not only to children themselves, but ultimately to the economy of the country as well.

Conclusion and Implications for Practice

The refugee population in both the United States and Australia is increasing rapidly, with each year seeing a greater influx into both countries. Programs like the VCAL and LEAP efforts have already become a necessity rather than a novelty. The unfortunate fact is that there are still far too few of these programs available to make a meaningful difference in the majority of young refugee lives. At the same time, it is essential to the economy and social structure of both countries that such a difference be made. Challenges such as language barriers, emotional scarring, and discrimination must be investigated and addressed at the school level to ensure the effective growth, learning, and economic contribution of refugee children. Both the United States and Australia have significant measures and programs in place to create a safe and supportive environment for refugees; however, much more research and implementation is still needed to help refugees become more effective and fulfilled citizens in their new countries.