Dilemmas Among Access and Quality in Refugee Education: Is Hopeful Policy an Oxymoron?
By Isabel Fitzpatrick, Ivy Ryan, Malcolm Thompson, & Shon Correa Martell
Our team planned and facilitated a REACH ROUNDS discussion amongst a group of policymakers working on education in settings of migration and displacement. The purpose for this discussion was to allow individuals from diverse professional settings and geographic contexts to consider the common dilemma of how to expand access to education for refugees while also ensuring quality schooling.
We used a Refugee REACH ROUNDS brief, “Access or Quality? Decision-Making on Priorities in Refuge Education”, to ground our discussion. We chose this brief because of our own personal commitments as educators, researchers, and policymakers to access and equity in our work. The brief reflects our guiding belief that quality education is a human right while also documenting that “only 31 percent of refugee young people access secondary school compared to 84 percent globally” and that global funding for refugee education is short term “even though 80 percent of refugees are displaced for over five years.” We aimed for our discussion to grapple with this dissonance and explore ways to work through this dilemma.
The REACH ROUNDS brief provides a rich and detailed narrative from which we could ground and guide our discussion. We see in the brief the dilemma play out in practice for Farakh, pseudonym of an Education Coordinator for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. He wrestles with the true purpose of education as he navigates local needs and resource constraints. We envisioned Farakh’s story of grappling with decision-making as a portal or a mirror for policymakers – and us – to step into and reflect upon the experiences of refugee youth whose lives they – we – directly impact through their work.
We shared the brief with participating policymakers ahead of our discussion to allow for reflection on personal and professional connections to the dilemma and the responsibility they have had in their careers to make consequential decisions for refugees’ access to quality education. The participants arrived ready to engage with one another and to learn more about each other's reactions to and interpretations of the brief. Our team offered the participants a selection of guiding questions to facilitate exploration of how the complex tensions between access and quality shows up in their roles, as well as any pathways forward they have encountered in the policy space that brings them hope.
One participant noted that “Hopeful policy is an oxymoron. I feel hopeful when I work with people.” This reflection guided the learning and takeaways from our discussion. Some themes that emerged included:
the need for displaced peoples’ experiences to be recognized as assets and for them to be tapped as leaders and experts in policy discourse.
the importance of decentering Western notions of what quality education “should” look like in international settings. One participant noted: “Refugee issues are not and should not be an accepted reality. They are the product of complex histories of colonialism, unfair trade practices, inequitable distribution of resources, and environmental degradation. Thus, when we discuss the purpose of education and possible solutions, it needs to be couched in these realities.”
the need to be constantly aware of how working at the systems level can result in worldviews that are so zoomed out that we misjudge what the people we are committed to serve seek.
Our hope is that policymakers, including our future selves, can remain connected to and make decisions informed by the specific contexts, histories, and desires of the communities that their work impacts.
If you would like to discuss planning a ROUNDS discussion within your organization or with a group of colleagues, please be in touch.
Disclaimer: The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this publication belong solely to the authors and do not necessarily represent those of REACH or the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
About The Authors
Isabel Fitzpatrick (she/her) is an Ed.M. candidate at the Harvard Graduate School of Education in the Human Development and Education program. Her work is grounded in cognitive neuroscience research and the relationship between language, learning, and executive functioning in school-aged children. She has worked as a teacher and education researcher in Spain, as an ESL teacher in Massachusetts for almost ten years, as a tutor and mentor for unaccompanied refugee minors building their futures in New England, and most recently as a graduate assistant with the Immigration Initiative at Harvard.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/isabel-fitzpatrick/
Ivy Ryan (she/her) is an Ed.M. candidate at the Harvard Graduate School of Education in the Educational Leadership, Organizations, and Entrepreneurship program with a concentration in Identity, Power, and Justice in Education. Her work surrounds creating more accessible informal learning spaces, cultivating youth power and agency, and cross sector partnerships. Prior to coming to HGSE, she worked as the director of a summer program and as a theatre teacher in public, private, charter, and independent schools as well as summer camps, after school programs, and nonprofits across nine states.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ivyryan/
Malcolm Thompson is an Ed.M. candidate in Education Policy at Harvard Graduate School of Education. His work specializes in leveraging data analysis to shape education policies that are equitable, accessible, and enriching for students regardless of their race, gender, class, national origin, and disability status. Working with children has been his passion since he himself was a child, and hopes to find a career where he can both work with youth face to face and create policies that improve lives at scale. He is originally from New York, but has recently lived in Pennsylvania, Hawai’i, and Massachusetts.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/malcolm-thompson-713a8a146/
Shon David Correa Martell (they/them) is an Ed.M. candidate at the Harvard Graduate School of Education in the Human Development and Education program with a concentration in Identity, Power, and Justice in Education. Shon’s passion is cultivating community-based research and advocacy as a way to lead systemic change. They are focused on combating social and institutional inequities faced by predominantly low-income, Black, Latine, and Indigenous, LGBTQ+, neurodivergent/ or disabled, historically minoritized communities. With over 10+ years supporting in various roles as an educator, researcher, and fierce advocate for humxn rights, Shon is looking forward to continuing the work toward dismantling the school-to-prison pipeline. First-generation graduate raised in South Central Los Angeles, CA who also enjoys exploring new music, finding tasty restaurants, and occasionally spending time with friends playing online video games.