She added: “Students do not feel welcome by their colleagues, and sometimes even by their teachers. This has increased the dropout rates among male students because they are able to find work more easily than girls. Girls, however, prefer to continue their education since the alternative is early marriage.” (See a related article, “Pandemic Will Force Thousands of Refugee Girls to Become Brides Instead of Students”.)
The United Nations has supported evening Turkish lessons for Syrian students. But that assistance could not overcome the knowledge gap of refugee students who had been out of school for a long time.
The language barrier also stopped Syrian parents from attending school meetings because of the difficulty of communicating with school administrators.
The study recommends that local authorities fund teachers who are culturally aware of the refugee student community, have an introductory period at the beginning of every academic year to help students make up for what they have missed, and provide staff trained in special needs to treat the psychological effects of being a refugee.
Ann Phoenix, a professor of psychosocial studies at University College London, said there could be no integration without social interaction between teachers, students and parents.
“The studies raised major problems that should be dealt with through the actual educational system rather than a new system,” she said. “Integration means assimilation of the new students into the existing system, and not creating a new system that is unequal with the old. This is an issue that should be addressed.”
Phoenix also wondered who would design language programmes. “If Turkish teachers are not informed of what they have to do, in order to accommodate refugee students in schools, it will be difficult and complicated,” she said.
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Sarmini told Al-Fanar Media that “providing language learning is the first step to create a dialogue with the parties concerned, since most of the Syrian families cannot cover the tuition fees of teaching their sons Turkish.”
She concluded: “Firstly, these children need psychological care, then equal opportunities to learn. At the moment such things are not available, except for the financially privileged.”
source : Syrian Refugee Students in Turkey Need Language and Psychosocial Help, Studies Find (al-fanarmedia.org)