Most literature on refugees’ experience accessing and participating in HE focuses on research drawn from qualitative interviews and case studies within the ‘global North’, notably Australia, Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States. While there is a large body of literature that looks at the many barriers faced by refugees trying to access HE, many of which will be highlighted in this literature review, there are relatively few studies that take a strengths-based approach, considering the skills and capital brought by refugee students. There are notable exceptions; Harvey and Mallman’s (2019) study, for example, considers the strengths of refugee students in Australian HEIs, and found that refugee students often performed well academically, despite their difficult life experiences, and strove to be a role model for their family and friends (p. 666). Other strengths identified in the study are refugee students’ multilingualism, though this was rarely appreciated or utilised by the university (Ibid., p. 667), as well as the different knowledge and life experiences they bring to the classroom (Ibid., p. 664).  Other studies echo these findings, demonstrating that refugees learn to be resilient and develop navigational resources to deal with systemic challenges (Naidoo et al., 2018; Mkwananzi, 2018). 

Considering aspirations as student capital is a key part of a strengths-based approach to HE interventions (Yosso, 2005). ‘Aspiration’ is defined by Sellar and Gale (2011) as “the capacity to imagine futures”. Educational literature has long focused on student aspirations as a key precondition for accessing and succeeding in HE (Gale & Parker, 2015; Schneider, 2018, p. 461; Zipin et al., 2013). The downside of this, as pointed out by Bok (2010), is that it may lead to the overlooking of structural inequalities and challenges to accessing HE. The sections that follow in this literature review are our effort to not ignore these significant barriers. Nonetheless, considering refugee aspirations within tertiary education is an important part of seeking out the unique perspectives and experiences of refugee students (Schneider 2018, p. 461).

According to Ramsay and Baker (2019), most of the research on refugee educational aspirations is drawn from those in contexts of settlement, meaning they have been accepted by another country to reside and study there with the option of staying long-term or permanently. Among non-settled refugees, while there is an abundance of literature that considers the educational aspirations of refugees in refugee camps (Bellino, 2021; Dahya & Drydon-Peterson, 2017; Dridi et al., 2020),

there is need for more perspectives of refugees in urban and peri-urban centres in the global South, as physical location largely determines access to services, supports, and access to HE. Furthermore, more research is needed that connects the pre- and post- resettlement experiences of refugees, specifically in terms of their aspirations and experiences around HE (Ramsay and Baker 2019, pp. 69-70).

Literature suggests that aspirations are socially constructed; anthropologist Arjun Appadurai (2004), for example, states that  “Aspirations are never simply individual (as the language of wants and choices inclines us to think). They are always formed in interaction and in the thick of social life” (p. 67). This is captured by a recent study of secondary schools in Kakuma refugee camp, where Bellino (2021) finds that student aspirations are shaped by teachers enforcing a narrative of meritocracy, whereby one can pull themselves out of the present challenges by working hard. Here, academic performance is mixed with sentiments of moral achievements; students are reminded that good grades result in scholarships and poor grades bring ‘shame’ (p. 825). This has serious implications when only 2% of the estimated 31% of Kakuma-based students enrolled in secondary schools qualified on national exams to compete in tertiary scholarships (Ibid., p. 820). To succeed in getting a scholarship and leaving the refugee camp to study at a HEI amounts to what Nygreen (2013) describes as a zero sum game within education, whereby one succeeds by getting ahead of others. The psycho-social implications of this competitiveness will be explored further later in the literature review.

There may be a disconnect between the aspirations of refugee learners and HEI agendas, which do not always adapt their requirements but rather cause refugee students to adjust their preferences based on what they feel they are capable of pursuing (Parker et al., 2013, p.6). The sections that follow take a student-centred approach to understanding the multifaceted barriers to higher education, as well as the systems and processes that help in overcoming such barriers. An appreciation of refugee strengths and aspirations are an important part of understanding the refugee experience in HEIs and forming programmatic interventions, but it is important to remember not just the aspirations of refugee students, but also of the many players and discourses within the global education ecosystem, which presupposes access to high quality and affordable education will ensure economic success and social connectivity (Dryden-Peterson et al., 2019). 

Furthermore, within the context of bridging programmes, it is also critical to acknowledge both what they do and what they do not do, noting the risks therein. Bridging programmes often focus on preparing individuals to fit the system, rather than on structural changes to the institutions, and their staff and programmes might enable only certain learners to be able to access and thrive within them (Strydom, 1997, as seen in Hay & Morals 2004, p. 62). This too constrains how creative bridging programmes can be in their approach to course design and delivery; if their goal is to prepare students for a particular model of educational provision, they might do best to replicate that model in their own system. Even if bridging programmes thus aim to shift student demographics, and ultimately diversify knowledge production, in HEIs, they can end up being extremely conservative, creating applicants who fit within the acceptable boundaries of the traditional institutions they hope to enter. Instead, as Morrice (2009) notes in his review of student trajectories following a bridging programme for those with refugee backgrounds in the UK context, the question we ask needs to shift from how students’ social capital can be enhanced to access HEIs to how HEIs can better recognise the valuable forms of capital that students can bring to them.

References

Appadurai, A. (2004). The capacity to aspire: Culture and the terms of recognition. In V. Rao & M. Walton (Eds.), Culture and public action (pp. 59–84). Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

Bellino, M. J. (2021). Education, merit and mobility: opportunities and aspirations of refugee youth in Kenya’s Kakuma refugee camp. British Educational Research Journal, 47(4), 817-835.

Bok, J. (2010). “The Capacity to Aspire to Higher Education: ‘It’s Like Making Them do a Play Without the Script’.” Critical Studies in Education 51 (2): 163–178.

Dahya, N., & Dryden-Peterson, S. (2017). Tracing pathways to higher education for refugees: the role of virtual support networks and mobile phones for women in refugee camps. Comparative Education, 53(2), 284-301.

Dridi, M. A., Radhakrishnan, D., Moser-Mercer, B., & DeBoer, J. (2020). Challenges of blended learning in refugee camps: When internet connectivity fails, human connection succeeds. The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 21(3), 250-263.

Dryden-Peterson, S., Adelman, E., Bellino, M. J., & Chopra, V. (2019). The purposes of refugee education: Policy and practice of including refugees in national education systems. Sociology of Education, 92(4), 346-366.

Gale, T. and Parker, S. (2015). Calculating student aspiration: Bourdieu, spatiality and the politics of recognition. Cambridge Journal of Education 45(1): 81–96.

Harvey, A., & Mallman, M. (2019). Beyond cultural capital: Understanding the strengths of new migrants within higher education. Policy Futures in Education, 17(5), 657-673.

Hay, H. R., & Morals, F. (2004). Bridging programmes: gain, pain or all in vain: perspectives on higher education. South African Journal of Higher Education, 18(2), 59-75.

Mkwananzi, F. (2018). Higher Education, Youth and Migration in Contexts of Disadvantage: Understanding Aspirations and Capabilities. Cham: Springer.

Morrice, L. (2009). Journeys into higher education: The case of refugees in

the UK. Teaching in Higher Education,14(6), 661–672. https://doi.org/10.1080/13562510903315282

Naidoo, L., Wilkinson, J., Adoniou, M., & Langat, K. (2018). Refugee background students transitioning into higher education: Navigating complex spaces. Springer.

Nygreen, K. (2013). These Kids. University of Chicago Press.

Parker, S., Stratton, G., Gale, T., Rodd, P., & Sealey, T. (2013). Higher education and student aspirations: a survey of the adaptive preferences of Year 9 students in Corio, Victoria. Centre for Research in Educational Futures and Innovation. Deakin University, Australia.

Ramsay, G. and Baker, S., (2019). Higher education and students from refugee backgrounds: A meta-scoping study. Refugee Survey Quarterly, 38(1), pp.55-82.

Schneider, L. (2018). Access and aspirations: Syrian refugees’ experiences of entering higher education in Germany. Research in Comparative and International Education, 13(3), 457-478.

Sellar, S., & Gale, T. (2011). Mobility, aspiration, voice: a new structure of feeling for student equity in higher education. Critical Studies in Education, 52(2), 115-134.

Yosso, TJ (2005). Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth. Race Ethnicity and Education 8(1): 69–91.

Zipin, L., Sellar, S., Brennan, M., et al. (2013). Educating for futures in marginalized regions: A sociological framework for rethinking and researching aspirations. Educational Philosophy and Theory 47(3): 227–246.

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