Teaching English to Refugees in Transition: Meeting the Challenges in Cairo, Egypt

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TESOL Quarterly, 40(1), 35–58 doi:10.2307/40264510 Teaching English to Refugees in Transition: Meeting the Challenges in Cairo, Egypt PHYLLIS WACHOB AND ROBERT S WILLIAMS The American University in Cairo Cairo, Egypt doi: 10.5054/tq.2010.232341 & In this article, we examine certain English language learning and teaching issues pertinent to refugees who are in transition, by which we mean refugees who are waiting for, but have not received, permanent resettlement Such transitional refugees live in political, physical, and psychological conditions that are in many ways different than those of 596 TESOL QUARTERLY refugees who have been permanently resettled and thus present a set of challenges to ELT educators that call for responses that are tailored for transitional situations REFUGEE EDUCATION IN CAIRO Our work with refugees in transition is situated in Cairo, Egypt, a large United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) staging area for African and Middle Eastern refugees in transition, and thus a primary initial destination for refugees We are both professors in the Master of Arts in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (MATEFL) program at the American University in Cairo (AUC) and have also both done volunteer work in the refugee schools Over the past few years we have begun to connect our graduate students with the refugee schools through a number of formal and informal programs, including encouraging students to their teaching practica in the refugee schools and allowing them to some training of volunteer English teachers as a part of their course work It is difficult to say exactly how many refugees are in Cairo at any one time, but researchers put the number between 750,000 and million We work mainly with African refugees, most of whom are from Sudan, particularly the conflict areas of Kordofan, and South Sudan, which are served by a small number of refugee schools Most students and faculty in these schools are fluent in Arabic and at least of more than 50 tribal languages represented in the Cairo refugee population In fact, language issues pose major challenges for transitory refugee education Though English is the language of instruction in almost all refugee schools in Cairo, few students have more than basic fluency in English, and even refugee school faculty often lack adequate English skills necessary to teach in English The choice of English as a medium of instruction is driven by internal policy on the part of most of the refugee schools and by the desires of refugees from South Kordofan and South Sudan, who make up the majority student population of the refugee schools The refugees’ preference for English as a medium of instruction is itself influenced by two factors: policy decisions made in Sudan and a desire and belief that they may be resettled in an Englishspeaking country The change in South Kordofan and South Sudan language policy is the result of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the government in Khartoum on the one hand and, on the other, the governments of the South Kordofan and Blue Nile provinces and of South Sudan, a political entity made up of 10 southern provinces and governed by the Sudanese People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) This agreement gives autonomy in primary and secondary school TEACHING ISSUES 597 and education administration to the three southern signatories (‘‘Comprehensive Peace’’ Schedule C 22, 2004a; 22 ‘‘Comprehensive Peace’’ Schedule A 22, 2004b), which have all indicated that they will reverse a longstanding policy of Arabization and make English the language of instruction in the schools This article focuses on our efforts as English language teaching (ELT) professionals to address transitional education issues for these groups There are also refugees in these schools from the Dar Fur region of Sudan as well as from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Chad, and Somalia, though not as many as from the two aforementioned areas In addition, there are now substantial numbers of Iraqi refugees in Cairo, who are finding their way to the adult English programs in the schools with which we work For political reasons, special schools for refugees in Cairo were founded out of necessity, because the Egyptian government functionally provides no education for either juvenile or adult refugees Although refugee children, though not adults, may enroll in Egyptian public schools, the conditions for their matriculation, such as the providing of birth certificates and other documentation that is difficult, if not impossible, for refugees to come by, prevents them from doing so In addition, many refugees from Sub-Saharan Africa have very negative experiences with the Egyptians and thus feel unwelcome in government schools Thus these special refugee schools, founded in many cases by refugees themselves, are the only providers of formal primary, secondary, and adult education for refugees in Cairo There are even young adults with interrupted schooling in the primary and secondary programs of these schools This fact poses special challenges for refugee school teachers, many of whom have little or poor formal training in English All of the schools within the scope of this report receive at least some funding from Christian organizations, and several are supported and administered by churches Thus in almost all of these schools, a Christian religious class is part of the curriculum, even for Muslim students enrolled in the schools This is not the case, though, for adult ELT and specialized education programs, except for young adults who are finishing interrupted schooling As far as we know, there are no special refugee schools sponsored or funded by Muslim organizations Palestinian and Iraqi refugee children may be more welcome in Egyptian government schools, though it is unclear how many have actually matriculated in government schools However, adults who have experienced interrupted education are not able to attend government schools, and there are still large subpopulations of refugees in Cairo that have no access to formal education of any kind 598 TESOL QUARTERLY CHALLENGES IN TRANSITIONAL REFUGEE EDUCATION Classroom Challenges Classroom challenges for young as well as young adult students can be categorized into physical aspects, such as space, or lack of it, and what one normally thinks of as adequate structures and supplies; child welfare issues, including loss of familial supports; and the subsequent problems with discipline, including gang membership Space is at a premium in Cairo, with a population of 18–20 million crowded along the banks of the Nile Space to live is poor to inadequate for refugees, with much overcrowding School space is also limited and often difficult to obtain, especially for non–church-run schools, since local landlords are often unwilling to rent to refugees themselves In some cases, schools are forced to relocate when landlords or local neighbors become unwilling hosts of the schools When space is found, it is most often woefully inadequate, with small and poorly lit classrooms and assembly areas Obtaining adequate supplies and textbooks is also a major challenge, especially for those schools without church sponsorship While these problems may not be unique to transitional situations, they are certainly more pronounced in Cairo and can be insurmountable, causing the eventual closing of refugee schools Venturing outside living areas or refugee centers puts refugees at risk from the local population or police Similar to the situation for resettled refugees, lack of adequate familial support for children and young adults is also a primary issue, causing focus and discipline problems in the classroom This is often more pronounced for refugee school students who are separated by death or migration from parents and relatives However, even where intact families are concerned, the changes to traditional familial structures imposed by a transitional existence can mean that the family is unable to provide the kind of emotional support for students that would enable them to focus on their learning Without the physical, psychological, and moral support of their families and community, young adults often turn to gangs, which have now become a major problem for many of Cairo’s refugee schools The presence of gangs in the refugee schools is bringing violence into the educational process, threatening the quality of education for all involved Gangs offer support, but are associated with criminality and rejection of authority Students drop out of schools that offer little in the way of hope for education or job training, and bond with their peers in an attempt to find their space Faculty Challenges In addition to the classroom challenges discussed previously, there are also sets of challenges involving refugee schools’ faculty, many of TEACHING ISSUES 599 which but not all are unique to the transitional context As previously mentioned, almost all refugee schools in Cairo use English as a medium of instruction, even though most students and faculty are fluent in Arabic One challenge, perhaps unique to teaching refugees in transition, especially in Cairo, has to with qualifications of refugee schools’ faculty Because it is difficult to find and recruit qualified faculty for refugee schools in Cairo, and because teachers are often very poorly compensated, the refugee schools’ faculty group has many challenges Many refugee teachers who lack a tertiary-level education, formal teacher training, and high-level English language skills are themselves faced with the same basic economic, political, social, psychological, and emotional challenges as their students While there are some trained teachers among the refugee schools’ faculty, it is safe to say that a large majority shares this profile Not only does this make it difficult for teachers to prepare and offer quality lessons, it also means that most teachers not have the tools to work independently to develop lessons and to better their teaching skills These kinds of nonpedagogical issues also lead to teacher absenteeism Finally, there are challenges involved in the effective use of volunteer teachers and tutors who work with adult school programs Although there are always well-meaning and welleducated volunteers in refugee schools, their teaching and tutoring skills vary widely, and because there is no centralized administration of volunteers for refugee schools, some schools have many volunteers while others have few, if any Administrative Challenges Administrative challenges in refugee schools revolve around curriculum, fiscal support, relations with the local and national government, meeting the needs of interrupted schooling, and extracurricular activities Although refugee schools in Cairo are formal in the sense that they offer graded courses and the systematic study of subjects, few if any, have a set, officially recognized curriculum This problem is now being addressed by the schools, but until the curriculum issue is resolved, schools are unable to offer students acknowledged documentation of their studies or levels of achievement attained Fiscal support for schools mostly comes from overseas Christian churches, and this tenuous line of support means refugee schools take what they can get, such as buildings without furniture, with little hope of making firm plans for the future Yet another administrative challenge is extracurricular activities such as music, art, sports, clubs, and field trips, which are woefully inadequate In addition, lack of these resources is another push toward gang activity as extracurricular 600 TESOL QUARTERLY HOW THE AUC COMMUNITY IS HELPING The aforementioned challenges to the refugee schools in Cairo have been and continue to be met by a variety of parties using various approaches, including the refugee schools themselves Teacher training, on a small scale, is being funded by outside sources, but is currently carried out locally for one refugee school only These refugee school teachers are studying English and pedagogy, upgrading their knowledge and skills to meet the challenges of their students and schools While it would be possible to look more in depth at the activities of the refugee schools, this article will focus more on the responses to refugee school challenges by the students, migration specialists, and ELT professionals at the AUC There are three primary organizations at AUC that work to assist refugees schools: the Cairo Refugee Language Project (CRLP), a research umbrella housing traditional and advocacy scholarship for refugee language issues; the AUC MATEFL program; and the Center for Migration and Refugee Studies (CMRS), a research center that offers diploma and master’s postgraduate degrees Though these organizations have their own individual mandates with regard to refugee issues, they often work together to assist refugee schools The CRLP houses two refugee school projects: the refugee school directors roundtable and the refugee school faculty development project The former is a discussion group, moderated by CRLP and usually held at AUC, which brings together refugee school directors to discuss mutual challenges and problems The purpose of the roundtable is not to offer direct assistance to refugee schools but rather to offer a forum which might generate problem responses from within the schools themselves So far, roundtable discussions have focused on pressing needs of refugee schools, including such issues as curriculum unification, teacher training, and funding resources These subjects are often controversial among group members, and ready solutions and approaches are not often immediate One example of this has been the discussion of a possible unified curriculum, which has both political and pedagogical dimensions At present, none of the refugee schools offers a full curriculum that is recognized by any national authority This means that students who graduate from the refugee schools have no chance to study at the tertiary level A possibility for the schools would be to use some recognized national curriculum, such as the Egyptian curriculum, which mostly uses Arabic as a language of instruction However, because the vast majority of refugees want to study in English, there has also been discussion of adopting an English-based curriculum such as the East African curriculum used in Kenya and Uganda, or the new curriculum of South Sudan, which is still under development To date there has been no group consensus on this issue, but the discussion TEACHING ISSUES 601 itself has led to raised awareness and understanding, leading to some possible future solution Other roundtable discussions have led to more immediate actions For example, a roundtable discussion gave rise to the refugee school faculty development project, whose first program was a content-based English course for refugee school faculty This course, offered at AUC and taught by MATEFL students under the guidance of two faculty members, sought to specifically enhance those English skills used to plan, develop, and teach EFL and content-based courses in the refugee schools It combined a traditional grammar-based approach with taskbased learning and focused on the development of teaching vocabulary, grammar problems found in the participants’ writing, and concepts of developing lessons around clearly stated learning objectives Participants worked in groups to develop lesson plans and activities based on the textbooks used in their refugee school courses There were great differences in the level of academic English competence among the course participants, which meant that some participants were able to take more new skills into their classrooms than others, but response to the course from refugee school teachers and directors was generally very positive We are at present planning to develop some teacher training modules to complement the English course In addition to the English course offered by the refugee school faculty development project, which directly enhances teaching in the refugee schools, the AUC MATEFL program has responded to refugee school needs by integrating some of them into MATEFL course work in the areas of practice teaching and curriculum development One refugee school has become an MATEFL teaching practicum site, and as MA students teach courses in the school, they model sound pedagogical methods for the school faculty We are at present encouraging more graduate students to their practicum in refugee schools and also have plans to expand the program to more schools In the area of curriculum development, we are now offering special topic courses, where graduate students develop short textbooks for refugee schools In the first course of this kind, given in the summer of 2008, students developed a business English course and companion textbook, which has since been piloted and is now used in one of the refugee schools We hope to offer more such courses in the near future The AUC CMRS sponsors a community translator project, the Student Action for Refugees (STAR) program that provides English lessons and a wide variety of graduate student projects The Community Translator project trains specifically for translating for UNHCR and other governmental or nongovernmental (NGO) services Language instruction in English and Arabic as well as specialized vocabulary and methodology of translation is provided 602 TESOL QUARTERLY The STAR program is a student club at AUC and is involved in many projects, the most important of which is a large number of English language classes for refugees These courses are not usually taught in refugee schools, as those centers are already overcrowded and, unlike those offered for children or adults with interrupted schooling, their content and focus are different, which is mainly skills enhancement for work or hoped-for resettlement So successful has the STAR program been, that there are long waiting lists for classes, which enroll over 1000 every semester It is an important interface with the AUC students and the refugee community Some of the challenges have been the many difficulties with placement tests, where there is widespread cheating because students not know the concept of a placement test Also the many and varied spellings of the same name creates problems with class lists and tracking students in classes In addition, contact information is a problem, as students are reluctant to give out phone numbers, they not have a phone, or they share a phone with another person Placement in classes by levels is not always possible, as students want to study with their friends no matter the proficiency level Intergroup conflict (intertribal, interreligious, and interethnic differences) also arises and brings the outside world into the classroom Women have a particularly difficult time as refugees, and in their quest for education meet obstacles as well They are frequently uncomfortable with their classmates if they are the only female in a classroom and are more likely to drop out Women-only classes have met with partial success, mainly due to lack of child care and other support services for women with children Although foreign exchange students have been the majority of volunteer teachers, some Egyptians have volunteered, sometimes causing apprehension on both sides, as Egyptians are more likely to be veiled, and many lack so called native-like English ability Also, the move of the AUC campus from downtown Cairo to a far-away desert location has hampered the program somewhat CMRS has sponsored various graduate student projects that involve language programs, and these continue to expand as the program moves into offering an MA One such program used hip-hop as a way to learn English, involving students in translating rap and reggae songs and then performing them One CMRS MA student created a 12-week English book and curriculum based on 24 rap and reggae songs that students love and listen to nonstop CONCLUSION These innovations have been achieved through the dedication of refugee educators, migration specialists, a handful of ELT professionals, TEACHING ISSUES 603 and many volunteers, both from AUC and from other NGOs and religious organizations in Cairo Many of these responses can be seen as successes, not only in terms of the development and implementation of some curriculum for refugee school faculty and students, but also in the byproducts of these efforts These include enhanced identification of refugee school situations and needs, enhanced communication among refugee schools, and a heightened awareness of key transitional education issues among the refugee community, the ELT professional community, and the volunteer community However, many challenges to transitional education remain, as threats to our previous work Perhaps the most difficult among them are issues of sustainability on all levels It is always difficult to find funding and space; to recruit, train, and retain volunteers; and for the AUC ELT professionals to sustain the institutional and departmental commitment to transitional refugee education In order for us to build on our successes, the continuation of our work will necessarily focus on these issues of sustainability as much as the development of new programs Finally, we wish to point out that our work with transitional education is not a one-way street in terms of benefits to stakeholders The faculty and students in AUC’s MATEFL program gain as much, or more, than they give Working with refugees in transition provides us with real-world opportunities for teacher and administrator training and development as well as the opportunity to make important contributions to transitional education and to our discipline ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We would like to offer a special thanks to all of those involved in making transitional refugee education in Cairo work This group includes refugee school English teachers, administrators, and students; the faculty and students of the MATEFL program at AUC; and AUC CMRS graduate students and STAR volunteers THE AUTHORS Phyllis Wachob is an assistant professor who teaches methodology in the MATEFL program at the American University in Cairo Her research is in the fields of learner autonomy, motivation, critical friendships, refugees, and innovative methodologies, all from the perspective of critical pedagogy Robert S Williams is associate professor of TEFL/applied linguistics and director in the MATEFL program at the American University in Cairo, and director of the Cairo Refugee Language Project His research interests are in the areas of migration and language issues, endangered language documentation, and various aspects of online classroom talk 604 TESOL QUARTERLY REFERENCES Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the Government of the Republic of Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Sudan People’s Liberation Army (2004a) Protocol between the government of Sudan (GOS) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) on power sharing: Schedule C Powers of the States Retrieved November 9, 2009, from http://www.usip.org/resources/peaceagreements-sudan Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the Government of the Republic of Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Sudan People’s Liberation Army (2004b) Protocol between the government of Sudan (GOS) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) on the resolution of conflict in Southern Kordofan/Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile states: Schedule A The Exclusive Executive and Legislative Competencies of the Two States Retrieved November 9, 2009, from http://www.usip.org/resources/peace-agreements-sudan TEACHING ISSUES 605