"It Is a University Where I Felt Welcome": Poems of Asylum-Seeking Students' Experiences of Attending Australian Higher Education

• In Event: Sheraton Roundtable Session Five
  In Roundtable Session: Diverse Student Experiences in the Classroom (Table 10)

Abstract

Current social and political arrangements of higher education are inequitable for students from asylum-seeking backgrounds. Their access to university is limited and if they are accepted, their status as forced migrants puts them in a disadvantaged position. Utilising a voice centred relational method (VCRM) and poems, this article explores the narratives of asylum-seeking university students in Australia. The use of VCRM allowed us to slow down and engage in multiple listenings to selected participants’ voices. By listening carefully, this analysis revealed new understandings of their longing for safety, belonging, and success, and how the arrangements of higher education enabled or constrained the participants in achieving these. The importance of relationality is illuminated through the pronoun poems produced from participant transcripts.

Authors

• Mervi Kaukko, Tampere University
  Presenting Author

• Jane Wilkinson, Monash University
  Presenting Author

• Kristin Reimer, Monash University
  Non-Presenting Author