Teachers: key actors in empowering migrant and refugee students

• In Event: Roundtable Group 6
  In Refereed Roundtable Session: Enabling the capacities to act for migrant and refugee students: the Colombian case.

Proposal

Since 2021, Enseña por Colombia (ExC) has been part of a consortium implementing the USAID-funded Leadership for Change in Education Program, a regional initiative led by Teach For All with partners Enseña por Colombia, Enseña Ecuador, and Enseña por Paraguay to improve the quality of education of marginalized and vulnerable children and youth in Latin American and the Caribbean (LAC), focusing on cultivating and developing leadership across different levels of the education systems. The Program focuses on four objectives: (1) Recruit and select growing fellow (teacher) cohorts in expanded target areas; (2) Train and support fellows to be effective teachers over a period of two years; (3) Implement alumni leadership strategies and community engagement activities; and (4) Strengthen the capacity of partner organizations while fostering regional learning.

Under this Program, ExC specifically aims to improve educational opportunities for migrant-receptor communities in three regions: Valle del Cauca, Caribe, and Santandares. Over the course of the Program, ExC has made several adaptations to its programmatic work to better serve Venezuelan migrant communities and students, focusing on strategies to both improve teaching and to enhance student leadership opportunities. Key strategies are summarized below:

Target recruitment of Venezuelan professionals to serve as fellows:

One of ExC’s goals through the Program has been to recruit and select Venezuelan professionals to serve as teachers in communities with migrant students. To set up Venezuelan migrants for success in the recruitment process, ExC designed and implemented a pre-recruitment training course for a cohort of 25 Venezuelan professionals. The course included (i) understanding the educational context and its challenges, (ii) identifying the participants' leadership skills, (iii) understanding the role of a fellow, and (iv) essay writing resources. For ExC, the course also sheds light on important obstacles that migrants face as they seek teaching jobs and school-based employment in Colombia, especially around validation of Venezuelan university degrees in Colombia.

Develop and implement the Intercultural Classrooms training module for fellows:

To ensure that existing fellows (teachers) are attuned to the needs and challenges of migrant students and to adapt their instruction accordingly, ExC developed and implemented “Intercultural Classrooms,” a 30-hour module that trains teachers in the following topics: (i) culture, (ii) migration, (iii) leadership for intercultural education, (iv) discrimination, (v) regulatory framework on immigration and (vi) intercultural education. To date, over 70 fellows have completed this module.

Support student leadership projects focused on inclusion:

Along with directly supporting teachers to better serve migrant students, ExC has engaged over 100 students in migrant receptor communities in student-led initiatives in their school communities. Designed as a competition, students submit proposal ideas to ExC, and the selected proposals then receive funding to be implemented. To date, ExC has supported nearly 20 student leadership initiatives in topics related to (i) improvement of school facilities; (ii) environment and conservation; (iii) self-care; and (iv) arts and technology. In 2023, these projects are focused entirely on inclusion, for example, by creating more welcoming school environments for all students, including Venezuelan migrants.

Author

• Ana Camila Medina Pulido, Enseña por Colombia