Where can a refugee that the host government will not receive take refuge?

Amanda Craig
published in the Ibn Khaldun Center's Civil Society

On October 8th, around 60 female refugees from in and around the city made their way up to a fifth-floor classroom on the American University in Cairo’s (AUC) campus, hoping for the chance to learn or practice English. As they arrived, often in small groups with family and friends, Alison Hollenbeck ensured that every woman was paired with a teacher who would be able to assess her level of English proficiency. Hollenbeck, a study abroad student at AUC, had taken charge of providing women’s English classes only a week earlier, after being exposed to the opportunity through an AUC student-run organization called Student Action for Refugees (STAR).

STAR is one of numerous groups trying to provide classes for refugees in Cairo, a city in which the large and growing refugee community and the hands-off approach of the Egyptian government has left many displaced persons without adequate protection or support. Refugees must rely largely on charities and volunteer groups with limited resources for health care, legal services and education.

Despite having ratified the 1951 Refugee Convention 25 years ago, the Egyptian government has failed to develop policies and procedures for integrating refugees that settle in Cairo. The Convention defines who is and who is not a refugee and spells out the host state’s responsibilities to its refugee community. According to the organization that authored the Convention, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the Egyptian government has practically ignored important sections, leaving issues concerning refugees’ access to primary education and physical and social security publicly unaddressed.

In addition, UNHCR reports that the Egyptian government has yet “to put in place the necessary arrangements for the reception and registration of refugee applicants and determination of their refugee status.” Thus, whereas UNHCR is intended to and does in most other states primarily act as a watchdog, in Egypt UNHCR is actually in charge of the status determination process and an assistance program.

However, in recent years the refugee population has increased so drastically that UNHCR is only able to provide assistance to the most vulnerable clients, about 20 percent of its total caseload. Furthermore, according to UNHCR, there are too few refugee-assisting NGOs in Egypt to fill the gap in assistance.

The remaining refugee population thus relies on the resources of a few international organizations, local churches and volunteer groups to satisfy its basic needs. Education programs of various shapes and sizes are scattered throughout Cairo, attempting to close the gap. However, with 120,000 or so refugees and asylum seekers—mostly from Palestine, Sudan and Somalia—reportedly in Egypt, demand is often too high to accommodate even a majority.

Jennifer Renquist, president of STAR, which offers arts and crafts, English and Swahili classes to refugees, said that the number of educational opportunities for refugees in Cairo is limited, especially for those who are beyond primary school. “There are only about 15 to 20 primary schools for refugees, ranging from a one-room apartment type of setting to one of a few larger schools like St. Andrews or All Saints, or Sakakini, which provides for about 1000 kids,” Renquist said.

There are even fewer opportunities for adult refugees to take classes, according to Renquist. STAR is a unique organization because it’s one of a few programs in Cairo that targets an older demographic of refugees, from teenagers and twentysomethings on up. It’s also unique because classes are offered in what Renquist called “a very safe environment”—a university campus.

The largely unmet demand for refugee classes or schools in Cairo was demonstrated by the 3000 refugees who stood outside the gates of the AUC campus this past September, hoping for one of 250 spots available in STAR’s mixed English classes. Shannon McDonald, who is in charge of the mixed classes provided by STAR, said it was incredibly hard to turn away so many people who all seemed so eager to learn.

When McDonald was contacting the refugee students who had been selected, through a random lottery, to participate in the classes, she had no answer for the families who asked why one son or daughter was going to get to learn and one was not.

Many refugee schools or educational programs that are either run or staffed by mobile foreigners are limited in their ability to expand alongside a growing refugee population. Both Renquist and McDonald described this as one of the problems STAR experiences. Because teachers are mostly study abroad students, organizers can never be certain that the number of students who are interested in volunteering will be the same each semester, or that the students who do sign up will be able to remain committed to teaching all semester. So, even if the teaching resources become suddenly available, they can’t necessarily take full advantage of them, especially since space and funding don’t appear quite as spontaneously. In addition, Renquist and McDonald themselves are both graduate students at AUC who will likely be gone or preparing to leave within the next year, though both just acquired leadership positions in the organization earlier this year.

The student-led nature of STAR, is, however, also cited as a positive by McDonald.

“We’re able to make it up as we go along,” McDonald said. “If one student has an idea, an initiative, that’s great. Go for it, do it.”

Such an instance occurred earlier this semester when the mixed English classes were unable to accommodate such a vast number of the refugees who wanted to learn, and Hollenbeck was given an opportunity to organize and provide women’s-only English classes under the STAR umbrella.

Hollenbeck, who had no previous leadership experience in this arena, took charge of contacting students and teachers, finding classroom space and acquiring a security clearance. Within one week’s time, she had organized about 60 students and 15 teachers and obtained permission to use five AUC classrooms every Sunday night for the rest of the semester. For Hollenbeck, who also teaches the medium-level English class, the entire experience has been “incredible,” leading her to “question many of [her] future professional plans.”

Hollenbeck teaches alongside fellow study abroad student Aminah Teachout, who has also found teaching to be an extremely rewarding and provocative experience, and one that she described as putting her “passion into practical application, especially here in Egypt where an epicenter of the global refugee crisis is just right next door.” Of the 20 or so women who are in Teachout’s class, almost all are from Sudan, with a handful of others coming from Ethiopia and Iraq.

“What I like best, and find most challenging, about teaching for STAR is that most of my students are older and wiser than me, yet lack the linguistic tools to express their knowledge and life experience. It is exhilarating to enable them,” Teachout said. “I’m realizing that although all of the women we work with speak fluent Arabic and thus have no trouble interacting with Egyptians, learning English enables them to interact with international organizations that might be in place to help with the refugee situation.”

Renquist is full of praise for the women’s classes and Hollenbeck’s efforts, clearly just glad that everyone involved is learning. At the same time, as Renquist, who arrived in Cairo in late December 2004, has become more and more involved in both refugee studies and organizations providing services to the refugee community, she has also become aware of how more work remains to be done and how many nuanced questions remain unanswered.

She is quick to point out that there are positives and negatives, and often, implied goals, in each of the curriculums a refugee school decides to teach.

“A program teaching an English curriculum promotes resettlement [in a different foreign country], one teaching an Egyptian curriculum promotes integration, and one teaching a Sudanese, for instance, curriculum, promotes repatriation,” Renquist said. “And repatriation is what most refugees seem to eventually want.”

Still, both Renquist and McDonald are content to offer whatever classes teachers want to teach and students wish to take. Last year, STAR offered Arabic classes, but this year, there was little to no interest in Arabic, so Renquist and McDonald decided to focus more on English classes, where they were inundated with interest.

Hollenbeck’s experience during the placement testing for the women’s English classes suggests one reason why refugees, who seem to be longing for repatriation, might also be interested in learning English. Hollenbeck said that during the placement testing, the teachers asked every woman who could to write a sentence or more about why she wanted to take an English class. The responses were overwhelmingly professional; few if any seemed to be concerned with moving to the United States, the United Kingdom, or any other English-speaking country. Many said that they wanted to work as translators, or learn an international language so that they could obtain a better job.

Yet, if professional careers are what the refugees in Egypt are trying to pursue, then the educational programs in place for younger refugees aren’t exactly laying the right groundwork. According to Renquist, many of the refugee schools are not accredited, meaning that their degrees are not recognized by the Egyptian government. As a result, refugees who attend these non-accredited primary schools can’t continue their education by applying to colleges or universities in Egypt.

Even if they could apply, the number of refugees who would be financially able to attend is nearly nonexistent. Only one higher education assistance program, the Albert Einstein German Academic Refugee Initiative Fund (DAFI, is offered to college-aged refugees in Egypt. Renquist explained that DAFI provides scholarships to six Egyptian refugee students at a time, meaning that another student can be awarded only when one of the six finishes his or her four-year education.

Underlying all of these frustrations, limited resources, inspired leaders and teachers and generous organizations are, however, the refugees themselves—who are still today trying to live their lives as part of a displaced community.

McDonald recalled an instance that occurred just a little over a month ago, when a man who had been randomly selected to participate in the mixed English classes was trying to take a placement test. He told McDonald that he couldn’t concentrate because “they tried to take off my neck.” McDonald’s eyes instinctively fell to his bare skin, where a thick scar wrapped around everything but his throat.

And so she stumbled upon yet another way to understand these English classes—wholly outside of being discouraged and confused by the lack integration policies of the Egyptian government, or the bureaucracy which determines refugee status.

“Why have classes for refugees? I think it’s definitely important for them to learn something,” McDonald said. “But it’s also important for them to be in a safe environment, to gather together, have a bit of fun. To have a place of refuge.”