Navigating university spaces as refugees: Syrian students’ pathways of access to and through higher education in Turkey

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to explore how refugee students construct pathways of access to higher education by drawing on interviews with 15 Syrian university students studying at different universities across Turkey. The research is located within a capabilities-based human development paradigm from which it outlines the factors that enable students’ transition into university and looks at how they navigate complex higher education spaces. The refugees’ narratives show that access to university is intersectionally shaped by personal ambition, family encouragement, community support, and the social and education policy. On the other hand, their educational experiences highlight that higher education works as a site of justice where the everyday racism, xenophobia, and discrimination is alleviated to a significant degree through providing a peaceful and safe space for coexistence with others despite its financial and pedagogical constraints. The paper draws attention to the agency of students in mobilising the assets they have gained for the good and well-being of their communities and fleshes out the values universities should promote for refugee students who have accessed university against the odds.

KEYWORDS:

• Capability approach
• Syrian refugees
• higher education
• access
• Turkey

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Ecem Karlidag-Dennis, Melanie Walker and researchers at the Centre for Research on Higher Education and Human Development, University of Free State for their comments and suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Melis Cin is a Lecturer in Education and Social Justice at Lancaster University. She is a feminist researcher with a particular interest in exploring the relationship between education and international development. She also looks at how education can be used as a peacebuilding tool in conflict zones and uses socially engaged art interventions as a way to understand the local meanings of peace in formal and informal education settings.

Necmettin Doğan holds a PhD from Free University of Berlin. He is a professor in Sociology Department at Istanbul Ticaret University. His research interests include Migration, Turkish philosophy and tradition and approaches of German sociology.

Notes

1 Although we use the term refugee in this paper, Syrian nationals who came to Turkey after 28 April 2011 due to the civil war are provided with temporary protection (TP) by the Government of Turkey. This means they are not sent back to Syria unless they themselves request to do so.

2 Pseudonyms are used in order to not reveal the identities of the participants.