While students at the Kobane school in Sulaymaniyah, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KR-I), enjoy their summer holidays, classrooms have opened their doors to other types of learners: refugee teachers and parents.
Throughout the summer, Maqboola has been one of about 30 Syrian refugees attending morning language classes four days a week. As their instructor writes new words on the board, the students read and repeat the new vocabulary aloud, filling the classroom with the sound of a new language.
In Syria, Maqboola grew up speaking the Kurdish Kurmanji dialect prevalent among communities in northwest Syrian. After completing her studies to become a teacher, she began her career in her hometown of Kobane, joining the local teaching staff and teaching Arabic curriculum. Her work went beyond just teaching; she played a crucial role in the development of her community by nurturing young minds and empowering the next generation with knowledge.
When she fled to Iraq in 2019 due to armed conflict, her knowledge of Kurmanji helped her navigate daily life in the KR-I. To continue her work as a teacher at the local school, however, she needed to perfect her knowledge of Sorani, the Kurdish dialect most widely spoken in the KR-I and the official language of instruction in public schools.
At the onset of the Syrian crisis, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) set-up a parallel refugee education system, featuring a KR-I specific curriculum and learning materials taught in Arabic by Syrian refugee teachers in refugee-only schools. In 2022 this changed with the launch of the Refugee Education Integration Policy (REIP), which seeks to gradually integrate Syrian refugee children and qualified teachers into the public education system.
“The curriculum language was changed to Kurdish Sorani, which initially created difficulties both for us teachers and the refugee students, as we were used to teaching and learning in Arabic,” says Maqboola.
To facilitate this transition, UNHCR provides Kurdish language courses to Syrian refugee teachers, helping them improve their ability to deliver quality education to both refugee and Iraqi children in integrated classrooms. Since September 2022, UNHCR has provided language courses to over 40,000 refugee children, parents, and teachers.
Language courses are also available for refugee students to aid their comprehension of the new instruction language, as well as for refugee parents to enable them to support their children’s learning.
“We really benefit from these courses…Now we can read, write, and teach effectively in the Kurdish Sorani dialect. I feel confident in delivering lessons to students,” Maqboola says with determination, her eyes set on the upcoming 2024-2025 academic year.
The realization of the REIP is a joint effort between the Government of Iraq, UNHCR, UNICEF and Save the Children. It signifies not just an educational shift but a broader social transformation. By empowering refugee teachers, the chance to contribute meaningfully to the education system in Iraq, the initiative benefits both refugee children and the communities that welcomed them, while also creating livelihood opportunities for a more sustainable and inclusive future.
Dilshad Omer, the Director General of the Department of Education of the KRG in Sulaymaniyah states that “As the new academic year approaches, organizations are preparing students and teachers in various locations to learn the language and successfully implement the programme. With strong collaboration with UNHCR, we prepared well-trained staff to facilitate language courses for students and teachers across all schools in Sulaymaniyah governorate.”
The REIP programme has been possible thanks to the PROSPECTS partnership, an initiative spearheaded and funded by the Government of the Netherlands. One of its aims is to seek to further durable solutions for refugees, internally displaced persons, and the host community in Iraq, including through strengthening inclusion in national education systems.
The success of the REIP speaks for itself. In the 2023-2024 academic, 70 per cent of all Syrian refugee children were enrolled in 1,500 public schools in the KR-I – a 11 per cent increase from the previous academic year.
For teachers like Maqboola, the language classes have also played an instrumental part in allowing them to continue their profession, support their families and gain new skills.
“They hired us as qualified teachers, same as the local teachers. We benefit each other,” she concludes.
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