Give us a fair chance

Ahmed (not pictured) arrived in the UK as an unaccompanied asylum seeker after several months spent travelling over land from Afghanistan. He gave his age as 14, but a social services age assessment decided he was 16 and too old for school. The dispute meant it was more than five months before a project worker for the Refugee Council was able to find him a place on an English language course at college. "Everybody is older than me in my classes so it is difficult to make friends," he says. "It would be much better to be in school because they would all be the same age as me." A bright student, Ahmed would like to study science, but he has been told he has to study English first. His ambition is to become an electrician, but he doesn't know how he will get the qualifications he needs. Experiences such as Ahmed's feature in Education: Every child's right, a report researched and written by a group of children and young people who are passionate about human rights, with the support of the Children's Rights Alliance for England (CRAE). The project aims to identify and raise awareness of the barriers to accessing education faced by young refugees and engage other organisations in campaigning for improvements to the system. The report, published in January, is part of CRAE's Big Lottery-funded Get ready for change! project, which supports children and young people to take a leading role in human rights research and campaigning. "Such child-led advocacy and campaigning is crucial to achieving a society where children have equal status and respect, and where all children can have their say on the issues that matter to them," says Sam Dimmock, head of policy at CRAE. In 2007, CRAE's young researchers conducted an investigation into children's rights in England, presenting their findings to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in June 2008. Refugee children's access to education was one of three areas targeted for further research and campaigning, the others being the presentation of young people in the media and counselling services in schools. The research for Education: Every child's right took the form of a series of focus groups involving more than 50 refugee children and young people aged 5 to 19 from across England, and the adults working with them. The focus groups found much excellent practice but also discovered wide variations in the quality of support young refugees receive. The report sets out a list of recommendations and is being disseminated to government officials and ministers, NGOs, child-led groups and local authorities. School admission is one area of concern. Although some children, particularly those of primary-school age, started school within a few days of arrival, the report found it was common to wait at least a month. In some cases, there was a delay of up to six months, and none of the children who arrived in the UK unaccompanied waited less than three months. What came as a surprise to researcher Usman Ali, 16, was the contrasting levels of support in different areas of the country. "It was the regional disparity," he says. "Local councils have strategies in place to help these young people. In some areas it's working really well. But not in others. Children shouldn't be missing out on three or four months of their education." Many of the unaccompanied children interviewed said they did not have the money to buy everything they needed for school. Some children reported not being able to afford lunch. Other problems included difficulties using library facilities, due to not having identification, and a lack of information about the available sources of support. The bulk of interviewees said the most important aspect of schooling was to learn English so they could become independent, but there were wide variations in the amount of English language tuition and support they received. One young person recalled asking social services for a dictionary but never getting one. They spoke of their confusion on being dropped into mainstream classes that were taught in English, and how they felt isolated by their inability to communicate and make friends. All the children surveyed agreed that bullying and teasing can be a problem for new refugees. "It's bad for everyone," one child is quoted as saying, "but it's more common for someone who's just come here from a different country, as their culture's crushed … they have a different culture and they don't understand the phrases or the sayings, and they might find difficulties in coming together." Access denied Equal access to the curriculum is another issue. Some young people had been put into bottom subject sets as a matter of course, and this had implications for their potential exam grades. They also reported being restricted in the subjects they could study, due to a lack of resources and staffing to support their additional English needs. Many of the young refugees interviewed had high career aspirations and were keen to make the most of their education. "One thing I found really striking," says Usman Ali, "was that when we asked if they thought you should have more playtime at school, one young girl said: 'I don't think we should have playtime as we go to school to learn.' It just shows that they want to take every opportunity to excel. It's not that they don't want to learn, it's that they're not given an equal opportunity to do so." "Education is the single most important factor affecting the life chances of children," says Donna Covey, chief executive of the Refugee Council." Improvements must be made to ensure refugee children – some of the most vulnerable in our society – have the help they need to get the most out of school or college." Listening to other children's stories has had a profound effect on the young researchers involved in Get ready for change!, says Dimmock. "They're realising that different children have different life experiences, but that they all want to be treated fairly and play an equal part in society. That's the common experience that pulls them all together." Web links Children's Rights Alliance for England: crae.org.uk