Today there are more forcibly displaced people globally than at any time since the end of the Second World War.  Over half of all refugees are children. Global levels of migration are also higher than ever before. In 2017, 258 million people (or one in every thirty) were living outside of their country of birth. The education and assessment needs of refugee and migrant children are complex and can differ enormously.  In many cases education policy and practice can further hinder the chances for young refugees and migrants to acquire the education and qualifications that they will need to thrive in the communities where they reside and in the world.

These challenges can include a lack of understanding of the talents and skills that they have acquired as well as the specific educational needs of young people who have been through traumatic experiences, long-standing barriers to accessing education, and policies that prevent refugee and migrant children from acquiring the kinds of qualifications that will help them to thrive in the world.  All of these hinder not only the wellbeing and future prospects of these young people but also of the wider societies in which they will live.

However, new insights from cutting edge research, assessment, and practice around social and emotional learning, language policy and the use of technology have the potential to create a much more positive future for refugees, migrants and all young people in our education systems.

Building on the 2019 Global Education Monitoring Report and recent Education for Tomorrow’s World work on language policy and social and emotional learning, this program will bring together experts, policymakers and practitioners from a wide range of organizations, sectors and countries to develop policy and financing solutions that can create better education outcomes and life chances for both refugees and displaced people and their host communities.

KEY QUESTIONS
Over the course of the five-day program participants will address key questions, including:

• How can learning environments help mitigate and reverse the effects of stress and trauma on students?
• What scalable and transferable teacher training approaches can help educators develop safe and inclusive classrooms?
• How can technological and policy solutions help address challenges around recognition of refugee and migrant education credentials?
• How can education assessment, research, and interventions increase life chances for refugees, displaced peoples, and their host communities?
• What can be done to ensure that multilingualism is seen as contributing positively to communities and societies?
• How can social and emotional learning help to foster a sense of connectedness, solidarity, and cohesion between migrants and host communities?
• After the 2018 Global Compact on Refugees and the Global Compact for Safe Orderly and Regular Migration where are the early examples of international best practice and how can they be replicated?

PROGRAM GOALS
During and immediately after the Salzburg program, participants and staff will co-create a number of strategic products to leverage the learning and recommendations from the meeting:

• Advocacy: A Salzburg Statement will be jointly drafted to respond concisely to the Key Questions and serve as a call to action to help participants personally as well as their institutions and communities.
• Online engagement: A series of online debates will be launched following the program to continue online engagement on a monthly basis around key questions raised through the program.
• Multimedia outreach: A series of webinars and podcasts will discuss and disseminate the Salzburg Statement and multiply its impact in different settings. These will provide an opportunity to engage with many more people than are present at the meeting and bring the outcomes to new audiences.
• Impact report: A report will subsequently be published summarizing the program as well as highlights from the Twitter and webinar debates that follow it.

PARTICIPANT PROFILE
Salzburg Global Seminar’s Education for Tomorrow’s World programs seek to bring together cross-sector and cross-generational change-makers from around the world to tackle complex challenges.

This program will bring together around 60 participants, including global education leaders, researchers and change makers, with expertise across refugee and migrant education, social and emotional learning, language policy, design thinking and the use and development of technology in education from around the world.

PROGRAM FORMAT
The highly interactive program will be structured around a mix of thought-provoking presentations, curated conversations, informal interactions, knowledge exchange, and practical group work. The process seeks to combine theory, policy and practice across sectoral silos, opening up new perspectives and learning opportunities. Participants will also work intensively in focus groups, allowing for in-depth group work on key issues.

NEWSLETTERS

Download the program newsletters as a PDF

Issue 1

Issue 2

All issues combined

PHOTOS

All photos are available to publish under the Creative Commons license - Attribution/Non-commercial. Photos should be credited to Salzburg Global Seminar/Katrin Kerschbaumer

Hi-res, non-watermarked photos are available from the Communications Team, press@salzburgglobal.org