Doctoral Dissertation Research: Civic engagement and schooling for resettled communities

Schools for refugee youth play a vital role in facilitating the transition and assimilation into host societies. This doctoral dissertation research project investigates the role that resettlement schools and the social and civic networks of refugee and resettled students play in the integration of youth into host societies. By examining the impacts, networks, and outcomes of students in resettlement schools within the context of state policy, this doctoral research project advances scientific knowledge of transnational educational policy for refugee youth. The research develops a social network model adaptable to other studies on migrant and refugee schooling. In the context of dropping secondary school enrollment rates of refugee students globally, a scientifically tested model addresses the education and integration needs of displaced youth worldwide. Findings will be disseminated to local stakeholders in both academic and non-academic settings. In addition to training a graduate student in the methods of empirical data collection and analysis, the research engages a historically underrepresented group in science into the research design. To measure the effects of resettlement school pedagogy and curriculum on social networks and civic practices of resettled youth the researchers will use qualitative research methods and social network analysis. Research methods for the project include participant observation, interviews, discourse analysis, and archival analysis. Specifically, the research identifies the civic practices and cultural strategies developed by students that are most effective for assimilation and their impacts on government structures and educational programs. The examination of the effects of cultural and social factors on formal refugee and migrant schooling environments contributes to the anthropology of education, migration and refugee studies, and educational policy.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.