Category: Refugees

Kyaka II refugee communities celebrate completion of the first four Early Childhood Development Centres.

1/8/2020

Children celebrating outside a new ECD centre in Kyaka II

In July 2020 we broke ground on the start of our sustainable construction project in Kyaka II. Partnering with Haileybury Youth Trust (HYT), over two years we will be working alongside local communities to rebuild and refurbish 14 Early Childhood Development (ECD) centres that we support across the 30 zones of the camp.

Supporting Congolese refugee communities through lockdown

16/7/2020

Severino's family is one of 188 elderly-headed households in Kyaka II, who were supported with supply parcels through lockdown.

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Near the start of Ugandan lockdown, all education services were shut and the World Food Programme cut food rations by 30% for refugees. Since then, our team in Kyaka II refugee settlement have been finding creative ways to get supplies to the most vulnerable households, support teachers and ensure children have access to learning.

Working on the edge with refugee children

9/6/2020

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As we approach our 30th year working with children on the edge of their societies, we reflect on what ‘the edge’ is for the children today and review our progress in working with refugee communities.

Meet Jemima

23/4/2020

This is Jemima's class which she loved to attend.

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Jemima is four years old and attends one of our baby classes in Kyaka II refugee settlement. She started school in 2019 and was very happy with everything in her class. She was a regular attender, along with her little brother and performed very well with her learning.

Tragically her little brother died and this was a turning point for Jemima and her entire family.

She started coming to the centre less often and when she was there she couldn’t concentrate. This led to a fast deterioration in her learning, and she failed her end of year exams.

“The loss of her little brother left Jemima and her parents shaken and demoralised. They stopped seeing education as something valuable and were considering stopping her from coming to school” - Ibrahim Bagwiire (resource person for Kaborogota Zone)

During school break, the head caregiver, a team of teachers from her centre, and Ibrahim made numerous visits to the family where they comforted them and gently persuaded them to bring Jemima back to school. They also encouraged Jemima and talked to her parents about how being back in a safe and welcoming environment on a regular basis would be the best place for her at this time.

Jemima returned when school term began in February 2020 and her teachers decided it would be best for her to repeat baby class so she could fill in the gaps she had missed and have another chance to take the exam. They gave her extra time and attention right up until the time the coronavirus pandemic struck.

By then Jemima was attending regularly and doing very well in both classroom and outdoor activities. The head caregiver attributed this turnaround to the expertise of Jemima’s teachers and himself, adding that training from Children on the Edge Africa developed the skills they needed to help Jemima when she needed it most.

Meet Bawk Kai Mai

10/3/2020

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Bawk Kai Mai is five years old and lives in Kachin State, Myanmar. She and her family were displaced by conflict near their home and had to flee to the mountains on the border of China. Bawk Kai Mai now attends one of the Early Childhood Development Centres we support in these camps.

When I grow up

10/3/2020

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The last set of exams in Lebanon saw some great results. Overall the children achieved a 99% pass rate for the Arabic and Maths tests which were taken by 211 students, and a 100% pass rate for English which was taken by 68 older students.

Exams are graded on a scale of 1 -10 with 10 the highest, 1 the lowest and 6 a pass. The majority of students are high-performing with 70% getting a grade 9 or above in Maths, 67% in Arabic and 59% in English.

You can see from the photo above that the children have loved celebrating, but what would they like to do with their skills in the future? Our partners asked them and here are a few of the responses...

Going digital in Bangladesh

6/2/2020

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In the largest refugee camp in the world, Children on the Edge are pioneering digital learning to deliver meaningful education for our 7,500 students in the refugee camps. Beyond this, the children work together to create and share their own fun packed videos using a digital platform called ‘Moja Kids’.

Meet Gali and Maurine

24/12/2019

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Gali is three years old and his parents fled to Kyaka II refugee settlement about four years ago after a life-threatening conflict erupted between the Hema and Lendu tribes in their village of Ituri in DR Congo.

Uganda is a leading example to the world in the way it hosts refugees, but Gali’s mother Maurine says that since crossing the border into the country life has not been easy. “I was a farmer back in DRC and although the government gives us land here in Uganda, it is too small to use for an agricultural project. We are solely dependent on handouts from the World Food Programme and support from UNHCR”.

Broadening horizons through digital learning - Meet Raiyan

19/11/2019

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Raiyan is 10 years old and a student in a school supported by Children on the Edge in the Rohingya Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangladesh. He has learnt a lot since starting school and is now working at level 2. He concentrates hard in his lessons and is naturally very creative. When his teacher tells a story or describes something that has happened to the class, Raiyan immediately starts imagining it.