Skip to main content

Syrian children in Turkey need education+

Pic: News24
Distressing news coming out regarding a lost generation of children, victims of the war in Syria. Human Rights Watch has released its report into Syrian refugees in Turkey and finds that as many as 400,000 Syrian children there have no access to education.

This is in a context of virtual 100% primary school attendance in Syria pre-civil war and high levels of high school attendance as well as good scores on educational ratings, such as literacy.

This is what war does.

It may be easy to blame Turkey for this situation. But, this country has taken in around 2 million Syrians fleeing violence and a broken country. Rather than blame Turkey - and blame is not a word we like much here, anyway - maybe we should all look at what are we doing as individuals, and at what are our governments and the international bodies that represent us doing about this.

This appears evidence that more needs to be done. It's not about blame, but about finding solutions.*

We take a broad view on education. For us, it's not just about going to school, although that's certainly a vital component of any rounded education for any child. But, is it fair to ask, what is an education? Is it just how to add fractions or to conjugate a verb? Or is about learning how to be healthy, sharing and fair minded person?

Of course it isn't. At its, core a good education is about being challenged, and challenging yourself, in a secure and supportive environment. As such, it's a lot more than book learning.

Recently, the United Nations General Assembly reaffirmed the role of sport as a powerful force in promoting sustainable development and reconciliation, two central issues we humans seems to struggling with the most. The Sustainable Development Goals, agreed on at the end of September, include numerous areas in which sport can have an impact.

This is to say, sport should not be seen as a luxury or as ephemeral. We think it should be part of any education system, including for those in critical situations like these Syrian children.

Children in situations like those Syrian refugees in Turkey need the safety, security and regularity of school lessons. But, they need more. They need to get their childhood back. Let's call it education+. You can learn to read and write in a matter of months. But you can never get a lost childhood back.

All children should have access to the basic academic learning. But they need to know about fun, exercise, physical education, play and fresh air too.

Those of us fortunate to live in peace and abundance take these things for granted. But, children like those who have escaped the Syrian war have had them taken from them.

Education+ means to feel the rush of safe competition and then know how to shake hands at the end of it all. It's to learn you can win and lose with grace. It's to get the feeling of a space that is both shared and contested, to know that rules count, to know that individualism is great but that we work best when we work together.

These are important and valuable lessons for any child. Teaching them to be children again is an investment in our future. Important lessons are embedded in sport, when properly organised. They should be part of any education system, even the most basic.

It is our goal to provide such a service.

* And Turkey has rejected apparent bids to help in its dealing with Syrian refugees, so  the issue is never simple.






Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Post-UNOSDP - Is the IOC fool's gold?

This is a longer version of an article published on SportandDev.org With the United Nations Office on Sport for Development and Peace closed down by the global body, there is undoubtedly a void in this space in which many of us here work. But, for all the high profile oomph the UNOSDP added to the world of sport for good, it’s passing need not be seen as devastating. For one, the work the UNOSDP has already done in its 16 years of life has laid a platform for the development of sport for social justice. While many of us knew for years that sport had a wider purpose beyond mere business or entertainment, the UNOSDP has provided a base of credibility that may have otherwise taken much longer to establish. While much of the work is, in many ways, still to be done, the UNOSDP has left a positive legacy on which we can all build. More problematic is the shifting of the UNOSDP’s brief to the IOC. Obliging the IOC to administer to the peace and development facets
2 comments
Read more

Statement on Funding for the Rohingya Football Club

We are very pleased to announce that The Kick Project has received a $AUD16,500 donation from the Australian Government to fund a pilot soccer program with Rohingya refugees in Malaysia. The funds, coming through the Australian High Commission in Malaysia, will allow the charity to support the Rohingya Football Club which has become a vital part of the exiled Rohingya community in Kuala Lumpur. The program entails kitting out the team, providing transport to games and establishing a sports and community hub where Rohingya people can access sporting equipment and coaching. Young people, and girls in particular, are the long term focus of the initiative. The Kick Project founder James Rose says the Rohingya are in dire need of assistance. "The UN has called the Rohingya arguably the most persecuted group in the world. They've been forced to flee their homelands in Myanmar, where they have been made stateless by government decree, and many have lost their lives
4 comments
Read more

House of Cards: What Might a Post-FIFA World Look Like?

With news that FIFA bigwigs Sepp Blatter, Michel Platini and Jerome Valcke have been "red carded" by FIFA and will have to sit out the next three months, it looks like finally the dead wood is being pruned at the world game HQ. However, worse may be yet come. What can be done to get the people's game back to the people? The current danger is that as the poison is leeched from FIFA, nothing will be left. If corruption is as rife as many - including us here at The Kick Project - believe then more will be shown the door and still more, aware that the gravy train has terminated, will move on voluntarily. The result may well be a vacuum at the heart of the world's most valuable sport. The immediate consequences of this may be no Confederation Championships and no World Cup in three years time or beyond. That's bad enough, but the real concern is who or what will fill this void. There are essentially three likely outcomes. One, would be to hand FIFA over to e
Post a Comment
Read more