JOURNAL

QUALITY EDUCATION FOR REFUGEES IN KENYA
out to explain the high attrition rates for this program. Moreover, the high turnover
rates mean the system cannot guarantee that there will be trained teachers in refugee
classrooms.
Teachers specifically remarked on the need for specialized training to better
address the needs of refugee children “so the environment isn’t harsh.” Another
teacher agreed:
Now because of the situation they are going through it has forced us to
understand that they are going through [a] hard situation. Therefore, one
has totally different ways of handling them. For example, most of them
are easily angered. Therefore, when they are angered we have to know
the way to handle them, not again to harass them. We calm [them] down
and know how to control them. Yes. They are not like normal children
down there or outside the camp.
Teachers also expressed concern about managing tensions between groups
of students from different countries. As one teacher explained: “Because they are
a mixture from different nationalit[ies], we find it difficult to handle them. The
type of hardship they are going through, also the background[s], are different
from different communities of different nationalities, therefore, at time[s] it might
bring crisis in the classroom or out there.” In all the schools, several teachers
expressed particular concern about how to guide male teachers in their conduct
with female pupils. Given their lack of training, new teachers often relied on the
more experienced teachers in the school for “guidelines on how we are supposed
to handle students.” A male teacher at Angelina Jolie explained:
Yeah, they really assist us a lot and they also show us what we are
supposed to do as a teacher, and how we [are] supposed to relate with
the student. Because these are girls, and we are young people, so yeah. So
they used to give us the way on how we are supposed to relate with them.
In sum, many of the teachers we interviewed indicated important training
needs, including the needs of refugee teachers in general, and how best to relate
to female students.
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