School Climate

Students of refugee backgrounds are globally engaged learners to who human rights, social justice and conflict resolution have concrete relevance.

Things to consider

• Young people especially question why violence and other threats occurred to their families and communities.
• Students are likely to engage with global issues as a means of recovering from their experiences of persecution, violent conflict and human rights violations.
• Global citizenship curriculum can be included at all stages of schooling and through all learning areas.
• When students develop a sense of global citizenship, they learn to respect key universal values, such as peace, social justice and upholding the rights and dignity of all people.

What you can do

• Educate around global citizenship by integrating global perspectives into the curriculum, drawing on contemporary events.
• Encourage your school to actively engage with its local community around global issues.
• Develop school programs to support students’ understanding of the impact of inequality and discrimination upon citizenship.
• Make the promotion of human rights and social justice an integral part of everyday school life.
• Visit Global Education: Teacher resources to encourage a global perspective across the curriculum.

Students of refugee backgrounds feel supported when their school promotes cultural and religious diversity.

Multiculturalism in the school context means respecting and valuing cultural and religious diversity, and encouraging and supporting all to contribute to the school community. In particular, many new arrivals would like to celebrate or recognise specific religious and cultural events at school as they occur across the calendar year.

Some former RESP schools’ approaches to promoting multiculturalism, have included:

• Placing religious and cultural dates of significance on Compass.
• EAL leader sends an email out once a week about cultural and religious events/dates of significance in the week ahead.
• Expand/develop Cultural Diversity/Harmony Day activities.
• Introduce Refugee Week activities.
• Provide opportunity for SRC leadership group to plan activities that celebrate diversity.
• Hold four cultural celebration days – Harmony Day, Afghan Day (during Eid), Pacifika Day, Indian/Sri Lankan Day (during Diwali).
• Introduce anti-racism/social cohesion programs, e.g. Multipride or similar.
• Create stickers and posters that promote inclusion and celebrate diversity. Stickers have messages, such as ‘Love more. Hate less’, ‘My school is a school where all kids belong’, ‘Don’t tolerate intolerance!’, ‘Support diversity’, ‘Keep calm and respect diversity’, ‘Stop racism’.
• Create video of students saying ‘Hello’ in different languages. Install new display in school reception of students from diverse backgrounds holding signs that say ‘Hello’ in their home languages.
• Develop policy on school’s acknowledgement of religious/cultural occasions.
• Create prayer space/quiet reflection space for students – consult with students regarding the development of the space.

For more ideas, visit Multicultural Education Resources.

To engage effectively with your school, students and families need to understand the school’s verbal and written information.

Effective interpreting and translation services are vital. Interpreters are free for government schools. For more information, visit DET’s Interpreting and translation services policy.

Onsite and telephone interpreters are available for:

• Parent/carer–teacher interviews.
• Information sessions.
• Educational assessments.
• Enrolments.
• Meetings.

Telephone interpreters are available at all times through LanguageLoop

What you can do

• Ensure families know that interpreters are available.
• Create a system for the effective allocation of interpreters.
• Train teachers to understand how to work with interpreters.
• Set up a process for allowing families to provide feedback about service quality.

Tip: Multicultural education aides (MEAs) are not trained interpreters and should not be given that responsibility.

You should endeavour to have as much of your school’s written material as possible translated into numerous community languages.

Government schools can use DET’s Free newsletter translation service, and the DET website has a series of translated generic multilingual school notices in community languages.

What you can do

• Ensure your website is available in multiple languages.
• Use translated audio files (or podcasts) on your website.
• Reduce translated notices to key information only.
• Use the same template (or colour) for all actionable notices (e.g. those requiring permission or signature).
• Establish a dedicated telephone line, in community languages, with key school dates recorded.
• Use visuals to enhance engagement.
• Use smartphone apps for translated group messages.
• Create translated videos with school background information.

‘The MEA is very important to parents from our community. We see her at all times all over the school. She stands in the corridors when parents drop off children and tells them about programs.’ (Parent)

Multicultural education aides (MEAs) (or bicultural workers/family liaison officers (FLOs) in some schools) are invaluable for schools. They  understand the refugee experience and can do much of the work of partnering with families.

Some families report choosing schools based on the presence of an MEA from their language group.

MEAs have a wide range of responsibilities, including:

• assisting newly arrived families settle into the school community
• helping families with day-to-day school tasks (e.g. forms, appointments, events, general liaison)
• assisting communication between students and teachers
• helping teachers understand home cultures and families’ school/education expectations
• integrating EAL learners
• translating school materials when required.

Other MEA considerations:

• MEAs are often exposed to confidential and sensitive information. It is vital to support MEAs by providing supervision and debriefing.
• Professional development should be made available, and the role should be reviewed regularly.
• It helps to profile your MEA’s work among the broader staff so the MEA’s role is clear.

For more information about MEAs roles and responsibilities in Victorian schools, see DET’s MEA Handbook.

Tip: MEAs are not trained interpreters and should not be given that responsibility.

By proactively addressing racism at your school you are providing a vital protective factor for the engagement and wellbeing of students and families of refugee backgrounds.

Schools benefit from dealing with racism in a proactive and public way. The 2017 Speak Out Against Racism (SOAR) study surveyed 4664 primary and secondary students in Victorian and New South Wales government schools and found that:

• About one-third of all students reported experiences of racial discrimination by peers (31%) and just over one tenth (12%) by teachers.
• More than half (60%) of the participants reported seeing other students being racially discriminated against by their peers.

Nearly half (43%) of students reported seeing incidents of racial discrimination directed towards other students by teachers.

Experiences of racism at school may trigger trauma reactions among students and families of refugee backgrounds.

You may feel that students and their parents/carers are being overly sensitive to racial discrimination. They are highly sensitive because direct and indirect experiences of discrimination at school present traumatic reminders of humiliating experiences in their country of origin, or along the journey to Australia.

What you can do

• Learn more about the types and impacts of racism through VicHealth’s Racism and its links to the heath of children and young people.
• Assess your school’s current policies and practices that address racial discrimination by using VicHealth’s Localities Embracing and Accepting Diversity (LEAD) school-based audit tool.

Identify, prevent and respond to racism at your school. See DET’s Bully Stoppers – Racist Bullying resources and the Australian Human Rights Commission’s Let’s talk about race: A guide on how to conduct a conversation about racism.

Your school’s physical environment plays an important role in supporting students who may feel highly stressed at school.

The school physical environment comprises school grounds, buildings, facilities, gardens, décor, and organisation. It should foster interaction among members of the entire school community, while also providing quiet spaces where students and staff can safely retreat as needed.

The Victorian Government’s Healthy Schools Achievement Program defines a health-promoting school environment in this way:

[Quote] A safe environment is designed to prevent unintended injury and to promote inclusivity. This means creating school facilities that promote healthy behaviours, comply with safety guidelines, and making sure that all students can move through you school with ease, regardless of their ability. It also means creating an environment that is free from discrimination, bullying and harassment and where all students and staff feel supported.]

You will see positive impacts when creative and practical strategies are applied across the school’s physical environment to promote safety and wellbeing. Consider supporting ‘co-design’ by involving students, teachers and other staff, and families in the process of improving your school’s physical environment.

Eight participating schools in the 2016–17 Refugee Education Support Program  (RESP) told us what they do across the whole-school environment to support students.

It is important to review how your school’s curriculum promotes inclusion and an understanding of cultural diversity among all students across your learning areas.

Inclusive curriculum supports students’ recovery by restoring their sense of meaning, identity and justice, and promoting their dignity and value. Additionally, with the appropriate curriculum, teachers can assist students to develop an age-appropriate understanding of the political causes of violence and human rights violations.

What you can do

• Collect information and keep records about the cultural and linguistic backgrounds of students.
• Ask your multicultural education aides (MEAs) to contribute their cultural perspectives to curriculum content to make it more relevant to all students.
• Review your curriculum and audit your library resources for cultural bias: Anglo-European culturally biased curriculum resources misrepresent the cultural and linguistic diversity of contemporary Australian society.
• Provide students with opportunities to give curriculum feedback to teachers and school leadership (e.g. How it enables their participation/How racism is addressed/How diversity is acknowledged).
• English: understand that English is one of many languages spoken in Australia and that different languages may be spoken by family, classmates and community.
• Science: identify how ‘race’ is represented in your science curriculum.
• Humanities: examine how identities are influenced by people and places
• Health and Physical Education: allow students to participate in physical activities from their own and others’ cultures, and examine how involvement creates community connections and intercultural understanding.

Helpful curriculum resources

• The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority’s (ACARA) Australia Curriculum Website connects curriculum with student diversity and promoting equity.
• Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority’s (VCAA) Intercultural Capability curriculum resources are available to support the explicit teaching and learning of the Victorian Curriculum F–10: Intercultural Capability.
• The VCAA curriculum resources were developed in collaboration with primary and secondary teachers from government, Catholic and independent schools as part of the 2018–19 Intercultural Capability Project.
• DET’s Languages and Multicultural Education Resource Centre (LMERC) has an extensive range of items to support inclusive curriculum development and multicultural learning.

Your school is a natural context for supporting the health and wellbeing of students. You can support students by anticipating specific health and wellbeing concerns to arise, and being prepared to sensitively respond.

School staff, students, families, communities and agencies in partnership  create a school-wide health-promoting environment. The SIFR whole-school approach is adapted from the World Health Organization (WHO) Health Promoting Schools (HPS) framework.

A Health Promoting School is a school that is ‘constantly strengthening its capacity as a healthy setting for living, learning and working’ (WHO 2011). The Australian Student Wellbeing Framework highlights the importance of teachers, students, families and communities working together to promote health and wellbeing.

Children and young people of refugee backgrounds will have similar health problems to their Australian-born peers (e.g. viral illnesses and injuries), as well as health issues specific to their country of origin and refugee experience.

They are more likely to have health concerns associated with malnutrition, disease, physical injuries, and sexual or physical abuse. The influence of potential health problems should not be overlooked when considering student wellbeing at school.

Useful Resources 

• Refugee Health Guide includes information about the health needs of children and young people of refugee backgrounds. For newly arrived students, a refugee health assessment provides a starting point to address any existing health issues and introduce longer-term preventative health care.
• The Refugee Health Program provides a free service. It is also able to provide education for school staff about the health and wellbeing needs of students of refugee backgrounds.
• The Immigrant Health Service (IHS) at the Royal Children’s Hospital has general pediatric Refugee Health Fellows who provide clinical care for children and young people of refugee backgrounds.
• DET’s Doctors in Secondary Schools initiative funds general practitioners to attend Victorian government secondary schools.

All children and young people of refugee backgrounds, regardless of age or Medicare status, are eligible for free age-appropriate catch-up vaccines. Enrolling students in school is a good time to check that their vaccinations are up to date.

Children and young people who arrive as a refugee or seeking asylum are likely to need catch-up vaccinations.

It is important to ensure that students are vaccinated according to the Australian immunisation schedule, equivalent to Australian-born children of the same age.

Vaccination status can affect Centrelink payments for families under the Australian Government No Jab No Pay policy. Read more about immunisation requirements here. If a family is experiencing difficulties with Centrelink regarding immunisation status, it is best to contact their GP, Refugee Health Nurse or a settlement health coordinator.

Refugee Health Program or Settlement Health Coordinators provide a free service, and you do not need to make a referral. Parents and carers may need support accessing information about immunisation.

Take a holistic approach to assessing young people’s learning and development needs and consider their educational starting points. Students can thrive with additional supports in place. 

Suraya (aged 16) had only been at school for six months, but already they’d booked her in for a cognitive assessment. The school couldn’t make sense of how she just didn’t seem to understand instructions. She’d previously had three terms of the English language school. She was from a refugee camp in Thailand, had been born there, no previous schooling.

There were so many factors impacting on this student.

Exposure to multiple traumatic events, combined with disrupted schooling  and settlement challenges, have far-reaching impacts upon young people’s development.

Things to consider about your students

• Are likely to need extra effort in academic skills acquisition
• May have multiple languages spoken but academic proficiency in none
• May have their age inaccurately recorded (indicator is birth date 31st December or 1st January), which has implications for assessing their learning competencies and school placement
• Are likely to require EAL support across the curriculum
• May exhibit learning and behavioural difficulties, which you should initially interpret through a trauma lens.

Young people of refugee backgrounds may have poor understandings of sexual health, and limited opportunities to learn about sexuality and gender before and after their arrival in Australia.

Your students may

• Be exposed to new sexual cultures
• Be inadequately informed and more vulnerable to blood borne viruses (BBVs) and sexually transmissible infections (STIs)
• Be experiencing high levels of guilt and shame
• Be facing forced marriage and find it hard to tell you about their situation
• Have little confidence in accessing health care services
• Have past experiences of gender and sexually based violence, such as physical assault, Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), sexual harassment or rape.

Student conversations

 ‘I’ve been having these thoughts …’ (Student)

In the context of trusting student–teacher relationships, it is common for ‘awkward’ conversations to emerge.

Things to consider

• Students may prefer to talk with gender-matched teachers.
• Who would the student ordinarily have these conversations with (culturally)?
• What information have they already accessed and from where?
• Is there an appropriate family member to discuss this with?
• Are they comfortable with you including the family member in the conversation?
• Harm minimisation and risk assessment, including:
  • access to online information that is reputable and accurate
  • access to reading material about sexual health and puberty
  • assisting to access another service with more expertise.

What you can do

• Anticipate conversations regarding sexuality, gender and sexual health.
• Understand these conversations with young people in relation to their recovery from refugee trauma, while meeting their developmental needs.
• Be prepared to provide supportive information to students who may have lost family members and social networks they would ordinarily look to.
• Be sensitive to culture and religion, while recognising the importance of young people discussing with safe and supportive adults.
• Include families, when possible, in these conversations, and support families to talk to their children about sexual health and identity.

As a teacher, you may be the first trusted person to come into contact with a child who is facing forced marriage.

Forced marriage is not limited to any particular cultural group, religion or ethnicity. It is important that you know what signs to look out for, and how to support and refer cases of forced marriage.

International best practice suggests that attempts to mediate between people facing forced marriage and their families should be avoided. See My Blue Sky for information and resources for teachers about forced marriage in Australia.

Young people may feel too much shame or fear of being identified to go to an LGBTI service.

Lydia discloses to her teacher that she is attracted to women. This is very confusing and creates a lot of turmoil for her. She states that there are no same-sex attracted people in her community, and that she is fearful if she acts on this … Lydia shares that being a girl in her culture ‘sucks’ and that she often wishes that she was a boy, as life would be easier.

What you can do

• Maintain an openness to conversations about sexuality and sexual identity.
• Acknowledge the great risks some young people take in disclosing to you.
• Remember that you don’t have to be an expert – you can look up information together.
• Do not be embarrassed – it’s not about you, it’s about the young person.
• Use clear language and factual information.
• Be aware of your own assumptions and biases.
• Establish confidentiality.

Useful Resources

• A key part of the Victorian DET’s Safe Schools program is to provide professional development for secondary school teachers so that they are equipped to support LGBTI students.
• AGMC and Rainbow Network have a wide array of LGBTI resources and links to specialist services.

Asylum seeking students and their families are likely to experience poor health owing to:

• Stress and anxiety about the outcome of their protection claims, and being unable to plan for the future.
• Prior extended periods in detention with deleterious effects on mental health.
• Past trauma and torture experiences.
• Financial hardship.

Things to consider

• Students are likely to have adult-like caring responsibilities at home and may be affected by their parents’/carers’ trauma.
• Some families may be reliant on charity for their shelter, food and medical care. If parents/carers do not have work rights they will not have access to Medicare.

What you can do

• You can help ensure adequate supports are in place by identifying students and families who are asylum seekers at enrolment.
• ‘Voluntary School Contribution’ notices are anxiety provoking for asylum seeking families. Explain to parents/carers that these payments are not compulsory, and provide a translated letter with this message.
• Provide families with information regarding local support services and emergency relief providers.
• Support students to access low-cost text books.
• Provide uniform alternatives, ensuring that uniform items can be purchased at a low cost.
• Provide food programs for all students, e.g. breakfast club, sandwiches at lunchtime, basket of fruit and packaged food items.

Children and young people can be referred to Foundation House whether they are newly arrived or have been in Australia for many years.

They are required to meet all of the following criteria:

• Have a refugee or refugee-like background.
• Have a history of torture and/or other traumatic events prior to arrival in Australia or be an immediate family member of such a person.
• Have a history of torture and/or other traumatic events prior to arrival in Australia or be an immediate family member of such a person.
• Consent to receive our services (if under 18 years of age you MUST have the consent of parents/carers).
• Do not pose an unacceptable risk to the safety of staff or other clients.

When do students require a referral?

Not all students exhibiting trauma reactions and disclosing traumatic material require a referral to Foundation House. Where problems are persistent and severely disrupt the student’s capacity to participate and learn, a referral to Foundation House may be helpful. You will need to complete a Schools Referral Form. If you have questions about making a referral, telephone (03) 9389 8900.