Refugee Support Project Reaches New Stage at NCG

NCG has launched the next phase of its student refugee support programme Our Community is Your Community and appointed Shivan Merza, a refugee from Kurdistan, as Project Coordinator.

The programme focuses on helping student refugees overcome barriers they face when arriving and learning in a new culture and society. Project Coordinator Shivan will work alongside two part-time ESOL student advisors, funded by the UK government’s Kickstart Scheme, to provide daily 1-2-1 support.

Since starting in December 2021, the programme has worked directly with approximately 120 refugees, asylum seekers and other ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) students in its Newcastle, Carlisle, and Kidderminster Colleges, and NCG plans to expand this support across all of its seven colleges.

Our Community is Your Community aims to support students in a variety of ways, focussing on activity including technical English language, building social bonds and connections, employability, refugee entrepreneurship, and health and wellbeing.

Liz Bromley, Chief Executive Officer at NCG said: “Shivan, our Project Coordinator has been a real driving force behind the Our Community is Your Community programme to date, which is terrific. As a network we’re lucky to have someone who has experienced first-hand the challenges student refugees face and despite the odds been very successful to lead the programme. As colleges we have existing partnerships with organisations we can work alongside to make it easier for student refugees – for example we are currently working with the travel network Nexus on a range of initiatives, including translation of travel guides and documents.

Students who engage with Our Community is Your Community can have the confidence that Shivan will understand the upheaval, unpredictability, and predicaments they face, given his first-hand experience of what it’s like to be living and studying as a refugee.”

Shivan’s father fled Kurdistan as a young child in 1973 after Saddam Hussein’s regime burned their village, leading him and his family to embark on the 9-hour walk to Syria, where he lived for several years. Shivan was born in 1992 and, after several periods of fighting, his family made it to Cyprus in 1998, and was granted recognised refugee status the same year in the British Military Base Area in Cyprus.

After completing his interrupted education, primary school year 1-2 Arabic, year 3-6 English school and year 7-12 Greek in Cyprus, and subsequent years of struggling to save up enough to fund his education, Shivan went on to secure a place on a Diploma in Oil and Gas for two years. Unfortunately, the political situation at that time meant it was impossible for him to find work in that area. He then secured a place at the University of Central Lancashire’s Cyprus campus to do a business degree, supported by the Director of the Campus. Shivan completed his degree with first class honours at Coventry University in 2021 after a transfer there following changes to his refugee status.

On the value of the Our Community is Your Community programme, Shivan said: “I know the struggle these students face – I had to overcome a lot of challenges and received a lot of support to achieve the qualifications I have today. Whether it’s navigating the automated telephone systems of paying water or electricity bills, applying for UCAS, or filling in forms for childcare funding – the problem solving we do varies hugely, reflecting the many challenges someone faces when navigating a new culture and language.

“Many refugees already have valuable degrees – whether they’re accountants, doctors or teachers – but without support learning to speak English, refugees won’t be able to share these skills with society.”

Our Community is Your Community has developed a year-long programme of events, including a gathering during Refugee Week 2022 (20^th – 26^th June) with an art and cultural exhibition – focussed on this year’s theme of healing – with the aim of sharing work from student refugee’s home cultures.

Shivan continued: “One of the things that I think is important to remember when working with refugees is to see beyond the image of the title ‘refugee’ as these are people with their own culture – aspects of their lives they were forced to leave behind.”

Our Community is Your Community is running alongside NCG’s group-wide programme of fundraising and support activity aimed specifically at supporting the plight of refugees from Ukraine.