Makeshift school on Greek island helps Syrian refugees feel normal again
Children in conflicts, Education in emergencies, Refugees and internally displaced people
Giving children a sense of structure and security, as well as lessons, is the aim of a school run by a Swiss NGO.
Standing with a group of children outside a refugee camp on the Greek island of Chios, little Roza can鶹APPt wait to get an early start to her day.
鶹APPGood school, good school!鶹APP she beams, her backpack on and pigtails bobbing.
Roza, a Syrian Kurd, is one of a small group of children in Greece鶹APPs island camps fortunate enough to get some schooling.
Thousands of others count education as just another loss in the long list of deprivations on the harrowing road from home.
Roza is one of some 270 children who are learning English, mathematics, arts and creative skills with 鶹APPBe Aware and Share鶹APP (BAAS), a Swiss NGO which has been active on Chios since May.
Operating out of a converted former restaurant in the island鶹APPs port capital, the 20-strong team runs classes for children from the age of six, as well as workshops for teenagers about cooking or going to the supermarket.
The school also promotes acceptance of other national backgrounds. And hygiene, including toothbrush use.
鶹APPWe鶹APPre not here to replace mainstream school,鶹APP says Nicholas Millet, a British volunteer and one of the founders of the BAAS school.
鶹APPWe provide an academic curriculum (but) for us, this is about children feeling like children again.鶹APP
BAAS project manager Jacob Rohde says the programme provides 鶹APPa drop of normality鶹APP for children who also experience regular outbreaks of violence in the camp.
But he believes that getting children into mainstream Greek schools is an 鶹APPabsolute necessity.鶹APP
鶹APPGoing to a normal school would provide these children with so much more of a sense of structure, safety and normality,鶹APP the 28-year-old German told AFP outside the school. Inside, a teacher can be heard strumming a guitar for youngsters in class.
At the makeshift Souda camp, 28-year-old Djeneba from Mali is one parent who has agreed to send her child to the Swiss volunteer programme.
鶹APPI want what is best for my child, she is the reason I鶹APPm here,鶹APP says this divorced mother, who fled Mali after her firstborn daughter died from the effects of genital mutilation.
There are more than 60,000 refugees and migrants in Greece. Among them are thousands of children, including around 2000 who are entirely on their own 鶹APP many under the age of eight.
More than half of these unaccompanied minors 鶹APP 1200 in all 鶹APP are staying on the islands of the eastern Aegean.
According to the United Nations children鶹APPs agency UNICEF, refugee children in Greece have on average missed 20 months of school.
On the mainland, the Greek education ministry last week began after-hours classes for some 1500 refugee children in 20 schools around the country.
However, there are currently no classes on offer at schools on several islands housing migrant camps.
The education ministry says children in island camps, many of whose parents have applied for asylum and are waiting to be relocated to the mainland, are on hold as their transfer could be imminent.
But Matina Katsiveli, a former magistrate who helps run a refugee support group on the island of Leros, says such a procedure could take up to six months.
鶹APPThese children cannot mill about all day doing nothing鶹APP this is a very big mistake,鶹APP she says. 鶹APPAnd keeping them indoors with nothing to do will be difficult, especially now that winter is coming,鶹APP adds Katsiveli, part of an Aegean refugee support network which had been nominated to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.
For some, the notion of allowing refugees to attend Greek schools, even at different hours from the local children, is difficult to accept.
Earlier this week, parents at a Chios school circulated a makeshift questionnaire about refugee children receiving after-hours classes there, the tone of which was clear from the preamble.
鶹APP(There is) a difference of culture, socially-acceptable behaviour, religious expression and habits, but it is chiefly a matter of hygiene,鶹APP it said.
Despite assurances by state officials that no child will be allowed to join the programme without vaccination, objections have also been raised at a few other schools on the mainland.
Last week, police had to escort refugee children into a school in Oreokastro near Thessaloniki because around 40 Greek parents were protesting outside.
The education ministry has said more than 10,000 refugee children will enter Greek schools on the mainland by the end of October.
For some, the notion of allowing refugees to attend Greek schools, even at different hours from the local children, is difficult to accept.
Earlier this week, parents at a Chios school circulated a makeshift questionnaire about refugee children receiving after-hours classes there, the tone of which was clear from the preamble.
鶹APP(There is) a difference of culture, socially-acceptable behaviour, religious expression and habits, but it is chiefly a matter of hygiene,鶹APP it said.
Despite assurances by state officials that no child will be allowed to join the programme without vaccination, objections have also been raised at a few other schools on the mainland.
Last week, police had to escort refugee children into a school in Oreokastro near Thessaloniki because around 40 Greek parents were protesting outside.
The education ministry has said more than 10,000 refugee children will enter Greek schools on the mainland by the end of October.
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