What Do School Principals Think about Refugee Students? Experienced Problems and Possible Solutions

Tuba Yavaş

Abstract


This research is a qualitative case study that examines the problems experienced by school principals in the Reyhanli district of Hatay Province in the education of Syrian students and their possible solutions. The sample of the research consists of the principals of 12 schools with the highest number of Syrian students in the Reyhanli district of Hatay Province, using the criterion sampling technique. The data related to the research were obtained from the answers given to the questions prepared by the researcher. The data were subjected to content analysis and results were obtained under two main headings (Problems Experienced with Syrian Students in Secondary Schools and Solution Suggestions for Syrian Students’ Problems) and 4 themes (communicative, disciplinary, psychological and sociological). According to the results obtained, school principals stated that they had problems in communication (specifically, the language problem) and discipline, student and parents’ adaptation to school, and identity information confusion in the e-school in the schools where they work. School principals stated that these problems stemmed from the deteriorated population structure in Reyhanli, and for this reason, reducing the Syrian population in Reyhanli by evenly distributing it to other provinces and districts may be the solution. They suggested that it would be beneficial to increase the number of Turkish courses, the number of Turkish lessons and at the same time cultural adaptation activities to solve the language problem. In the sociological dimension, a proposal was made for the integration of e-school with the population directorate.

Keywords


Refugee Student, Syrian Student, School Principal, Refugee Education

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References


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DOI: https://doi.org/10.7575/aiac.ijels.v.10n.4p.107

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