Two graduating seniors at the University of Utah accepted their diplomas this spring with bachelor’s degrees in nursing. Both have been hired as nurses by the University of Utah hospital, where they both got their start on the housekeeping staff.
These students attended the University of Utah through the Refugee Education Initiative, a privately funded scholarship program that launched in 2014. Besides tuition, the scholarship program offers students a holistic set of services, including dental and vision care, mental health counseling, career services support and connections to existing resources on campus.
Students come from 22 different countries, some recent arrivals from war-torn nations and others long-time residents who were resettled as children. Michelle Conley, refugee program manager at the University of Utah David Eccles School of Business, said there is a higher concentration of students from Bhutan, Iraq, Somalia and South Sudan.
Salt Lake City absorbs about 1,200 refugees each year. At the university, Conley said the David Eccles School of Business seemed like a natural fit for the on-campus arm of the Refugee Education Initiative because of direct ties to employer demand.
“There are so many companies out there right now who really are wanting to hire more diverse students,” Conley said. “By helping support more diverse students, both on campus and within the business school, we’re able to meet that demand.”
Scholarship recipients are not limited to studying in the business school and Conley said they tend to concentrate in nursing, engineering and the sciences. The program supports about 160 current students and it counts 95 graduates since inception three years ago. Besides physical and mental health services tailored to the specific needs of refugees, all of whom necessarily lived through some type of trauma, Conley has coordinated with tutoring services on campus to get students academic support when they need it.
Program leaders are also developing an English bridge program for high school refugee students who got into college but didn’t test into credit-bearing courses. As with many students for whom English is not a native language, college-level writing can be a major challenge.
But Conley said scholarship recipients can get extra help, and it seems to be paying off.
“The average GPA in our program is 3.2,” Conley said. “They’re succeeding in the classroom.”
While refugee education programs like the one at the University of Utah are rare, a number of U.S. universities have welcomed displaced students from Syria as that nation’s civil war grinds on. Without refugee status, however, Syrian students have to get visa approval to study in the United States, which is contingent upon a promise to return to their home country after graduation.
The plight of Syrian refugees has garnered worldwide attention, and the Institute of International Education has taken the lead in supporting the university-aged students among them.
The IIE estimates more than 200,000 university-aged students in Syria have had their higher education experiences disrupted by war. IIE President and CEO Allan Goodman calls the Syria conflict’s impact on these students unprecedented. And worldwide, the numbers are stark. According to Goodman, only 1% of the world’s 60 million refugees attend a university, compared to a global average enrollment in post-secondary education of 34%.
“Education is the orphan of every war,” Goodman said in a prepared statement. “Education in emergencies is one of the most underfunded sectors in humanitarian aid with higher education often considered a luxury.”
IIE is leading a consortium of 60 universities in the United States, Europe, Latin America and Turkey to support the displaced students of Syria with tuition and other financial support.
Meanwhile, the University of Utah continues its efforts with refugee students resettled in Salt Lake.