Pop Up University pops up everywhere!

One day, this future learning space, designed for the children and teachers in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya, could be the answer to helping refugees and disadvantaged students anywhere in the world.

As more and more countries close their borders to refugees, many more displaced people will need to find a way to begin or continue tertiary studies wherever they are. It is a known and accepted fact that quality education is the only pathway to freedom and a possibility of a life outside of refugee camps or temporary placements in host countries.

Education, for this generation of young people, is the only solution if there is to be any hope of countries rebuilding after refugees return home. War torn or disaster ravaged places need qualified professionals to begin life again - designing and building new cities, new infrastructure, new services. Starting systems from scratch will require innovative thinkers and creatives who can make something new from what is left.

Similarly, refugees know that they need recognised qualifications if they have any chance of gaining employment when they migrate to a new country. In fact, being a skilled worker gives them far more opportunity to migrate than those who require admission on humanitarian grounds. For example, in Australia last year, there were an expected 190 000 migration visas available. 3.2% of those were for refugees seeking asylum.

Refugees can't waste any more precious time. Children and young people who survive can't be allowed to become casualties because they couldn't get to a place that offered them education.

Education is the answer.

The question is... where do we need to go to bring it to the people?

If they can't come to us, we will take education to them.

Pop Up University can go to wherever there are people who need it.

People who need to access the already existing opportunities provided by philanthropic educational institutions need a Pop Up University. There will be a safe place to work; ICTs providing the portal to learning; and mentors providing the Community of Practice that is imperative to persevering with online study.

Pop Up University can be brought into:

* Existing refugee camps.

* New, temporary refugee camps.

* Areas where refugees are being housed within urban communities in host countries.

* Emergency accommodation during and after natural disasters, such as cyclones and hurricanes, earthquakes and tsunamis.

* Remote communities effected by ecconomic hardship and isolation.

Pop Up University is not a band-aid solution.

It brings accessibility, opportunity and support to places where it is most needed. Once these elements are in place, and learning begins, the roll-on effect means that these practices will become embedded, and will continue.

Why?

Because Pop Up University is addressing a need that has been recognised and communicated by the refugees themselves. They have advocated for assistance in the area of training and further education. They know what they desperately need, and they will be able to make use of the flexible opportunities that Pop Up University provides. It is likely, and expected, that the innovative and creative skills of the teachers in Kakuma, or any other refugee camp, would lead to many more ways that the community could utilise the Pop Up University.

Data about migration retrieved online 23rd October 2017 from

https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/rp/rp1617/RefugeeResettlement#_Toc461022106