Sabine Henry, in her presentation ‘Migration and Environment: a Key Issue with Some Empirical Evidence’ started from the question: How to define environmental migration? Under pressure of environmental factors populations migrate, either in anticipation of slowly deteriorating conditions as in Tuvalu, an island in the Pacific which is expected to disappear in 2050, or under immediate crisis conditions as after the typhoon Haiyan hit the Philippines in 2013. In the first scenario the projected time schedule allows to prepare for migration and retain some control over the process, as such containing the level of vulnerability, which is not the case in the second scenario, that leads to refugee-like situations. Do people return after disaster? In the case of hurricane Katrina only half of the population returned to New Orleans.

The diversity in population movements makes it difficult to define patterns. This is acknowledged in the definition of the International Organisation for Migration, IOM (2007): “environmental migrants are persons or groups of persons, who, for compelling reasons of sudden or progressive changes in the environment that adversely affect their lives or living conditions, are obliged to leave their habitual homes, or chose to do so, either temporarily or permanently, and who move either within their country or abroad”.

How many environmental migrants are there? There is a scarcity of data and the numbers are often controversial but estimations indicate 50 million displaced people today and predict a rise to 250 million by 2050, encompassing 162 million people fleeing sea-level rise, 50 million at risk of droughts and 135 million faced with desertification.

What is interesting to study is, while some people move away, others stay. What are the pull and push factors? When and how do people decide to leave their habitat? Sabine Henry collaborates in the development of a conceptual framework for the UN, the Foresight project, taking into account personal and household characteristics such as age, gender, wealth, ethnicity and religion, as well as intervening obstacles and facilitating factors, such as the political and legal framework, the cost of moving, the existence of social networks and diasporic links, recruitment agencies and technological means. She supervises doctoral research on the difference in attitude between city dwellers and rural populations in Burkino Faso and the gap between the actual situation and the human perception of the situation and how this plays out in the decision to migrate. Results show that perceptions often do not match observed situations.

The key issue being the condition under which people leave, rather than migration itself, the IOM suggests to facilitate migration in the early stages of the deterioration process, to mitigate forced displacement at irreversible stages and anticipate the problem by promoting sustainable development.

Who is more likely to leave and what are the effects on those left behind? Migration might even enhance the resilience of the home community through increased global connectivity and diversity of resources (e.g. through remittances). Further research should also take into account the level of tolerance of a society to environmental change and decision making strategies in light of future risk.

Edith Piqueray presented a project the Department ‘University and Society, Equal Opportunities and Diversity’ of the University of Antwerp has put into place: ‘IKAN, a Tutoring Project to Support Non Dutch Speaking Newcomers in Flemish Secondary Schools’, as an introduction to the second session of the next day.

It is a tutoring programme for educational support by students of the university community (the Antwerp Association of University and Schools for Higher Education) to help newcomers in secondary education who are from another cultural and linguistic background and need to master the Dutch language while integrating into the Flemish educational system and society at large. The pilot phase, which has been completed at the end of the last academic year, shows promising results so that the initiative will be broadened from this year onwards.

In the pilot phase 33 tutees from 4 schools were coached by 10 tutors. The tutors (one of them testifies of her experience in the following session) saw it as a means to develop their intercultural competences (inspiring self-reflection and critical analysis of their own society) and train their didactic skills. The project will now be extended to 4 more schools.

The target group is double. Students from over the world are received in secondary school in specific support classes called OKAN (which stands for education opportunities for newcomers of different linguistic background), organized on the initiative of the federal authorities to cater to the immediate needs of 12 to 18 year olds by orienting them into the host society (with a focus on language learning and inculturation). Students in higher education, from a mostly monolithic local cultural background, gain a learning experience in civic engagement by giving personalized support to OKAN students. That is why the project has been labelled IKAN, referring to the OKAN acronym but meaning ‘I can’.

Given the fact that 70% of pupils in the city of Antwerp are from a migration background, an initiative such as this is no luxury and it responds to the task of the university to render service to society and fits into its policy to attract more pupils from the target group to enroll in higher education (the number of OKAN pupils entering higher education is extremely low, since most of them end up in vocational education).

Afterwards, the 3 speakers were asked what they would like to further investigate within the field of migration and support to refugees. Sabine Henry would like to go further in her analysis of the role perceptions and emotions play in the decision to migrate or not, Milena Belloni wants to uncover practices of smugglers in migrant trafficking and Edith Piqueray proposes to chart the effects IKAN has on the subjects the programme is tailored to.

Stiene Ravn, who contributed a chapter on Refugee Education in Flanders for the Sirius project, a multi-country survey to enhance the education of refugee and asylum-seeking youth in Europe, shared her findings with the audience in her presentation ‘Practices and Challenges in the Integration of Refugee Students in Flemish Secondary education’.

During the school year 2015-’16 the number of foreign language speaking newcomers in secondary education in Flanders had more than doubled from 2059 in September to 4696 by the end of June. How were schools to respond to this influx? The government opted for immediate integration in regular education cushioned by special OKAN classes.

Stiene and her colleagues from CeMIS engaged in field work in two urban schools through participatory observation of the target group upon arrival, during the reception classes and the transition to regular schooling after the support period. They held focus group discussions with the pupils and interviewed stakeholders.

The impact of the sudden influx led to a diversification of the background of pupils (before that time most migrants were of Moroccan origin) and of an increase in illiterate pupils and unaccompanied migrants. The class sizes fluctuated with new arrivals and departures over the year. A need for specific training for teachers was felt. The limited experience with the fairly new instrument of reception education, the impossibility of ability grouping (the newcomers being dispersed over the country) and the vulnerable profile of the pupils, turned social integration within the school into a feat. The interaction between settled and new pupils demanded specific attention. The participation in wider society needed coaching by teaching staff who had to work with socio-cultural and youth organisations. After one year (extendable with another year) the transition to regular classes still needed coaching, especially for the pupils older than 15. The lack of flexibility to devise adapted educational trajectories within the Flemish system (e.g. the obligatory French course presents problems for pupils who are still grappling with Dutch) leads to the famous waterfall effect where a pupil is sent to less demanding programmes and ends up in vocational training with little hope of ever enrolling in mainstream higher education. For pupils older than 18 years there is no follow-up.

Transition seems to be the major obstacle due to structural problems. The compensatory support model prevents structural adjustment of the system itself. Here Belgium could learn from other models practiced in some European countries, such as the comprehensive support model in Denmark and Sweden with continuous teaching support and intercultural learning mainstreamed into education.

A panel debate brought in the views of a director of an Antwerp OKAN school, Joris Verlinden (where Brigitte Vermeersch did her apprenticeship), a diversity coordinator from the municipality of Antwerp, Sylke Blommaert, who is also involved in CURANT, and a tutor in the IKAN-project of the University of Antwerp, Hana Verstraeten.

Sylke coordinates a support team for minors, trying to find schools to receive them, organizing a summer school for 18 year olds, following up on individual trajectories, helping them in study choices, finding vacation jobs and leisure activities, orienting them to various services …It is difficult for them to plan their trajectory when their situation is unclear. These youngsters are forced to become adults too soon. We need to be flexible and innovative in assisting them to strive for realistic aspirations, given their often low level of education and lack of diploma’s. CURANT supports them in building out their networks and helping them out of their isolation.

Joris recognizes that receiving new groups of (often unaccompanied) migrant minors (mainly boys) demands flexibility and the willingness to rethink and adapt the whole organization of the school. How to integrate survivors in our overly structured systems? It is important to allow them space. You cannot impose the same expectations on them with their specific psychological problems. We need to invent new models that fit their situation. This requires stepping out of our (European) reference frame and embracing a broader approach which goes beyond teaching to work together with other actors from the social field. The school forms the bridge between pupil and society.

Hana aspires to become a teacher and was attracted by the IKAN project as a chance to develop her pedagogical skills. Working with pupils from another cultural and linguistic background requires a tailor-made approach. She learnt a lot about Middle Eastern politics through her pupils and encountered a lot of gratefulness.