Aarau
These students are committed to the education of refugees
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Unfortunately, while they are well on their way in their technical work, refugees often drop out of their apprenticeship due to a lack of school knowledge. “It doesn’t have to be,” said a group of students from the region. They now voluntarily give private tuition every Saturday.
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These students help young refugees who are completing an apprenticeship (from left): Anaïs Gutknecht (Suhr), Myuri Retnarajah (Rothrist), Claudia Lomuto (Erlinsbach), Julia Hauri (Oberentfelden), Grischa Ruprecht (Suhr) and Corina Walti (Oberentfelden) . There are other volunteers in the group.
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When refugees finally reach the place where they can live in safety and dignity, they have already come a long and stony path. But even after a permanent admission in the new country, the challenges do not end: Many find an apprenticeship and often do the practical work very well. In school, however, some of them have problems – be it because of the language or simply because of the inadequate educational background.
The school background they bring with them is completely different from refugee to refugee, says electrical engineering student Grischa Ruprecht. The 21-year-old from Suhr therefore had the idea of organizing tutoring for refugees. Everyone would win: Thanks to a good school leaving certificate and a generally better level of education, refugees would not be required to receive social assistance later in life, which would cost the state less in the long term – according to the young student, who is also involved in the Suhr FDP.
Grischa Ruprecht’s idea quickly caught on: his former Kanti colleagues, the pedagogy students Anaïs Gutknecht (21, Suhr) and Claudia Lomuto (21, Erlinsbach) immediately accepted and invited more volunteers. Today they form a group of around ten students who give tutoring to the young refugees on Saturdays.
Tutoring at the “Uma” school in the Telli
That provides the spaces for it Project “Uma – Living and Learning” from the network asylum Aargau, which runs a small school in the Aarauer Telli directly across from the KiFF. Over 50 volunteers work there for the education of refugees; the young students new since last autumn. Education student Myuri Retnarajah (25, Rothrist), agricultural science student Julia Hauri (21, Oberentfelden) and psychology student Corina Walti (21, Oberentfelden) also joined the on-site meeting this week.
Four to five of them each look after a vocational student and help them master the “mountain of school material”, as Claudia Lomuto says. In addition to work and school, some refugees also have to take care of the household and in any case have more difficult conditions than their home school colleagues. In addition to the language deficiencies in German, according to Mynri Retnarajah, the subject of general education is often difficult.
You want to help twice as many refugees in the future
The students therefore accompany the refugees from exam to exam with the aim of ensuring that they do not drop out of their apprenticeship due to bad grades. The contact with the slightly older tutors is extremely important for many: They become local caregivers who can also help in other practical areas of life.
The aim is for the group of ten volunteer students to continue to grow so that more refugees can be helped. “In the future, we want to be able to help around ten students every Saturday instead of four to five,” says Grischa Ruprecht.
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