Faith-based and lay organizations team up for Migrant and Refugee Education

The Refugee & Migrant Education Network (formerly known as the “IIMRE Network”), an initiative working towards connecting universities all over the globe in order to cooperate, research and collaborate in the field of migrant and refugee education, has teamed up with the Being the Blessing Foundation, the Center for Interreligious Understanding, and Manhattan College to host the Global Initiatives in Migrant and Refugee Education Conference 2018.

The Conference will be held from 15-17 November 2018 at Manhattan College in NYC, and aims, among other things, to create a better understanding of the reality and dimensions of the world refugee and migrant crisis, understand the educational needs of refugees, discuss the Global Compact of Refugees and its implications for universities, as well as ways of engaging university students in social responsibility, and to further develop the Refugee and Migrant Education Network in order to answer the tragic rates of refugee youth enrolment to education.

Faculty and NGOs representatives will meet to share best practices in teaching, research and social responsibility regarding refugees as well as to foster and expand collaboration between institutions committed to expanding refugee and migrant education. “Today, networking is key and if we, as Catholic universities and the Catholic church, are able to insist on some of the points presented —especially research, education and social responsibility— I’m sure we will be successful”, said Fr. Fabio Baggio CS, Undersecretary of Migrants and Refugee Section of the Dicastery of Integral Human Development, Holy See. Pope Francis has strongly supported this networking project in an audience with the representatives of IFCU (International Federation of Catholic Universities) and other founding RME members in Rome on the 4^th November 2017 (IFCU helped kick-start the RME Network in 2017 and continues to support some of its projects).

The conference will take place only two months after the Global Compact on Refugees will be discussed at the United Nations General Assembly, and major UN representatives have been invited to join the speakers.

Speakers invited to the 2018 conference in New York City include representatives of world-wide known organizations such as UNHCR, working for the well-being of refugees and migrants, such as Irazú Gómez Vargas, Sin Fronteras – Mexico City, Fr. David Hollenbach SJ, Georgetown University, Dr. Kristin Heyer, Boston College, Ashish Gadnis, CEO BanQu, Fr. Michael Smith SJ and Joan Rosenhauer, Jesuit Refugee Service, Dr. Stephen Rasche, Catholic University of Erbil, Armando Borja, COO Jesuit Worldwide Learning, Dr. Aldo Skoda, Scalabrini International Migration Institute, and Fr. René Micallef SJ, Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome.

To register for the conference, please visit our Eventbrite site. Early bird tickets are available until the end of August!