Learning Pathway DesignMosaik’s Guidance WorkshopsJordan and Lebanon

In 2018 Mosaik Education developed a set of Digital Guidance Workshops, co-designed with youth and their community. Each workshop is composed of eight sessions,which use a blended learning approach, with online education resources facilitated in partnership with local organizations. The workshops aim to help prospective refugee students understand which higher education pathways are best suited to them, set goals, and work on achieving them. The learning is complemented by a peer-support component, where each participant is matched with a mentor who was affected by displacement and are now enrolled in a higher education program.

Currently the workshops are implemented in Lebanon and Jordan. In 2019 65 completed the programme successfully.

Only 3% of refugee access higher education. Although there’s been an increase in the number of scholarships targeted at refugees from the Middle East in the past 8 years, refugee youth still report lacking the skills and confidence needed to submit applications. Furthermore, young refugees are often unaware of opportunities for scholarships and struggle with meeting the high demands of the applications. With the Guidance Workshops, youth are presented with a number of higher education pathways, learning options, and how to best plan towards the higher education option that suits their ambitions and realities.

Mosaik’s team uses a variety of outcome monitoring tools to track the journeys of workshop participants. In addition to collecting baseline and endline data on wellbeing and access to higher education, Mosaik uses reflective reporting tools with facilitators and mentors, conducts outcome monitoring exercises, and hosts after action reviews with youth, mentors, and facilitators at the end of each cohort.

Reported Outcomes – Youth 2019:

• 75% of participants feel confident planning their next step to access higher education after completing the workshop
• More than 80% of participants reported to have applied the skills gained in the workshop after completing the program
• 20% of participants already applied to a scholarship 6 weeks after completing the program

One challenge related to outcome monitoring is the timeframe often connected to a young person’s enrollment into a higher education programme which usually coincides with either fall or spring. Tracking participants over a long period of time is resource intensive and youth contact information often change which hinders Mosaik’s ability to measure long-term impact of program.

The importance of scaffolding learner autonomy in a blended learning context is one of the key takeaways from 2019. Learning to learn independently is a skill that requires practice. As the Guidance Workshops target vulnerable young people, many of the participants have never been given the opportunity to learn or practice these skills.

A learning environment that enables learning is also essential, and adapting to practical and logistical challenges has been necessary throughout implementation. Heat and poor internet connection were two of the most significant challenges, particularly in Lebanon.

The Guidance Workshops help young people make informed choices on access to higher education. The skills, tools, and guidance the workshops provide gives youth options and help them make decisions on which pathways are best suited to them. The ability to know, decide, and move forward is what participants find most valuable and meaningful – and will be increasingly important as the number and range of higher education options for refugees increases.