Refugee students
Grenoble ouvre ses portes

A gateway to higher education studies in France

Since 2015, the University of Grenoble offers one-month trainings in French language to refugees and asylum seekers settled or accommodated in the region. In order to develop the scheme, the university has designed a university degree called "Passerelle Solidarité" (Solidarity Link) in May 2016 specifically for refugees and asylum seekers who want to continue their studies in France.

The training lasts four months and is used as an upgrade. It includes French classes, French culture classes and methodology classes. The training is designed to help students enter a higher education course as early as September 2016 in Grenoble or anywhere else in France, so as to catch up with the studies they had started in their country of origin.

Eyes on the horizon

Fourteen students from Syria, Iraq, Bangladesh or Russia have registered in this new training. Among them are doctors, IT engineers, British literature specialists and microbiologists. Despite the ordeals they had to face, they all have in common an unwavering determination and desire to look up to what the future holds.

"I am a very ambitious person, I want to do everything and nothing can stop me!" said Anna on the university website. She is a credit analyst in a Syrian bank and she had to leave her city invaded by ISIS and flee to France. Now she wants to study in a Master's course in entrepreneurship, and she follows a single motto: "Dream your life and live your dreams".

A tradition of hospitality and solidarity

In order to finance part of the course, the University of Grenoble has launched a crowdfunding campaign. Thanks to a high public involvement, objectives were beaten. The university has guaranteed to use the additional funds to welcome more refugee students.

Hospitality is in the DNA of the Higher Education Centre for French Studied of the University of Grenoble. When it was first created in 1896, the centre was already welcoming families emigrating from Southern Europe to work in local factories. Today, more than ever, as its president Lise Dumasy explains, "the University of Grenoble-Alpes wants to fully play its role of player in the social integration of populations victim of the current global conflicts."

Initiatives are multiplying

Similar schemes have been designed in France over the last two years. Since autumn 2015 for example, the University of Strasbourg offers a semester of free French classes for refugees mainly coming from Syria and Iraq. Mathieu Schneider, vice-president in charge of the section "Sciences in society" is convinced that: "Learning the language is the first factor of social insertion."

Despite budgets often limited, these programmes prove the determination of French universities to participate in an appropriate reception of migrants and refugees.

[Photo credits]

Banner: © Université Grenoble-Alpes

Article body: © Télégrenoble