TOGETHER IN THE CLASSROM. CHILDREN FROM UKRAINE IN POLISH SCHOOLS. POTENTIALS AND CHALLENGES IN BUILDING A MULTICULTURAL SCHOOL IN THE CONTEXT OF THE WAR IN UKRAINE. TEACHERS’ PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

The aim of the study was to find out about the education in Polish schools of young people from Ukraine, who began to study there in connection with the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation on February 24, 2022. The research focuses on the educational processes themselves, both in terms of teaching, care and upbringing, as well as the broader conditions of these processes in the pedagogical, psychological and social perspective (as well as in the formal and legal context). The main research questions are as follows: 1. What are the previous experiences of schools and teachers in working with foreign children (including children from Ukraine)? What preparation of schools and teachers undertaken to admit children who came to Poland as a result of the outbreak of the war? 2. How is the process of educating children from Ukraine who came as a result of the war organized at the local level and at the level of specific schools? 3. How, in the opinion of teachers, are the relations between children who previously studied in Polish schools and children who came as a result of the war shaped? 4. How, in the opinion of teachers, is the mental functioning of children who came as a result of the outbreak? 5. What, in the opinion of teachers, are the relations between the families of students who came because of the war, and the families of children who previously studied in Polish schools like? 6. How, in the opinion of teachers, is the cooperation between schools and the families of children who came from Ukraine in connection with the outbreak of the war? 7. What aspects of educational work with children who came as a result of the outbreak of the war are difficult for teachers in Polish schools? The findings are interpreted in the context of describing the needs of Polish schools and teachers so that the educational process of young people with refugee experience from Ukraine is maximized and constitutes effective support for them in a crisis situation. The recommendations developed by the authors of the Report and a team of invited experts are both more general in nature, related to the philosophy, assumptions and principles of the support provided, and relate to specific substantive aspects of support that can be implemented in schools.