Document Type

Report

Publication Date

9-10-2026

Abstract

This study examines how school-aged refugee and asylum-seeking students, most of them girls from the "Global South," experience schooling, resettlement, and belonging within the Grand Forks community and the broader U.S. education system. Using a two-phase visual/arts-based participatory design, the research team engaged 34 co-researchers from various countries including Somalia, Afghanistan, Liberia, Burundi, Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico, and Guinea Conakry. In the first phase, 20 co-researchers aged 14 to 20 took part in a photovoice study, using photography, focus groups, and interviews to document their lived experiences. A subsequent arts-based Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) project extended this work through comics, painting, photography, and poetry, developed in collaboration with a community research advisory group. Four core narratives emerged from co-researchers' visual-textual narratives: 1) migration as resistance and survival; 2) un/belonging shaped by racialized experiences, language barriers, and peer exclusion; 3) tension between community-centered identities from co-researchers' home countries and the individualism of U.S. school culture; and 4) the emotional cost of navigating a new education system, marked by both gratitude for opportunity and moments of exclusion. Findings carry implications for school districts, teacher preparation programs, and policymakers seeking to support refugee and asylum-seeking youth, including calls for culturally responsive and sustaining pedagogy, expanded language and tutoring supports, and a teacher pipeline that reflects the communities schools serve.

DOI

10.31356/ehb-fac112

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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