Episode 2: Education in Emergencies
Jessica Oddy is an Education in Emergencies Specialist and a PhD candidate at the University of East London’s Centre for Migration, Refugees and Belonging, where she's also a lecturer as part of an Open Learning Initiative Higher Education preparation course for asylum seekers and refugees. Her current research focuses on diverse young people's experiences of education in emergencies, colonial legacies, and how race power and privilege intersect with humanitarian education responses. She has worked with organizations such as Oxfam, War Child UK, Save the Children, Lutheran World Federation, and others. She joins us from London, UK.
We speak about:
education as a protection issue
racism in the aid sector
the politics of knowledge production
the demand for programming for adolescents in education in emergencies
the narrative of educability
her PhD journey & action research
equity based design - and much more!
Transcript
Intro: There's some real gaps in understanding or even labeling or naming racism - racism. And it manifests in all areas of the work. But I think I'm hopeful that because of the impacts of Black Lives Matter across every sector, because of COVID-19 really highlighting how it's affected different populations differently, I hope that there's a window of opportunity to really think critically and change these really unequal power dynamics.
Safa: Welcome back to the Rethinking Development podcast. My name is Safa and I'm your host. Thank you for joining me as we speak with and learn from practitioners of all career stages and organizational affiliations around the world. In our conversations, we aim to rethink ethical behavior and best practices through the lived experiences and personal reflections of different guests. Today I'm joined by Jessica Oddy. Jessica is an Education in Emergencies Specialist and a PhD candidate at the University of East London’s Centre for Migration, Refugees and Belonging, where she's also a lecturer as part of an Open Learning Initiative Higher Education preparation course for asylum seekers and refugees. Her current research focuses on diverse young people's experiences of education in emergencies, colonial legacies, and how race power and privilege intersect with humanitarian education responses. She has worked with organizations such as Oxfam, War Child UK, Save the Children, Lutheran World Federation, and others. Jessica, thank you for joining me today. It's great to speak with you.
Jessica: It's great to be here. Thank you so much for having me on the podcast.
Safa: Wonderful. So just to start the conversation, I know you originally trained as a teacher, could you tell us what motivated you to become a teacher? What were some of the experiences that drew you to that career path?
Jessica: So I had maybe kind of an unconventional entry into into the humanitarian sector, but also in education. I live in the UK. And growing up, I was part of a scheme which was aimed at children from socially economically marginalized areas, to try and support them in accessing higher education. Because at the time, this was in the 90s, there was a huge, huge disparity between children who were from less economically affluent areas, accessing higher education. And so I participated in this scheme. And it really opened my eyes to the possibility of higher education being a possibility for me. And whilst I was at university, I was very fortunate to be able to do an exchange with the University of Havana in Cuba, and that really opened my eyes to so many things. I was sharing and living in the student accommodation there and attending classes in Havana, with students from around the world - from Haiti, from Western Sahara territories, from Palestine, from the Brazilian landless movement, from Venezuela. And it opened my eyes up to education as being a form of humanitarian action, but also south south humanitarianism, and the whole history of - well Cuba's history of international development and their approach to it. And I realized that I wanted to work in this area, in education, but in some of the contexts where my classmates were telling me about. So after graduating, I taught in the UK, I trained as a secondary school teacher, through a scheme called Teach for All. It's now a global movement, its in many different countries. And after doing that for several years, I then took my masters in humanitarian action, which led me to an internship in Israel, where I worked for a charity, the African Refugee Development Center, which worked with African asylum seekers from Sudan and Eritrea - which at that point in 2010, over 80,000 asylum seekers had crossed into Israel in that year, and many of them were unaccompanied children for who one of the driving factors had been that they wanted to continue their education. Some of them were coming - well from different contexts, from protracted refugee displacement settings, where they had been very, very few opportunities for them. And that led me to a short consultancy with UNHCR, and from there my first education emergency role with Save the Children in 2011. That was my route from teacher to education in emergencies.
Safa: Very interesting. So you mentioned your MA research. In that work, did you feel kind of a sense of responsibility to have your research be translated into advocacy and policy change? Were you drawn to being on the side of programming and policy change and contributing to that work?
Jessica: Yeah, so when I went to Israel, I was doing my master's thesis and I was looking at education experiences of asylum seekers and refugees. And through that, I came into contact with UNHCR and at that point, there really wasn't a focus on education access for refugees and asylum seekers. From a global perspective, UNHCR, they weren't really advocating or seeing this as within their remit, they saw protection as being perhaps quite a narrow, narrow focus on kind of like traditional protection programming, but not seeing education as falling or being a type of protective service. And so very early on, I hoped that my research could contribute, at local or national level, towards perceptions of education and also highlight the need for this to be a focus in refugee displacement settings. Since 2011, UNHCR has really changed their position, I think, in education emergencies and education in refugee context, there's a you know, push from global level for this to be a priority in displacement setting. But for many years, this wasn't considered an essential service by the majority, I would say, of humanitarian agencies and providers. You know, there's varying stats, but the average time in displacement is, I think, around 20 years. So if you get displaced as a child, or as a teenager, you could spend all of your educational cycle in a displacement setting, with very, very few opportunities open to you.
Safa: And so you continued your work down that career path, you are working later in Ethiopia and South Sudan. And in the context of education in emergencies, did you have certain experiences that made you realize that maybe more critical pedagogy or more equity based or anti racist based approaches were lacking, or something that wasn't really embedded in programming?
Jessica: Yeah, I mean, very, very early on, it became very obvious to me that there were some very serious unequal power dynamics - not just within the education and emergency sector, but within humanitarian aid in general. I'm British Nigerian heritage, and when I was entering these spaces, and these international organizations, I was very, very surprised by the lack of diversity, whether it was in a head office position - I think, particularly in a head office, when the head office is in a city like London, which is possibly one of the most diverse places on the planet. And yet, you could go into a headquarters, and it would be perhaps 90% white, middle class. And when I went overseas and worked in some of these contexts, the power dynamics became even more stark across all areas of, I guess, the humanitarian system. So from the structures, the way that, you know, programs were designed, the unequal partner dynamics, I mean all of the things that are being discussed at the moment around the inequities and racism in aid, of course, these affects every sector, and education and emergencies is a part of those sectors. So all those behaviors, problematic behaviors were being replicated in the sector.
Safa: And in your, you know, workplaces, with your colleagues, did you feel like at that stage that there was, you know, opportunity to bring those concerns up?
Jessica: I would say until last year, there's been very little acknowledgement that racism is an issue for our sector. And that kind - it reflects what you would see in education in international development in general. And there's been some really, there's been some critical pieces written about this, that there's a sort of erasure of race or silencing of race within the sector, people don't talk about it. It's like the elephant in the room. And it's only now I think that these things are being labeled what they are. And of course, there are so many examples in this field where you know, education in emergencies has enabled access to millions of children to have education in some really, really challenging difficult issues. You know, there are people who advocate very strongly for inclusion, for gender sensitive mainstreaming and recognize the need for like mother tongue multilingual instruction. But on the other hand, there's some real gaps in understanding or even labeling or naming racism - racism. And it manifests in all areas of the work. But I think I'm hopeful that because of the impacts of Black Lives Matter across every sector, because of COVID-19 really highlighting how it's affected different populations differently, I hope that there's a window of opportunity to really think critically and change these really unequal power dynamics.
Safa: Yes, and as you mentioned, this manifests in different ways. And you've written about how non- western educational pedagogies and frameworks, how they're not integrated in education in emergency services. Could you speak to us a bit about the hegemony of western knowledge systems and the harm that that perpetuates?
Jessica: Yes. I think, you know, the knowledge production is really, really problematic and it really relates to, I guess, the way the structures, the policies, the systems that are in place. But take, for example, there's a real issue with diversity within the sector, within global level education in emergency positions, there is such a severe lack of diversity. Because there's been this avoidance of looking at things like racism, it impacts the way that we respond to education in emergency programs - in terms of things like the programmatic design, which is one of the main services that education in emergency responder should be doing. But so often, the design and delivery of the program - well the design of the program, at least, is done by a very different set of people who will then be tasked to deliver the program. And what that results in is somebody perhaps, who has very little understanding of the local context, the language, the cultural and spiritual dimensions, the contextual knowledge of the current education system, being in a position where they are then designing a program which will be rolled out to potentially 1,000s of children in that emergency setting - which is extremely problematic, and also quite ineffective. Because we're seeing that there are lots - of course in emergency there are going to be lots of challenges for children learning, but the responses that we have aren't necessarily able to address the needs of the learners or the families. And I think that is because of the unequal power dynamics. And an example I can give is around how kind of at a global level, there tends to be a particular focus on what is considered an education emergency response. So there's a focus on early childhood or primary education as being the main priority. Whereas if you go to a displacement setting, and speak to children and families, there is a huge, huge demand from adolescence, from adults, for the opportunity to learn and to have access to education services. But these opportunities are so few and far between. And it's really because the people who actually are the ones who need the services - their voices are not being heard in these forums or their voices are not a part of the decision making or their voices are not part of the design of the program. You know, as an education, in emergency practitioner, I also know I've been complicit in this in many instances. I remember years ago, when I was in South Sudan, working on a program, there was an opportunity for a proposal for an education program. And so we did you know, the the usual needs assessment, and you went and talk to teachers, went and talked to young people, we used focus group discussions, came back, wrote the proposal, which was then funded, but it was funded for education for children up until 3 and 17. And when the teachers then had to enrol students in the classes, of course, there were children older than that who really wanted to participate - there were adults who were saying, well, actually, we haven't had an opportunity to learn for many, many years, are there going to be adult learning opportunities? And when they came to me, I was like, well, no, it's not in the proposal. And the head teacher said, well, you know, that's all well and good for you, you don't live in the camp. But he's like, I have people coming and knocking on my door every day saying, I want to be enrolled. And I'm the one who has to say, you know, sorry, that's not possible, even though of course, the communities wanted this. And it continues. I mean, I think the absence from the people who are actually affected by the crisis in the design process of programs is extremely problematic. And it's something that, you know, since I've really, really woken up and realized that this is something that needs to be addressed and something that we need to advocate for. And there's loads of examples - positive examples of where actually equity based design, particularly in education spaces can transform classrooms, can really tackle and be radically inclusive and I think that's something that as a sector, we need to definitely get better at doing.
Safa: That example also connects with the role of donors and the role of funders and the power they kind of have in shaping programs. Could you speak to us a bit about the thoughts that you have in terms of the role that they play in relationship to the other stakeholders within the context of education in emergencies?
Jessica: Yeah, so I think, well, for many years, education in emergencies wasn't funded, it wasn't seen as a priority. And there was a lot of advocacy around highlighting that actually, education is a right, that this is something that people want and deserve to have access to in conflict or crisis affected context. And I've been working in this sector for nearly 10 years and I've definitely seen that big donors such as ECHO, USAID, SIDA, DANIDA, - all of these donors, they're now on board with the concept, with the idea of education in emergencies being a priority, or being been part of the kind of humanitarian system. But there is still a massive disconnect between who gets to determine what should be a priority, what sorts of education programs should be funded. And perhaps it's because of my background as a secondary school teacher - I was so shocked when I first went and started working in these spaces, the way that donors, but also NGOs were so dismissive of programming for adolescents or education opportunities for adolescents. I mean, there are some exceptions, for example, MasterCard, Foundation are doing some really innovative stuff around supporting adolescents in emergencies. But predominantly, the focus is on primary and early years. And that's not to say that there shouldn't be funding for these two really critical ages, age ranges. But there also should be funding available for adolescents and youth and adults as well, because we cannot even think to address wider issues when we have, you know, over 700 million people, you know, lack basic literacy skills. Yet, if you're in a displacement setting, it's very unlikely if you're above the age of 12, or 13, that you're going to access or be able to access an education program for your age. However, I have been in donor engagement events where donors have pushed back and said, actually, we would fund this age range, but we never get proposals, we never get this put before us by the INGOs. And I found that really, really interesting. It made me really question like, Where is this resistance or dismissal of supporting this age range in emergency context? And that's really formed part of my research and looking into things around the kind of history of education emergencies, or the history of education in international development, is deeply deeply intertwined with colonialism and concepts of colonial education. And within the kind of British colonial history anyway, there was this real concept of educability- this idea that certain populations weren't able to access or didn't have the kind of cognitive ability to access higher education or that, you know, it was enough to give people basic education or technical training. And so I'm really interested to explore how those legacies continue to manifest in the programming that we do today.
Safa: That's such important work. So you mentioned your PhD research. So after some years of working in the sector, you decided to begin your PhD journey, could you tell us about that decision and that transition from the field to academia.
Jessica: I started my PhD in 2018. And that really came about again, from many years of working in a whole range of different education in emergency settings, and really wanting to understand why secondary education or a adolescent program was kind of perceived as like a luxury or a second priority. And I wanted to kind of understand this rationale a bit deeper and decided to do my degree at the University of East London because they have a Centre for Refugee, Migration and Belonging, which is really rooted in kind of scholar activism. And they have been very, they were very active in the - I say with quotations like the "European refugee response" back in 2016. They set up a University for All in Calais, which was a huge displacement camp in France. And they do a lot of very interesting work with asylum seekers and refugees in the UK. And one of the reasons why it was really important to be in an institution like that is because of, I think you mentioned it earlier, like some of the real issues that we see in academia, but also in aid around knowledge production. And this kind of really extractive nature of knowledge production, I guess, colonial in many contexts, the way and methods that are used to kind of mine displaced populations for information. And so I wanted to be somewhere where I could learn about more - well, learn about kind of like decolonial research methodologies, learn about kind of action research, and really co-creating research design with refugees and asylum seekers. And so the focus of my research is really about collaborating with young people, co-creating research design questions together, collecting data, looking at ways that they feel comfortable with this information being shared and kind of challenging a lot of the kind of deficit narratives that we we see or are common in kind of INGO, policy, advocacy and comms.
Safa: So this deficit narrative, or you know, your work on the concept of educability, could you tell us a bit about how that has shown up in the work that you see in the sector, or the work that you've been involved with when you were working in the field?
Jessica: So each year, there's, you know, as part of the humanitarian program cycle, all of the sectors set their kind of response plans for the year, and you can just go on humanitarian response info, and you will see, for every country, there is a humanitarian response plan. So as part of my research, I started to look into these humanitarian response plans and time and time again, there were so few - when they set their targets and they say, for example, we're going to reach 500,000, children with education services - so frequently, there was an age bracket on that. And there are very, very few opportunities for adolescents, perhaps, 1000, in a context like South Sudan, you would see that within the humanitarian response plan for that country, they were only seeking to support that amount of very small, minute number of adolescents. And it's really problematic when you see this in reality. Like a few years ago, I went, I had an opportunity to go to Uganda, where I was supporting a project that was doing children's consultations with young people in three different refugee camps in the country. And I remember going to one of the camps and in a camp with a population of 100,000, with a high number of adolescents who had come from a number of different locations, from the Democratic Republic of Congo, from South Sudan, there was only one Secondary School which had the possibility of teaching 100 children. And you know, in a camp where there's 100,000 people. And when I was talking to the different nongovernmental organizations who were working in that space, this was not a priority for them. They didn't see this as something that they should be advocating for, that this was a kind of organizational priority. So I think one of the drivers perhaps behind doing this research is, first of all, to contribute to a body of evidence where there's very, very little that looks at this age range, and also to try and and show that actually, young people are really, really desperate for these opportunities and to have these opportunities and for organizations to really unpack why they don't see this age group as a priority. And I think if we did have more equity based programmatic design, and we did actually involve people from the get go in the project design, our responses, not just for education, but for all our sectors would look very different.
Safa: Yes, so earlier, you mentioned that in your current research, you're trying to use approaches or research methods that are more around co-creation. Could you share more about how you think maybe those can translate to the development sector or humanitarian sector?
Jessica: Yeah, so I've been really influenced by a lot of the decolonial scholars and decolonial scholarship, the legacy of empire, we've got 500 years of history and resistance to coloniality. But I think in the past few years, there's been a kind of resurgence of interest around decolonization and what that means. As a term, it runs the risk of becoming a bit of a buzzword. In essence, it really is about interrogating, actively dismantling, and seeking to move beyond colonial modes of knowledge production, systems, structures and policies. And that means that we have to really, really be mindful of all actions. Anyone who is working in a humanitarian context has to, I think, have a level of reflexivity. And from an academic perspective, there's been loads of writing on this by - particularly in like critical race theory, by scholars like Patricia Hill Collins, from Kimberly Crenshaw, around intersectionality, there's a whole wealth of scholarship out there around being mindful of how our positionality shows up in different spaces. And so for the humanitarian sector, I think we need to be really reflective on ways that we collect data, the way that we design programs, to be really mindful of who is in those spaces, who gets a seat at the table, we need to be mindful of our own positionality. So even if we're working in our country of origin, we all still, you know, have different levers of privilege. And we need to be mindful of that - how that shows up in our work and how that may influence how a problem is framed. Or even if it's a problem in the first place. We should be considering if people who are impacted by the crisis get a say in the decision making? And if not, what ways are we planning to share the power with them? And I really think just like in action research, which is all about kind of challenging the hierarchy of knowledge in academia, within program design, we need to be positioning those who are at the margins, as the leaders in the design process and the experts in their experiences. You know, it's not for somebody like myself, who may not know the historical or economic or, you know, with very limited understanding of the crisis to come in and to design an education program. It's not something that would happen in western countries. You know, just take COVID, for example, we didn't see people from different countries flying in and shaping our education responses. So we shouldn't have this assumption that we're the best people to do it in these settings. The other thing is around relationships, which is really critical, something that comes up in research, but also within development and humanitarian aid is around the kind of unequal power dynamics that shape kind of international, non governmental organizations and local actors. You know, very often local or national partners will have limited scope to be in the project design phase, to negotiate budgets, to actually give critical feedback to the implementing partner in that role. And for me, I think we see such inequity, in the EIE setting atleast, because we're trying to design inclusive programs, but our processes are not inclusive. You know, the right people aren't in the room. And so how can we expect to have an inclusive outcome? I also think, to be mindful, or try and reflect on how you know, or if local, national customs and practices of working together or to include or exclude, we should be as much as possible - and I say we, I mean, whoever's in the kind of positions of power, people who are in any position of power need to be thinking about how they are going to cede power. How often a community that is affected by a crisis is meaningfully engaged in planning an organization's response? Or even getting to see the response plan? It is very infrequent. It's very rare that we have kind of even strategic advisory groups with difference national hyperlocal stakeholders who have a critical role in inputting, reviewing, monitoring and challenging kind of our programs. This kind of two way learning doesn't seem to be a priority. And when I'm saying all this, I'm not - while this is something that I've noticed in education in emergencies - I know it's something that is prevalent in all of the sectors, this unequal power dynamic or exclusion. But I think why it's particularly pertinent in education contexts is because there's a whole industry behind, I guess, like the knowledge production and you know, who develops the guidance, who develops the toolkits which are often used in these responses? If they're not from a local or national perspective, then how useful can they be in these contexts? Not to dismiss you know, everything - of course, there are approaches that have been maybe successful, but we shouldn't just be copying and pasting from one response to another. And I think the other key thing is to make the invisible visible. So I've yet to read an education in emergency report that acknowledges the huge role that communities play in supporting each other with education opportunities, that highlights the role of diaspora communities, that demonstrate kind of local initiatives to resource mobilization. There's, you know, very little visibility of the role of national partners and community led organizations in most lNGOs kind of social media advocacy and comms. Even in terms of the dynamics - so, again, at global level, why is it that we have in many of these bodies, you know, predominantly all white, all anglophone staff leading initiatives, or in these spaces?
Safa: Yes, so many important points. So to follow up on one of them, in your work over the years, have there been times I guess, when maybe you were in a work situation where a colleague or manager reacted in some way in which you thought that was incorrect use of their power? And did they cause you to think maybe, you know, I don't feel like this is the place for me or no, it just motivated you to change things?
Jessica: Yeah, I mean, one of the reasons as well, I think that I decided to take a step back from being a part of this expatriate kind of overseas deployment or overseas deployment types of roles is because I realized, I was very uncomfortable with my complicity in a sector, in a humanitarian structure that I found to be incredibly hierarchical, with real racist policies and structures in place. So just thinking about places where I've worked, you know, in South Sudan in 2011, 2012, at the height of the civil conflict there, you'd have, you know, people who were, who had been displaced in extreme poverty, living in Juba, living in the graveyard, next to hotels, which on the weekends were full of expatriates spending $40, $50 on a bottle of wine, and complaining incessantly about national staff, or the fact that nothing worked in that country, whilst you know, driving around in four by fours. I found that as a sector, you know, there are some real issues that need to be addressed. And, of course, like talking to my colleagues in these contexts, I mean, they see these inequities, they see the fact that expatriate staff get more R&R than they do, you know, they get to go home and visit their families more than they do. They know that they're getting perhaps a third of the salary that somebody else is getting, despite doing, you know, often more of the work. They see, you know, who gets to speak in meetings, the meetings are often in English as well, regardless of the of the country. And you know, there's the power of language. If we speak the language, then you can participate. But the fact that, you know, it was only last year that I was on a call where we had simultaneous translation, and I was like, wow, this is so refreshing. Because in the majority, at global level, at least, most of these panels, these discussions are done or delivered predominantly in English. And so you've got a very narrow group of people talking to a very narrow group of people, and excluding, you know, 1,000s of people who actually probably do have the solutions or do have valid input into tackling some of these issues.
Safa: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Now that you have taken this step back, and you know, you have more the researcher, lecturer hat on, do you feel like this is the place that you'd want to stay? Or do you do have this plan to after your PhD, focus more of your work and your time on program design work opportunities?
Jessica: That's a great question. I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. I've really questioned what my or if, you know, I should have a role in this sector and what my role should be. And I think at the moment, I should be using the privilege that I have to be highlighting some of these issues which is easier for me to do then for somebody else - you know, the repercussions and I think that's one of the luxuries of doing independent research work is that the independency means that I may be able to say things that people within their organizations may or may not feel comfortable or able to say, especially if they are, you know, in an organization with very little, which is the norm, with not a very diverse body, or if they feel that they could be penalized for highlighting some of the systemic racial and intersectional inequalities that shape the sector. So for the moment, yeah, I think I'm quite happy to be in the research role. And I think it's really important that as a sector, we improve the way that we do research, that it shouldn't be extractive, we should improve our practices. And we should look at the ways that the, you know, research issues are framed, like, who gets to decide whether something is is an issue and who gets to shape the data, who gets to decide what data is important? I think there's definitely room for criticality there.
Safa: And thinking about your work in terms of your research with young people who experience displacement and their access to education, what are some of the things you're learning from young people?
Jessica: Great question. So, so much has been coming up from the action research. I mean, first and foremost, the young people who are engaged in this project, they are kind of peer researchers. So they're conducting the research amongst their peers, and using a wide variety of methods to do that. So from photo-voice, using photography, audio, blogs. From that, we're really getting a really rich data set. I mean, one of the key things is that there is not one kind of universal refugee or IDP education story, each student is highlighting their own journeys, their own challenges in continuing their education, but also the importance of peer networks and the important role that families play in enabling young people to continue to learn in really, really challenging contexts. We're also learning a lot around how young people hope to use their education, how they see it is critical for addressing multiple areas in their life. And not just for individual gain, either - like seeing it very much tied to wider kind of social justice issues. Young people that I've spoken to, or whose stories have been shared with me, when they're saying they hope to become a teacher or a doctor or an entrepreneur or business owner, it's not just for their own economic benefit, but thinking about ways that that can support them and their families. Yeah, and they see it as one of the kind of key things that they need to really thrive in this world.
Safa: And one aspect of going through experience of displacement, and also just working in education in emergencies is the need for a trauma informed approach and being trauma sensitive. Have you faced that challenge?
Jessica: Yeah, of course, I think having a trauma informed approach is critical to the work. I mean, I think all humanitarian work should come from a trauma informed approach. And so often it doesn't. And so often, you know, the way that policy or comms is done is from a very, is often from a practice, which can actually re traumatize the people that are supposedly, you know, we're supposed to be trying to help. And that's why I think it's really important that we really reflect on the practices that we use. So one of the things about participatory action research is that young people design the questions themselves. When we do risk analysis with young people, it's really to discuss risk in all its elements. Like if you were to ask somebody this question that you've suggested, what could be some of the consequences of doing that? What could this potentially trigger? How is this trauma sensitive? How are we making sure that what we do doesn't do more harm. So having this trauma sensitive approach is is really critical.
Safa: We've spoken a lot about what needs to change but in trying to kind of go more to what are the practical approaches that can be implemented - could you speak to us a bit about your understanding of equity based design and its relationship with the outcomes that we hope to achieve.
Jessica: So I think that if standard education in emergency responses were designed from an equitable base, they would be decolonial and accountable to affected populations by default. That will be the outcome. And by equity based design thinking, for me it is just a really interesting approach. It comes from design thinking, which was this kind of initiative that if you're designing a program or designing a product, then you really need to stay focused on the people you're designing for, and by listening to them directly, you're going to arrive at the kind of the optimal solutions that meet their needs. But design thinking, I think, similar to like the humanitarian program cycle is still problematic, because it doesn't challenge the notion of expertise, like who gets to be the expert? And of course, we know that that is often linked to kind of colonial hierarchies of knowledge, and that we so often see in many different spaces that you know, the intersection between race, gender, social class, your passport, can determine how your valued in a space and whether your ideas will be taken up or not. So there's assumptions to this term expert and that these should be two separate groups. And with that, this assumption about the roles and responsibility. So equity based design thinking is kind of like the next stage from design thinking. And it's really about repositioning the expert and saying that actually, the person whose voice should be the most prominent in the design phase is the person who's going to be benefiting from this intervention. That really will shape the way the problems are framed and the way the solutions are proposed. Now, equity based design thinking it has its origins from the US so in itself, its also not particularly the colonial method. But I do think it really opens our eyes to a process which allows us to really ensure radical inclusion. And there's loads, there's a lot of different models around actually based design, but I really liked one, which is called equityXdesign, which I think is really applicable to education in emergencies, because it states: you should be approaching any problem by looking into the historical context, with this principle of radical inclusion, and the importance of process of product. And then they have five principles, which they say, if you want to do this, you're required to design at the margins, start with self, so self reflection, ceed power, make the invisible visible, and then speak to the future. And this last thing about speaking to the future is, you know, putting in place structures today that we need, if we really want to reframe, reframe aid, if we really want to have an equitable aid sector, then we need to make sure that our actions radically rethink and address you know, the prevalence of like racism, power imbalances and inequities that show up in so many of our programs. For example, in EIE, education in emergencies, we may have this big vision around an equal number of girls accessing education. So then we need to be thinking about like, you know, what is the curriculum? What is the local context, what are the local knowledge is that we can be using? Who are the stakeholders that need to be creating the solution? What are we doing to support female teachers in the classroom? What are we doing to support the training of female teachers? How are we making sure that there's post primary opportunities for girls to aspire to? What funding is available within the community or within non-traditional donor driven funding opportunities? How are we engaging with cross thematic areas or local networks or diaspora groups and national plan based diversified funding? Like what are we doing to reposition advocacy to shift this change? I think as a process equity based design thinking offers a really great way to helping humanitarians to reframe current humanitarian programs.
Safa: Yes, absolutely. For maybe for many people, it's a new approach. It's something that they haven't really heard about yet. So thank you for the overview. And I think it gives a lot of food for thought.
Jessica: Yeah, I think that you know, this type of dialogue is needed more than ever because we know global displacement is at an all time high. And we know that today the reality is that forced displacement is not only more widespread based, it's not a short term or temporary phenomena. And that means that the programs, the structures, the systems that humanitarian actors design today, lay the foundations and set the pace for decades to come. So we need to be, we need to be really, really critical and future thinking when designing programs.
Safa: Yeah, I think that's so well said, thank you so much for those words. It's been great to speak with you, we've touched on a variety of things. It's been really enriching and there's a lot to take in and think about. Thank you so much.
Jessica: Thanks for having me on. Thank you so much.
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