Ongoing Projects

The Interdependence of UNHCR’s 3 Durable Solutions: Refugee Integration in the Shadow of Resettlement Hopes (PI)
with Maria Nagawa, Noa Rubinstein and Ibrahim Kasirye Funded by: Displaced Livelihoods Initiative  (2024-2025)

We examine how refugee perceptions of resettlement opportunities influence local integration efforts in Uganda, drawing on in-depth qualitative data from 20 key informant interviews and 4 focus group discussions (28 participants) conducted across Kampala and selected settlements. Our findings reveal that most refugees prioritize third-country resettlement while underinvesting in local integration pathways, believing that demonstrating self-sufficiency might harm their resettlement chances. This is exacerbated by a problematic information environment where unclear eligibility criteria, limited transparency, and reliance on informal networks fuel misinformation and strategic vulnerability performances. The study further highlights how misconceptions surrounding vulnerability criteria create perverse incentives for refugees to appear perpetually dependent, even as resettlement opportunities diminish globally. We therefore argue that UNHCR's three durable solutions—integration, resettlement, and repatriation—should be recognized as interdependent rather than separate pathways, as refugees' perceptions of one solution directly shape their engagement with others. Our research demonstrates how refugees actively navigate policy spaces, suggesting that effective support should enhance rather than diminish their agency.

In the shadow of two wars: perspectives of statusless children and youth from Ukraine and Eritrea in Israel Today (Co-PI)
with Noa Levy. Funded by: Minerva Center for Human Rights Child and Youth research grant   (2025-2027)
This research project examines the experiences of stateless asylum-seeking youth, mainly from Ukraine and Eritrea, engaging a Youth Advisory Board (YAB) consisting of asylum-seeking youth who will co-design the study, drawing on their lived experiences and expertise to inform the study. The study explores how these young individuals interpret and experience their right to development, as outlined by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), within the context of their precarious legal status and social marginalization and explore their intersecting condition of liminality.

Leveraging Early Adolescence for Development: Longitudinal and Experimental Evidence from Ghana

With Esinam Avornyo, Sharon Wolf and Daniel Oduro.
This study builds on an ERC project that focuses on early adolescence (10-14 years), a delicate stage in human life during which strategic interventions can have a dramatic impact on individual future well-being, both in terms of seizing opportunities and preventing health or economic risks. Unfortunately, evidence on ‘what works’ at this stage is scarce, especially in economically disadvantaged world areas, where 90 % of the world’s 1.2 billion adolescents live. Furthermore, we don’t currently know whether investments at this stage can enhance the effectiveness of support received earlier in life (e.g., early childhood care) or compensate, at least partially, for early-life poverty. An intervention, relying on a sample of 2,500 children and their parents, aimed to address this lack of evidence by developing and testing an innovative and digital parenting program to support adolescents in Ghana. After the intervention, 20 parents and 20 adolescents who participated in the program were interviewed to understand the challenges that parents and adolescents in per-urban Ghana identify and the mechanisms of change and practices that parents find beneficial, particularly relating to stress management, emotional regulation and adolescence-related issues.

Nyerere’s “fossilized” education for self-reliance: Between Washington D.C and Tanzania With Bahati Hussein
Part of the ERC Grant “The Afterlives of Development Interventions in Eastern Africa” (PI: Yonatan N. Gez, ISCTE) – I am a board member of this project.  (2025-2027)
This research explores the contemporary revival of Tanzania's self-reliance education scheme, framed within the concept of the "afterlives of development." Drawing on Julius Nyerere's 1967 guide "Education for Self-Reliance," rooted in his Ujamaa socialist ideology, the model was initially popular but fell out of favor during economic crises and geopolitical shifts. Recently, it has re-emerged, supported by the same international donors who once rejected it, along with Tanzanian actors. Through archival research, interviews, and school ethnography, I examine the revitalization of Nyerere's educational philosophy and its lasting influence in East Africa.

Belonging and Wellbeing in Migration and Education Research

With Tom Nachtingal and Halleli Pinson

This project conducts a meta-analysis and systematic review of how belonging is conceptualized, operationalized, and linked to well-being in migration and education research. Drawing on 450 articles from global migration and education databases and focusing on the period 2000–2024, it examines whether belonging is treated as a process, an outcome, or a prerequisite for academic success. The study analyzes scholarship across leading sociology of education and comparative education journals, alongside migration-focused outlets, to map how belonging and well-being are invoked in relation to learning, safety, and integration. By examining the discourse of INGOs and academic debates, the project aims to trace the connections between these terms and educational outcomes, as well as identify the gaps that remain in theory and practice.

International Students and Political Identity on Campus

With Corey Shdaimah

Research on international students in higher education has primarily focused on their experiences on campus in relation to cultural adaptation and adjustment, academic performance, wellbeing, belonging and economic and policy perspectives. This project looks at the civic and political identities of students from countries involved in conflict in “magnet countries” for higher education. The project aims to understand the experiences of students who are ascribed certain identities and/ or political/ moral/ religious views based on their nationality and the interrelations they have with those surrounding them, around their governments’  involvement and their complicity in conflict. The project builds on Goffman’s (1963) idea of the stickiness of stigma and contamination. This project focuses on students from China, Russia, Israel and predominantly Muslim countries in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Dialogue and critical thinking: Undergraduate academic writing and dialogue (Co-PI)
With Sigal Ben Porath, Ariana Zeitlin and Tom Nachtingal

This study looks at how dispositions for dialogue are developed among undergraduate students at the University of Pennsylvania. The purpose of this study is twofold: 1) to evaluate if, and to what extent, Paideia-designated seminars foster student development of dispositions needed to engage in dialogue across differences; 2) to examine the specific programmatic and pedagogical elements of Paideia-designated seminars that are contributing to student dispositional development. The findings and insights from this evaluation will inform dialogue-centered programming at the University of Pennsylvania and expand knowledge more broadly about the effects of college-level courses focusing on dialogue. It will identify key program components that are most effective towards cultivating student dispositions such as curiosity, humility, and empathy.

Walking to School: Planning for Educational Facility Location in Urban Malawi (Co-PI)
With Tamara Kerzhner and Shahar Livne
In Malawi, going to school is the most common trip taken by children, typically on foot, exposing them to various risks. Managing children’s travel burdens significantly affects household costs, time, and safety concerns. Despite these challenges, urban planning rarely considers school locations, with decisions driven by legislation, land availability, and profitability. Using an interdisciplinary approach, combining the sociology of school choice and the geography of walkability to explore the relationship between school access and urban mobility. The study involves interviews, surveys of parents and caregivers on school choice, and walking interviews with children to capture their daily experiences of walking to school.