How do non-citizen children claim space? A comparative place-based methodological exploration
According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), of the 117.3  million displaced people worldwide,  47 million are children and youth, many of whom live in urban areas. Understanding the lived experiences and barriers to education for displaced children, most of whom will be living outside their country of birth for protracted periods, has never been more pressing. While scholars and policy-makers attempt to understand best practices and their influence on children’s well-being, educational trajectories and social integration, the differences between contexts make it difficult to compare the experiences across different case studies. This has often led comparative scholars to focus either on the implementation of a specific policy or legacy of a specific tradition (e.g., colonialist, feminist) or to choose several particular variables, which inevitably means that complexities are lost and critical issues may be overlooked (Brown and Schwisfurth 2024). Spatial analysis allows us to look at the social production of space at local scales (Vavrus 2015, 138) and consider context through space. Employing Massey’s framework of looking at how trajectories interact in space allows us to look at “power geometries, " investigate school-community interactions, and open up the context complexities (Dunne et al. 2021). Based on three case studies in urban centers in Kampala, Uganda, Tel Aviv, Israel and Philadelphia, United States, this paper argues that this framework allows us to focus on locally relevant ‘burning’ educational questions for displaced children while allowing for comparative analysis. Through the integration of school ethnography, in-depth neighborhood analysis, and GIS mapping techniques, the research examines how refugee and migrant children experience integration within the intersecting local histories, geographies of migration, and educational landscapes of their specific localities. The study explores the diverse perceptions of migration, belonging, and locality that shape children’s experiences in school and neighborhood spaces, highlighting the role of historical and contemporary migration contexts in shaping educational access, social mobility, and well-being. By linking these lived experiences to broader “everyday geographies” (Mankiw, 2015), the paper offers a nuanced understanding of how place, identity, and education intersect while expanding the analytical lens beyond legal migration frameworks and school boundaries. The transnational comparison reveals critical insights into how educational and social integration processes vary across national and historical contexts, offering a new perspective on comparative children’s geographies and migration studies.

Collective Responsibility: Cultivating Inclusive Classrooms for Refugee Children through Ubuntu-inspired educational practices
This article presents findings from an ethnographic study focusing on the inclusion of refugee children in three refugee-hosting primary schools in Kampala, Uganda. I draw on classroom participatory observations and fieldnotes from several months of ethnographic work to help unravel the intricate interplay of local integration policy, pedagogy, and societal perceptions of migration and childhood in shaping the lived experiences of refugee children. The analysis delves into the impact of convergent pedagogical practices and cultural values on refugee children's sense of belonging and well-being in the classroom. While acknowledging the broader influence of increasingly nationalistic and anti-migratory global discourse on refugee children's school experiences (McIntyre & Abrams, 2021), this article contends that local definitions of belonging, membership, and well-being also wield significant influence. Specifically, the study explores how Ugandan teachers employ a blend of convergent Western and traditional Ubuntu-inspired, whole-class pedagogy to create an instructional environment that diminishes differences between children but also underscores mutual support, solidarity, and responsibility. This research exemplifies alternative conceptualizations of refugee inclusion originating from the Global South, emphasizing a paradigm centered on collective responsibility, diverging from approaches that frame refugees as individuals undertaking (or resisting) integration efforts.

School Choice in Uncertainty: Temporariness and Liminality of Ukrainian Refugee Mothers (with Halleli Pinson)

This qualitative study focuses on the educational choices of Ukrainian refugee parents, primarily mothers, who fled to Israel in the months following the Russian invasion. Comparing the educational choices of 22 parents, those who can claim citizenship based on their Jewish ancestry (classified as ‘returnees’); and those who received extended temporary tourist visa (classified as ‘fugitives’), the study shows the layered conditions that contribute to educational decision-making. The research participants share a similar background and have all fled the same country abruptly. Like other refugee parents, they face an acute sense of uncertainty, not knowing when and if they will be able to return home. However, there are vast differences in their experiences upon arriving to Israel, as the degree of temporariness they experience is mitigated by their legal status. Parents were highly focused on education as a future-making process, but the precariousness of their legal status dictated their ability to exhibit educational agency and make their own school choices. We focus on three main pillars shaping these Ukrainian parents’ educational choices: the centrality of education for Ukrainian parents, their educational agency, and how liminal legality and notions of temporariness shape educational expectations and future trajectories. 

Vulnerable or Entitled? Refugee Students in Schools in Kampala (with Halleli Pinson and Lynn Schler)
This article explores how the competing narratives of vulnerability and entitlement shape the educational experiences of refugee children in Kampala, Uganda. While Uganda’s refugee policy combines an open-door approach with a self-reliance strategy, its implementation in urban contexts generates tensions over resource allocation and belonging. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in three primary schools in Kampala, including participant observation, visual documentation, and 120 interviews with refugee and national students, parents, teachers, and NGO workers, the study examines how various actors interpret and negotiate the meaning of "refugeeness." The findings reveal that schools often instrumentalize refugee status, framing students either as economic assets or as vulnerable dependents, depending on the schools’ needs and location. Parents, too, move between mobilizing vulnerability discourses to access resources and embracing narratives of self-reliance. Most strikingly, refugee children themselves frequently reject imposed notions of victimhood, instead viewing their status as a privileged. They see refugees as better off than national children, in terms of access to resources, community support and future trajectories and opportunities. The article challenges Western-centric assumptions about refugee vulnerability and calls for a rethinking of integration frameworks through a Global South perspective that foregrounds the agency of displaced children and the everyday practices through which refugee identities are constructed within resource-strained urban education systems.