Student Refugee Programme

The Student Refugee Programme aims to give prospective students a fair chance to start or continue their studies by providing them with the necessary guidance and support before and during their studies. So far, more than 700 refugees have applied at the VUB. Most of them come from Syria, Palestine, Turkey and Iraq, and study in English-taught Master programmes, especially in Social Sciences & Solvay Business School, Engineering, Languages and Humanities. The uniqueness of the student refugee programme lies in the principles behind it: the individual follow-up of students, taking into account the complexity of their situation, with diversity and openness at its core In 2011, the VUB joined the Scholars at Risk network (SAR) and thereby dedicated to work at protecting threatened scholars and promote academic freedom. We believe this is our role as a civil society actor in Belgium, in Europe and in the world. Getting involved is a multi-layered engagement. It implies providing shelter and hosting threatened scholars, raising awareness, publicly taking a stand to protect higher education values and academic freedom, participating to advocacy campaigns, organising events and seminars on campus etc., all with the aim to protect the fundamental values of academic freedom and free inquiry. So far, VUB has hosted four scholars at risk, from diverse personal and academic backgrounds. They were hosted in research groups in different faculties and departments: Engineering, Education Science, and Sciences.