Schooling and Education in Lebanon

← 6 | 7 →

DEDICATION

The authors would like to dedicate this book to all those displaced children, their parents and teachers in scattered refugee camps throughout the world.

Our responsibility and duty as parents and carers is to provide the best education for our children, love and protect them, but also to give them the freedom and stability that allows them to have a normal childhood and to dream of their future, a future they create for themselves so they can live their lives as we did before them. Nothing says it better than the renowned words of wisdom recorded by the famous Lebanese poet and writer Gibran Khalil Gibran in his book, The Prophet:

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, and though they are with you yet they belong not to you … (Gibran Khalil Gibran, 1923). ← 7 | 8 →

← 8 | 9 →

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We would like to express our deepest appreciation to all those who helped us and made it possible for us to gather information for this book. Visiting schools, homes and camps during such difficult times in Lebanon would have been impossible to achieve without the help and support of school principals, teachers, parents, students and stakeholders who sacrificed their time to provide us with information and made sure that we were safe. We would also like to thank family and friends for accompanying us on our visits, ensuring our safety and introducing us to people and places. A specific thank you also to the family members who carried out some extra interviews on our behalf since our departure from Lebanon on late matters and provided us with feedback. Last, but not least, a huge thank you to Dr Marizon Yu for her great work on the diagram and the cross-referencing to it, as well as her tireless support.

Nina especially wishes to thank the University of Adelaide for providing her with study leave and financial support to travel to Lebanon in the second part of 2014. Without this opportunity it would have been impossible to meet the large number of humble and generous people including family, friends, children, parents, teachers, principals and community leaders interviewees; which allowed us to gather the information needed to complete this book.

We are most grateful to everyone involved in this journey, and acknowledge the fact that we could have not completed this book without their help. ← 9 | 10 →

← 10 | 11 →

ACRONYMNS AND ABBREVIATIONS

← 12 | 13 →

PREFACE

Most people viewing the state funeral of former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser on 27^th March 2015 at Scots’ Church in Melbourne’s CBD would have been most impressed by a large group of Vietnamese Australians present, complete with a large sign proclaiming their thanks to a man who, as Prime Minister from 1975 to 1983, welcomed them to Australian shores, and through government policy, facilitated their Australian citizenship. As his son, Hugh Fraser, emphatically stated in his eulogy, Fraser was a “truly global man”, who loved Australia, and who in his public and private life really cared for what was happening globally, to the extent he could not remain silent in the face of such events as global refugees (News.com.au, 2015, n.p.).

News.com.au (2015) also reported:

The volume of public mourners spread across the corner of Russell and Collins streets to St Michael’s Uniting Church where screens telecast the service and police shut down traffic.