Karen Burmese Refugee Education Project

• To provide a high standard of education for Karen refugees so that can be recognized by higher tertiary institutions.
• To educate Karen young people by providing opportunities to make future contributions to their camp communities, equipping them to hold responsible roles as good citizens in the camp or if they can be returned to their home country in the future.
• To improve background education, so that those not going for resettlement are able to be trained to take over the work of those skilled workers, who have left.

The school offers basic education in the usual primary and secondary school subjects such as Thai language, Drug and Sex Education and Vocational classes.

Thai Language: The students are taught Thai Language for them to be able to talk to their Thai neighbours that would lead to less misunderstanding in the future. The subject is a compulsory subject from year 1 to 10. Classes in Thai culture are also taught so that the refugees understand life in their host country.

Drug and Sex Education: The school provides Health Education classes emphasising on prevention of drug addiction and related problems. Students are trained to recognize diseases causing health problems such as typhoid, dengue fever and malaria. Sex education is also taught in health classes to increase awareness of the dangers of HIV/AIDS and allow students to make informed and responsible life choices. Health classes operate at all levels of the school.

Vocational Classes: Introductions to computing classes are offered to senior students with a view to understand techniques needed for tertiary education, should the opportunity arise.
Currently there are 44 dedicated teachers and one part-time teacher teaching at the school. The school administrator, Helen has been with the school for over twenty years. She has inspired many young refugees to go back and teach at the school once they graduated from year 12. The school has a system under which experienced teachers mentor the newly recruited teachers and the system worked quite well.

Eden Valley School’s program has been assessed as highly successful within the constraints of camp conditions, based on the number of qualified high school graduates that support camp operations and who have been successful in starting college and university education when they resettled to third countries.