Universities of Sanctuary is an initiative to recognise and celebrate the good practice of universities welcoming people seeking sanctuary through facilitated access to higher education (HE), supporting local refugee communities, and taking an active role in learning about the issues and obstacles faced by this group in pursuing Higher Education.

At Royal Holloway, as part of being a University of Social Purpose, we are developing our activities to support an application to become a University of Sanctuary.

On Monday 8 July, we held a successful Refugee Research and Collaboration symposium where we brought together over 50 academic and professional colleagues, students and representatives from community organisations supporting refugees and others affected by forced migration. We shared current research and collaborative activities that are taking place, such as student English for speakers of other languages (ESOL) classes, as well as discussing possible future initiatives.

We will be continuing our University of Sanctuary work over the summer and into the autumn term, with a view to applying when the process opens in the new academic year. One of the tasks will be to maintain our webpage for information about our Sanctuary activities, as well as disseminating and celebrating our research and collaborative work. If you wish to get involved in the University of Sanctuary development, including the website, please contact Anna.Gupta@rhul.ac.uk.