The King’s Sanctuary Programme includes a range of projects, through which King’s has supported sanctuary seekers to thrive in higher education, educated thousands of displaced people through blended bridging programmes and bespoke contextualised online university courses, and has enriched the UK community sponsorship scheme by developing an education-led pathway for forcefully displaced students and academics. King’s also aims to enhance understanding of forced displacement among our students, staff and alumni and to develop opportunities for them to make a positive contribution through engagement activities, training and volunteering opportunities.
King's College London is partnering with Citizens UK and others to lead on a sponsorship model for UK universities to help host displaced Ukranian students and academics.
As the UK’s first university to act as a Community Sponsor for a refugee family displaced by the Syrian war, King’s is sharing learnings from that scheme to inform this new initiative and deliver a model for how UK universities might best implement the Government’s Homes for Ukraine scheme. This model will provide a blueprint for how university communities can work together to host displaced students and academics, and a set of resources and detailed guidance on how best to support hosts and refugees through that process.
The University Sponsorship model builds upon the principles of Community Sponsorship which allows community groups made up of volunteer members to organise and implement the resettlement of refugees into their communities, and to provide education opportunities to mitigate lost learning and research.
We aim to provide a range of advice and support covering areas including education, employment, health, and language skills. We are therefore looking for members of the King's community to act as volunteers, including one-off, short-term and longer-term roles.
