As a part-time, remote-based, doctoral student at Lancaster University, I have been so pleased with the support and progress of my studies, yet like many of us, I have felt the impacts of COVID-19 that are ripping through our society. I have struggled to think through how to redesign or even redirect my research due to travel restrictions and inability to during unpredictable times. However, after much reading and reflection, I have identified some plausible solutions for my data collection through the use of online technologies that may even bring a positive and initially unintended benefits, mainly broader international participation.

The current title of my thesis is "Higher Education for Refugees in Kakuma Refugee Camp: A participatory approach to understanding their capabilities and aspirations." The world is currently hosting the largest number of refugees and forcibly displaced persons since World War II, estimated at 80 million (UNHCR, 2021), challenging existing infrastructures and humanitarian response mechanisms. As the number of refugees continues to rise, the displacement duration is also increasing, now an average of 20 years. Education, including higher education, is one of the top priorities of refugees, perceived to play a critical role in rebuilding their lives and communities (Evans & Forte, 2013; Nicolai, 2009; Mendenhall et al., 2015; Streitwieser, Loo, Ohorodnik, & Jeong, 2018).

Despite renewed global political interest to address refugee needs, access to higher education remains extremely limited, with 3% of qualified refugees enrolled (UNHCR, 2019) and fraught with challenges. There is limited research and thus minimal understanding of this field, yet it is being flooded with new actors, policies, programs and promises. However, the refugee voice is absent. I am curious about how programs reflect (and if they meet) refugee's immediate and future needs. My research project seeks to better understand what refugees hope to gain (aspirations) from higher education and how higher education has shaped their lives.

I had chosen to situate my research in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya due to the number of higher education programs offered there. My data collection was initially intended to be done in the camp, meeting with refugees who lived there; however, due to COVID-19, adjustments had to be made for the data collection to be virtual. This June, I was awarded a grant from the British Association of International and Comparative Education (BAICE) to support my work.

There is little literature, mainly anecdotal, about how researchers are conducting participatory research remotely and how they are to modifying their data collection methods, which include providing all participants with phones to do short video journals and conducting training and meetings on Zoom (Marzi, 2020). Real positives emerging, such as potential broader participation from more isolated individuals in global research initiative, equality and lower costs, while also facing challenges around technical difficulties with use of online platforms (Tam´ı-Maury, Brown, Lapham, & Chang, 2017). Valdez & Gubrium (2020) have even developed a set of protocols to shift on how to do community based participatory research virtually including: email to invite participants, signing consent forms through DocuSign, meetings and interviews through Zoom and recorded, paying cash incentives via online platforms.

Participants for my project will be alumni of higher education programs in Kakuma refugee camp, with about half of the participants still residing in the camp and the rest have moved to other locations or countries. Virtual participation will be enabled through a series of Zoom workshops, with refugee participants using tablets provided by the BAICE grant and the rest joining through personal devices. I am partnering with a refugee-youth led organization, Youth Education and Sports (YES) who runs a learning hub in the camp, to support on the ground facilitation, internet connectivity and coordination of participants. I am now in the final planning stages to roll out this virtual data collection and remain nervous but hopeful about the process.

Erin Buisse is a PhD student in the Department of Educational Research at Lancaster University.

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