This ethnographically informed field study, drawing on a blend of feminist theories and cultural learning pathways framework, reveals that Syrian mothers show strong presence and readiness to take active roles when opportunities present themselves in alternative spaces in the public schools of Turkey. As mothers produce counterstories in relation to their gendered, religious, and ethnic identities, they talk back to anti-immigrant discourses. Their dialogues with teachers show apparent contradictions between what they hoped for the future of their children and what the school envisioned. Such co-constructed conversations in alternative school spaces have the potential to shape schools’ role in supporting refugee families and children within and beyond the schools.

DOI: 10.1080/10564934.2017.1394164
ISSN: 1056-4934