Supporting Refugee and Asylum Seeker access to higher education in Australia
Australia has some of the best higher education in the world, with students coming from all over the globe to study. Opportunities exist for refugees and asylum seekers to access higher education, with a number of universities providing specialist support. We provide seminars and individual support to help you find out what you can do at university. Contact us for more information.
About RASEN
We've been operating since 2019, supporting refugees and asylum seekers in realising their dreams of going to university in Australia. We communicate with universities to understand what options are available, some universities have specialist scholarships for refugees, asylum seekers or people on humanitarian visas. We work with other refugee and asylum seeker organisations to get the best information to you. We hold free seminars to come along to, where you can learn about your options, and support you in writing and submitting your applications.
A message from our founder
My name is Paul Halman. I am the founder and director of the Refugee and Asylum Seeker Education Network (RASEN), started in 2019. We help refugees and asylum seekers in Australia to find and access tertiary pathways for education, through identifying scholarship and entry requirements, support with applications, and delivering seminars to help explain their options. We liaise with higher education providers to increase opportunities for refugees and asylum seekers.
About Dr Halman:
Paul has extensive experience in international development and humanitarian work. He has worked in developing countries for many years in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia and Latin America. He has been a Program Manager and Director on a range of projects relating to education, child protection, human rights and refugee protections. Paul has lived and worked in refugee camps in Africa with Sudanese refugees, in Yemen with Somali and Ethiopian refugees, with refugees across the Pacific, in Australia, and in post-conflict Latin America. While living in the Middle East he founded a network to provide support—material and financial—to repatriate migrant workers to home countries after experiencing abuse or hardship in-country, facilitating transportation through a neutral country.
Paul also has significant experience in humanitarian disasters. He has been involved in disaster response activities in Central America after volcanic eruptions, Nepal in the earthquake recovery and monsoons, conflict and post-conflict work in Africa and Latin America. He works with the State Emergency Service in Australia in a range of emergencies, including the recent floods in eastern Australia.
In addition to this, Paul has developed courses and taught in a number of universities across the world, including Mexico, Kazakhstan, Libya, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Australia and the UK. He has a BA from the University of Western Sydney, two MAs from University of New England, a PGCert in Human Rights from Curtin University and a PhD from University of Queensland. He is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA), a Member of the Australian College of Educators (MACE), a Member of the Queensland Justices Association (MQJA) and a Justice of the Peace (JP). He is also a longstanding member of the Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies and the think-tank Australian Institute of International Affairs (AIIA). He continues to engage in research and academia on issues relating to refugees, international development, humanitarian disasters, communication, participatory development, education and sociology and holds a position as an Honorary Research Fellow at the Centre for Communication and Social Change (CfCSC) at the University of Queensland, Australia.