The canton is experienced in integrating foreign students. Around 1,500 new children who do not speak French come every year.

It’s just after 8 o’clock. Accompanied by teacher Roxane Loser, the children in the reception class at the “Hugo-de-Senger” primary school enter the classroom, wash their hands and sit down. They come from Nicaragua, Peru, Morocco, Brazil, Honduras and Senegal. And since a week, 8-year-old Danyl from Ukraine is also among them.

The children from all over the world have one thing in common: they do not speak French and, in addition to their regular class, they work part-time in the reception class until they have a reasonable command of the language.

After just one year, the children can express themselves quite well and follow the lessons.

The newcomer Danyl seems to understand little so far and still follows the lessons passively. This is normal, says Roxane Loser: “The children mostly listen for a few months and only then do they start to speak. After just one year they can express themselves quite well and follow the lessons.»

Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, around 500 Ukrainian children have attended school in Geneva. This has largely been embedded in the existing system, says Geneva Education Director Anne Emery-Torracinta.

Legend:

Danyl Fleh with his family from the Ukraine to Geneva. He recently started attending teacher Roxane Loser’s reception class.

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But if far more children from the Ukraine were to arrive in the next few months, the existing structures would probably be at their limit.

Nobody knows how many children will start school with us in the next school year, this uncertainty makes planning difficult.

“No one knows how many children will be enrolled in school with us in the next school year, this uncertainty makes planning more difficult,” Anne Emery-Torracinta told Schweiz aktuell. The canton assumes that most of the new arrivals from Ukraine will stay in Geneva for the long term.

The canton has decades of experience with the integration of foreign-language children. Every year, 1,500 new non-French-speaking schoolchildren come to Geneva. All in all, children from 164 nations go to school in Geneva.

Geneva State Councilor Antonio Hodgers also came to Geneva from Argentina as a child refugee. The integration was easy for him, he is very grateful to Geneva and Switzerland for the open reception.

State Councilor Antonio Hodgers came to Geneva as a refugee

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Legend:

Originally an Argentinian: Antonio Hodgers made it into the Geneva government in his new homeland. Previously he was a member of the National Council.

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Geneva State Councilor Antonio Hodgers is originally from Argentina. His mother fled with him and his sister after his father’s violent disappearance during the military dictatorship. At the age of six, he came to Switzerland via Italy in 1981.

Hodgers was already politically active as a teenager: first in the youth parliament, then in the Geneva cantonal parliament. In 2007 he was elected to the National Council – and in 2012 he was allowed to give the 1st August speech on the Rütli. Antonio Hodgers has been in the Geneva government since 2013, which he has also chaired.