The paper discusses narrative learning of people, who are working with refugees at the non-governmental organization in Lithuania. The narrative learning is revealed in the personal narratives and narrative interactions of workers at the chosen NGO. The purpose of this paper is threefold. Firstly, it aims to highlight the importance of exploring narrative learning of people working at NGOs working with refugees. Secondly, it presents the contextualized empirical data of narrative research. Thirdly, the paper presents 3 thematically rich narrative portraits of the NGO workers, which illustrate various aspects of narrative learning and the potential for transformation through reflection, dialogue, and the re-construction of the self in the work environment.

       Narrative learning is associated with the method of learning through stories and the process of learning, when meanings and understandings are created through narratives (De Groot, 2018). Employees of NGOs often share stories in their work and daily interactions and storytelling is frequently used as a tool in their daily work practices, however these stories are often heard only within the remits of organizations. Narratives are frequently revealed as personal stories of employees, which often are not visible and considered as everyday stories (Bathmaker, 2010). NGOs also play an important role in defining the identity aspects of the people with whom they work with (Szczepanikova, 2010). They often rely on engaged communities to disseminate work stories, and modern media platforms (such as Facebook) help to reach wider audiences and share narratives about their work, but limited communication and financial resources of local NGOs often limit access to larger audiences (Holohan, 2019). Narratives can also reveal, how professional and cultural identity of employees is constructed (Riessman, 2008). There is a lack of educational theories, which reveal the processes of learning in non-governmental organizations (Le Clus, M., 2011; Gohlich, M, 2016). Therefore, such narrative research could be particularly valuable for educational research as it can reveal, what narratives are emerging at the NGO working with refugees, how people are using narratives and learn in the work situations, what helps or hinders their growth, how they construct their understandings of self and learning at work and how work environment, social and cultural context might affect their stories and learning through narration.

      In this paper I refer to the ideas of social constructionism and understand narratives as constructs, which are created in a specific time and context.  I discuss various contextual layers of emerging narratives and pay attention to social relationships, interactions, and the specific context of the chosen NGO, where narratives unfold. I acknowledge my positionality and subjectivity choosing the organization and reflect, how my role as a practitioner -researcher affect, what people tell me and what impressions they try to make and the process, how I select and interpret the narrative and observational data.  The paper discusses and presents 3 chosen contextualized narrative portraits of employees of the organization, which reveal various aspects of narrative learning and different narrative learning styles. I use the theoretical and methodological framework presented by I. Goodson (2010) to present narrative portraits and analyze narrative learning aspects.  Presenting narrative portraits, I discuss the emerging narrative themes, narrative learning styles and attempt to reveal, how employees of the non-governmental organization construct the narratives about their experiences and how they use various narratives to learn and develop.  

This paper is based on the data collected during 1-year duration narrative study at the chosen NGO working with refugees. During the study, I used topic-oriented thematic narrative interviews and ethnographic observation data to collect rich and contextualized data and prepare narrative portraits of employees. Thematic narrative analysis and constructionist’s narrative analysis methods were used to understand narrative learning process of the chosen workers. The narrative data collection methods were complemented with ethnographic data to get contextualized and rich data and construct detailed narrative portraits. 9 narrative interviews and a big number of ethnographic interviews and observations were conducted during one-year duration fieldwork. Narrative data of interviews was complemented with ethnographic observations and various interactive narratives of employees recorded in the ethnographic fieldnotes. In this paper I present 3 different narrative portraits, which are thematically and contextually rich and illustrate various themes and aspects of narrative learning at the specific context. I use methodological framework of narrative portraits presented by I. Goodson (2010) to analyze narrative themes and various narrative learning aspects of research participants.

The 3 chosen narrative portraits of employees illustrate the potential for transformation through reflection, dialogue, and re-construction of self in work environment. Employees not only narrate, what happened to them, but also reflect on their choices and events of their life, which led them to choosing to do such work. The specific context of the Catholic organization, gender balance in the organization and national context shape their personal and organizational narratives and how the employees perceive the people they work with. The interactions with the colleagues, refugees, the researcher and others encourage employees to rethink the concepts of self in their work environment and shape their narratives. Organizational context allows for some employees to elaborate freely their personal life stories and their narratives are also encouraged by organizational mission, values and dominating organizational narratives. The individual narrative portraits reveal that not all stories are welcome and encouraged in the specific context of the non-governmental organization, some narratives are censored, some encouraged and employees need to navigate between their personal narratives, organizational dominant narratives and various national and global discourses, what results in active re-construction of self and narrative learning at the non-governmental organization.

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