“A curriculum which acknowledges the social responsibilities of education must present situations where problems are relevant to the problems of living together, and where observation and information are calculated to develop social insight and information” (Dewey, 1916, p. 192). Dewey (1916) elucidates education in terms of the means of buttressing citizenship and takes into account the function of schools to dissipate the barriers against living together as a community. Most of the educators, politicians, and members of the society accredit that reinforcing citizenship in education prepares individuals for their liabilities and duties as a citizen of the community (Bank, et al., 2005). In one of the Council of Europe seminars, the foci point of educating individuals in terms of democratic citizenship was stated as making young individuals predisposed to participate more in democratic life by supposing and enjoying their rights and liabilities in society (Birzea, 1996). Despite all recent efforts, it is the fact that a youth, living in isolated individuality and devoid of social and collective awareness, is growing up (Welply, 2019; Topolski & Leuven, 2008; UNESCO, 2011). For the youth in this century, citizenship is a phenomenon reduced at the level of being included in or excluded from a country, thereby settling far from common sense (Gholami, 2017; Brown, 2016). Hannah Arendt, a contradictory thinker of her time, conceived this lack of common sense as a ‘crisis in education’ approximately 60 years ago. She surprisingly pointed out that the source of the crisis was grounded in the basic assumptions of progressive education (Arendt, 1961). One of these assumptions, exaggerated student autonomy without the authority and responsibility of the adult in education is ruinous for building the bridge between the old and the new (Arendt, 1961). According to Arendt, young people not furnished with the knowledge of history and tradition are left unprepared to public life for the sake of individual freedom, about liberal democracy understanding (Arendt, 1961; Arendt, 1971). Therefore, to her, education should provide youth with the preliminary realm for not only 'legitimate citizen' but also being conscious citizens through adults taking responsibility for 'renewing a common world' (Arendt, 1961). This function of education to consolidate citizenship particularly gains huge importance when there is an increase in the number of newcomers such as refugees and immigrants in a country. Among these countries, Turkey has to cope with many Syrian immigrants who have forfeited the rights concomitantly gained as a result of being the citizenship of their original country.As for the literature on the relationship between education and citizenship, it is quite likely to put forward the importance of the topic. Bailey (2010) shows the relationship between liberal governmentality and educated citizenship. Pykett (2010) focuses on the concept of the pedagogical state considering the compulsory citizenship education of secondary schools in England. Staeheli, Attoh, and Mitchell (2013) reveal that engagement of university students into producing citizenship is rarely restricted and often seen as a way to empower them; nonetheless, sometimes not welcomed, even justified as illegal by political actors. The study of Grindheim (2017) in early childhood education centers highlights the role of play for the child- citizens to participate in daily life. Even though an array of studies is available in the literature, this study addresses the relationship between education and processing citizenship in the context of immigrant students. As they do not have much past interaction with the host country culturally or legally, education comes to the forefront regarding citizenship beyond legal steps. The study aims to understand how citizenship is negotiated by Syrian immigrant students  at Turkish universities through an Arendtian perspective.

The present study employs a qualitative research approach comprising a phenomenological design to explore the experiences of the Syrian students from immigrant backgrounds at Turkish universities. According to Vanderstoep and Johnston (2009, p. 208), a phenomenological design provides 'a description of the essence or essential common structure of an experience' at the end of the research. We used criterion sampling to determine our participants, as specific contexts, individuals, and experiences can be selected intentionally to furnish information to reply to particular research questions in this way (Maxwell, 2009). The basic criterion of the study for the participants is being a university student from a Syrian immigrant background to explore how they process their citizenship in a new country as individuals escaping from civil war. In the current study, we used a semi-structured interview form as the main data collection tool, and we developed the form on our own. Then, we shared it with other experts in the field with the intent of reviewing the level, clearness, relevance, and applicability of the interview questions. To guarantee internal validity and test the intelligibility, we interviewed experts from the field of educational sciences and took their recommendations. Finally, we came up with 6 six in-depth questions related to the participants’ perceptions of citizenship and education in the interviews. After we prepared our interview questions, we applied to the university Institutional Review Board (IRB) so that we could study a topic with human subjects. We requested three experts from the educational sciences field to revise the interview protocol, took into account their feedback. Also, we discussed alternative interpretations, which is investigator triangulation (Denzin & Lincoln, 2005). Thanks to data triangulation, we could reach wider data and speculate on many aspects of the phenomenon (Neuman, 2013). Therefore, we applied multi triangulation in our study. In the current research, we tried to ensure credibility with long-term interaction thanks to the expert review, participant confirmation, and long interviews with participants. Besides, we checked theconsistency of the findings obtained from the data to maximize the credibility of the data. During the data analysis, we preferred to adopt a three-step approach. Firstly, we explored the data to get a broad sense of it, then we (en)coded the data (Saldaña, 2009). After these procedures, we determined the themes as; the myth of acceptance at first glance, temporary togetherness, and university as a life-saver.

As a result of the analysis of the findings gathered from the participants, we explained the experiences and thoughts of Syrian immigrant students in Turkish universities with three themes. The study put forward through the first theme, the myth of acceptance at first glance, that immigrant students have the freedom to articulate their thought in academic processes. However, they are not assured that their thoughts are taken into consideration. Moreover, they are not taught any social rights at university, and lessons or the university environment do not serve any teaching about their social and legal rights. Accordingly, the thoughts of our participants are presented as academic equity, not serving for teaching social rights and freedom under the theme. The second theme, temporary togetherness, demonstrates that Syrian immigrants in Turkey are not supported by their surroundings including friends and lecturers. We categorized their experiences related to the theme as no social support, language barrier, social distance to immigrants, and racist attitudes. The last theme, university as a lifesaver, unfolds the views of participant Syrian immigrant students in the study in terms of two aspects. The first aspect is related to what being a university student in Turkey means for them. The second one is linked to what the university provides for them. Since the participants' views on both aspects are intertwined, we decided to present them under the same theme. We accordingly obtained four sub-themes as follows: academic facilities, socialization/desocialization for the future career, social acceptance, social rights for survival. We can conclude that universities in Turkey are deprived of social and legal support in immigrant students’ processing citizenship, and do not show any tendency to accept immigrants permanently in social life.

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