Background: According to Canada’s 2016 census, approximately 1.36 million people, or about 4% of the population, report at least one of their ethnic origins as Ukrainian. About 112,000 Ukrainians have come to Canada between 1991, with the collapse of the Soviet Union, and 2016 (Stick and Hou, 2022). An additional 200,000 individuals, mostly women and children, have been approved to enter through the Canada-Ukraine Authorization for Emergency Travel (CUAET) program since Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.  Many find their way to Ukrainian heritage language community schools or ridni shkoly (RiSH) to maintain the academic levels of their children’s Ukrainian language competence. These diaspora institutions are symbols of community identity.

 RiSh began with the first wave of Ukrainian immigration in the late 19^th century, are located across the country and have been revitalized with new perspectives with each of the six waves of immigration to Canada.  Unlike some immigrant groups and despite their prevalence in Canada for over 100 years, Ukrainians have produced very few articles about their language schools, instructors or learners (Bilash & Soroka, 2014; Bilash, 2015).

Research question/Objective: The sudden arrival of children to RiSH doubled or tripled the enrolment in these schools, calling for new instructors, many from among CUAET arrivees.  The resulting changing dynamics is the focus of the qualitative investigation of this paper.   

Theoretical Framework: Bourdieu’s notions of habitus, capital and field are useful here in helping to explain how individuals think about, and react and adjust to, the social world in which they find themselves. Bourdieu (1977) defines ‘habitus’ as “a system of lasting transposable dispositions which, integrating past experiences, functions at every moment as a matrix of perceptions, appreciations, and action and makes possible the achievement of infinitively diversified tasks.” (p. 78) It is an individual’s accumulation of cultural and historically specific knowledge of the social world within which they operate, including values and dispositions. As a sociological tool, habitus allows Bourdieu to “access internalized behaviors, perceptions, and beliefs that individuals carry with them,” and which are often reflected in practices and the social worlds they inhabit (Costa and Murphy, 3-4). Further, Bourdieu argues that habitus is not static. Rather, he “emphasizes the potential for habitus to be reconstructed or changed in the event of encounters with the unfamiliar, such as resettling in a new country” and “learned, acquired and transformed, both through new experiences in one’s social environment and the process of socialization” (Jung, Dalton and Willis, 2017, p. 6). Habitus is thus “a complex interplay between the past and the present” (Reay et al, 2009, 1104).

“Field” is understood by Bourdieu as “a series of institutions, rules, rituals, conventions, categories…which produce and authorize certain discourses and activities” (Webb, Schirato and Danaher, 2002, p. 21). Education can be considered a field as it is able to set rules for behaviour, thus creating a social system that has an internal structure (Özçürümez et al, 2023, p. 5). Within a field, Bourdieu argues that individuals maneuver, compete and negotiate for power, which he calls “capital”. Capital goes beyond economic resources to include social and cultural resources, including networks and connections and symbolic assets, like university degrees, as well as patterns of accent, dress, or “taste” (Kelly and Lusis, 2006, pp. 833-34). Thus, social and cultural capital are reflected in the ways of thinking teachers use in a classroom, and their classroom practices, their ideological beliefs, all of which have implications for their students and their education (Özçürümez et al, 2023).

After receiving approval of the University of Alberta's Research Ethics Board, data were collected using an online survey and a semi-structured interview guide whose design emerged from a literature review about heritage/ethnic language schools and the education of refugee children. Participants could choose to complete the survey (n=38) and/or interview (n=12) in English or Ukrainian. Interviewees all chose to be interviewed in Ukrainian. Interviews were conducted in Ukrainian by native speakers, transcribed, translated, verified, member checked, coded and then translated.

In the preliminary analysis, three themes have emerged and will be interpreted through Bourdieu’s habitus, field and capital. The themes are: 1. How instructors accomodate children who have experienced trauma 2. How instructors navigate classes with children who are Ukrainian speakers, Russian-speakers, and English speakers. 3. How local Ukrainian Canadian children and Ukrainian Canadian instructors are being “othered”: "I feel that it is challenging for a Canadian born teacher to feel like they have the "right" to teach Ukrainian School. Even though I hold a MA from the University of X and my thesis was focused on heritage transfer in the Ukrainian Community there is a sense of otherness from the staff. As if I "couldn't know" what it means to "truly" be Ukrainian. There are very few Canadian born teachers in Ukrainian schools in this province. (I know of only 2.) Also, the parent body is very difficult to engage. The school requires a lot of help on a weekly basis that it cannot afford to pay staff for. There are also high academic expectations from the parent body for such a small yearly investment." The results may be of interest to school leaders working with recent refugees from Ukraine, Ukrainian diaspora communities, and other diaspora communities.

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