A study on education process of Karachi children: The case of Şanlıurfa/Birecik

Gypsies, considered to be originating from India, are a community that has adhered to their own identity and lifestyle for centuries, and today continues their lives together in different geographies. Karachi group Gypsies, one of these communities, mainly live in the Southeastern Anatolia Region. Karachi Gypsy groups, who mostly live in the suburb of the regions they live in, have embraced a different lifestyle separate from the dominant society. These groups, which migrate seasonally, migrate to different regions as seasonal workers in the spring and summer months. These groups, who are mostly excluded and exposed to exclusionary words, have difficulty in adapting to social life. Gypsies in Turkey, as in many countries they live, who are a group that has been left behind remarkably from other segments of the society, with the problems of accessing education, schooling and job opportunities. In studies on the Gypsies, many researchers argue that education problems stem from the negative lifestyle of Gypsies. This study, from a sociological perspective, focuses on the problems experienced in the education process, which are assumed to be reasoned from many factors such as the expectations of the Karachi Gypsy group, living conditions, exclusion and acceptance processes. This study first tries to understand the views of Karachi children on the education-teaching process, their future expectations about the process and social, cultural and economic reasons supporting these views. In this sense, dynamics such as various exclusion practices, economic insufficiencies, seasonal migrations, nomadic working ways, free-life preferences, early marriage of children and early employment were identified as the difficulties faced by Karachi children in their education process. Factors such as lack of family-care, their distance to formal education as a community, lack of suitable working-space in the house, lack of role-model people in their social environment, lack of nutrition and transportation opportunities cause disadvantage to Karachi children in their education life.