The Science of Refugee Camps (2024-2025)
This project team examined the management of refugee camps in the Middle East and North Africa, focusing on the data needs of camp administrators. Through historical research, interviews with camp managers and collaboration with organizations such as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the American Statistical Association (ASA) and the International Statistical Institute (ISI), the team explored how refugee camps manage food, medicine, education, housing, security, governance and population changes. The students also organized a conference that brought together statisticians and humanitarian agencies to highlight how accurate data collection is essential for evidence-based decision-making in refugee camp management.
Findings emphasized that running a refugee camp requires data similar to that collected by census bureaus, public health agencies, school systems and immigration offices. With the number of refugees increasing due to war, political instability and climate displacement, and resources shrinking, the team worked with the US UNHCR to enhance metadata for The Hive, a database of camp reports, making information more accessible to analysts. The ISI agreed to sponsor a Data Science for Refugee Camp Management initiative, and the ASA engaged its human rights committee and volunteer group Statistics Without Borders to further support refugee issues. By placing refugee data challenges on the global statistics agenda and preparing student papers for publication in Chance, the project advanced new collaborations between statisticians and humanitarian organizations.
Timing
Fall 2024 – Spring 2025
Team Outputs
How Data Science Can Strengthen Refugee Camp Management (Poster presentation at the Fortin Foundation Bass Connections Showcase, April 16, 2025)
Conference attended by the UNHCR and the US UNHCR (Duke University, April 27, 2025)