With 19.9 million children currently under the mandate of UNHCR, 7.4 million are of school age, with 4 million unable to access education. Inability of children to obtain identification documents often leads to hindered access to education and access to other crucial services.
With almost 2 million stateless persons in the region, majority of which are children, UNHCR continues to exert efforts to allow children’s access to protection services, primarily healthcare and education.
To this end, UNHCR supported the League of Arab State’s adoption of a major Declaration on Refugee Education. In May 2017, UNHCR in collaboration with the Arab League and the Arab League Educational Cultural and Scientific Organization (ALECSO) organized a High-Level Regional Meeting on Education for Refugees in Tunis aimed at sharing experiences, highlighting innovations and reforms, and identifying best practices for upholding children rights to education, including by mainstreaming them within the National Education Systems in host countries; by addressing the challenges of refugees’ access to secondary, vocational and higher education; and by highlighting and overcoming the obstacles faced by Arab states in formulating policies for the provision of education to refugee students. The meeting also highlighted the means of enhancing the effectiveness of coordination mechanisms that would facilitate access of refugees and displaced children in the Arab region to educational opportunities which meet their needs and ensure their right to education.
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