UNHCR press conference: Report on refugee education

Hello, I'm Chung Agadini Williams, Head of Global Communications for UNHCR.

Welcome to today's virtual press briefing on Unhcr's fifth annual education report.

This year, our report called Coming Together for Refugee Education is highlighting some of the challenges for the millions of refugee children around the world, both in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, but also in the long lasting implications of their displacement.

There are at least, pardon me, 1.6 billion children around the world today whose education has been interrupted or completely suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

We're also looking at the devastating impact this will have on refugee children whose education has been either suspended or temporarily interrupted.

Particularly worrisome is the impact that this could have on girls around the world who are displaced and in dire need of access to education.

There is an estimated 50% of girls refugee students who may not be able to return to secondary school once the situation does improve with the COVID pandemic.

And this is particularly worrisome as we have such a large number of girls who are then exposed to greater vulnerability and potential for exploitation as well as dire protection concerns.

I want to share a brief story of one girl that I met who I'm thinking of quite a lot in the last three years.

Her name is Rena Akhtar, and you can see her photo there.

I met her in Cox's Bazaar in Bangladesh after she had made a absolutely harrowing journey with her mother.

She told me about how she had seen her father killed, how her grandparents had to be left behind.

And as she told me, she still had this small smile on her face.

And I I asked her how and why she was smiling.

And she said that that morning she had registered for school and that she would be attending class regularly for the first time in four years.

And she said that although what was left behind was something that she would never forget and never survive without constant pain and reminder of all the loss and tragedy that she and her family had suffered, that she had dreams of becoming a doctor one day and giving back to her community.

There are millions of refugee children who share these kind of dreams and aspirations and they need access to education to be able to bring these dreams to life and to help rebuild the countries that they've left and the countries that have welcomed them.

One finding from the the report, which will be available globally on the 3rd of September, is that we just finally broke through the barrier of secondary education and access to tertiary education.

So finally, for tertiary education, we've passed from 1% of refugee children to 3%.

And while that may not sound like a huge leap, we are talking about thousands and thousands of refugee students who are now able to go to university, particularly in part to the German government and the private sector who funded Gaddafi scholarship that allows refugees to attend universities in countries all over the world.

So in short, access to education and educating refugees is not only a smart thing, but it's the right thing to do as well.

And today I'm very pleased to have three people here with us today to talk about this very important education report.

On my right is Sajad Malik, who is the Director of UNHCRS Division of Solutions and Resilience, but who also can give you his first hand account from Syria where he served with UNHCR during the height of the crisis.

There, to my left, we have Mamadou John Balding, who is the Deputy Director of the Division of Solutions and Resilience, and Mamadou in particular will be able to answer those questions that are in French and that pertain to Francophone countries.

And we have seen a sharp increase not only in the interest and the support in Francophone countries for refugee students, but also some of the more volatile and tense areas, particularly in the Sahel region of West Africa, where thousands of schools have come under attack.

We also have online with us virtually from Copenhagen, Becky Telford, who's the chief of Unhcr's education team.

Finally, before we start, the report is critical because for the first time we will be commemorating on September 9th, the International Day to Protect Education from Attacks.

And as our **** Commissioner, Filippo Grandi noted, it is incredible that we are living in a time where we have to have a day that actually focuses on protecting children and protecting schools.

So I will hand over first to Sajjad.

Thank you, junior.

Thank you for coming together for for refugee education.

That's basically the title of of this year's report is in anyone looking for inspirational examples of hard work, resilience, dedication, strength of character of these young children and adults, refugee students, teachers, refugee teachers, parents, you'll find them in this in this report, we've tried to capture real life stories, we've tried to capture data, but we also wanted to bring some examples from this the the, the life that refugees are living in many parts of this world to, to bring those stories to you through this through this book, you'll have stories from Ecuador to Jordan, from Iran to Ethiopia to Syria and to other places where refugees are going through realising their dream that living a life in dignity and preparing for solution depends on access of full education.

That's absolutely essential for these refugees to make sure that they get quality education.

In this introduction, you'll see at the at the opening of of the of the book, the report of the **** Commissioner warns of the dangers of not investing in refrigeration.

There are risks of not achieving sustainable development goal for which is, which talks exclusively about ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education for all.

And that all includes refugees as well.

Uh, this report also makes strong case of inclusion of refugee children in national refugee hosting states systems.

They cannot be left out of those.

I'll give you some examples, excuse me for, uh, for the work that refugees, uh, have, have been able to achieve in Rwanda.

The Congolese refugee Dr Jonas uh, who got government of Germany's Daffy scholarship, gave him the opportunity to become a qualified Dr.

He's now working on the front lines with, with the in Rwanda for COVID-19 response.

Doctor Jonah's story highlights the importance of an enabling policy environment and the ways welcoming refugees can boost national systems.

There's also an interview with the Egyptian Minister for Education on that country's groundbreaking technological advances in education.

While Ecuador's policy of allowing refugee children to go to national schools, absolutely a noble policy, is also reflected in that report.

And Jordan's impressive online learning programme are also highlighted in this.

In Europe, Lord Mayor of commentary of the UK speaks inspiringly about bolstering cities, local networks which can support refugees and benefit host communities.

You'll find all these stories in in, in, in the report there.

But unfortunately, with COVID, which is a grave ******, now looms over those advances.

It could destroy the dreams and ambitions of these young refugees.

Children and their parents in every country are struggling with the impact of COVID-19.

This is not about closing schools or closure of schools.

They are being devastated because parents are unable to to earn income.

They are not able to have enough even to set send children to schools, buy uniforms, afford fees, not even able to buy mobile data and devices on top of food and shelter.

We are getting heartbreaking stories from around the world where parents in urban areas are not able to even meet the meet.

The Basing needs.

**** Commissioner was recently in Lebanon.

He came back and told us these heart wrenching stories that children have been pulled out of schools because parents cannot afford to keep them in schools and these children have now have to earn income with their parents.

The report also details the growing number of attacks from schools across the world in the run up to the first ever International Day to Protect Education from Attack.

We'll, we'll, we'll commemorate the commemorate that day on the 9th of September.

This is spearheaded by the Global Coalition for the Protection of Education from Attack.

I would be it would be a remiss if I don't recount the story which is so vividly.

It is in my memories.

IS in IS in Suran, a village north of Hama in Syria.

[Other language spoken]

When we went there for the first time, UNHCR missions and we were told that there are some returnees who have returned to this village and we went to see them and in one house with no doors, no windows, there was an old man sitting on the floor on a mattress.

And we discussed with him his needs.

He politely got up, held my hand and he walked me to the next neighbourhood and he said look at this building right in front of you if you help us.

And that was a school which was in ruins.

There was rubble all over the place, no doors, no windows, shrapnel.

You could see the mortar has been it all destroyed in their mortar had landed there in that school building.

And he said the village will come back to life if you help us rebuild the school.

Don't build my house, build the school.

That was the message to me.

And I looked around and I saw dozens of other children standing around me.

And I could see in their eyes the hunger for education was there.

There was a teacher who was standing there.

And when Isis came to that village, what she did, she took all the books, textbooks from the school and she hide them in her house.

She was hiding them for the last three years.

And she wanted us to rebuild that school so the children can get back to school, especially the girls who are not allowed to go back to school.

We rebuilt that school and they were now running two shifts a day and hundreds of children were going to that school and literally that village came back to life.

That's the passion.

In Africa side region alone there are 2500 such schools which are being in similar situation.

350,000 students are affected by that.

But we also have stories from Yemen, from Colombia, from Afghanistan, from Somalia.

[Other language spoken]

We have to have these things stopped.

And that's why we look at the day, International Day to Protect Education from Attack.

You'll also see in the report that there's a word from our global soccer icon, Masala of Liverpool.

Many of you would know that he's an ambassador with the Instant Network Schools programme of Unit CR with a partner Vodafone.

He says, and I quote, unless everyone plays their part, generations of children will face a bleak future.

But if we work as a team, as one, we can give them the chance they deserve to have a dignified future.

Let me just quickly run to through the call to action, which is also in the report and it calls to action the States and cities refugee children and youth are including in worldwide effort to restart education.

It calls to refugees girls have equal access to education.

We need to breakdown barriers that refugee children and youths with disabilities they face in classrooms.

We need to allow refugees to enrol in schools under the same conditions as nationals.

We need to give refugees access to school without documentation or certification.

When they flee their countries, they don't look for their documents, they leave their documents behind.

They are destroyed or burnt or damaged.

We cannot ask them for their documentation to continue for their education.

There's also Call to Action from schools and universities which ask schools and universities to welcome refugees into classrooms, give teachers the relevant training to integrate refugee students, provide language courses to refugees who do not speak the language, offer scholarships, be an understanding of the realities of displacement and stand up to discrimination, xenophobia, sexual harassment and bullying in classrooms.

We also call to action business community.

We want them to partner with Unit CR to boost investment, help us innovate and find solutions to new long standing problems, Needs, equipment, teachers, training, connectivity, online resources to internship, apprenticeships, training and job opportunities.

We also call to action donors to ensure reliable multi year funding of refugee education programmes.

One wonderful example is the government of Germany.

For the last 30 years they have been giving daffy scholarships for university education.

We want more donors to join in this programme, commit to the international goals and ambitions of organisations committed to refugee education.

And finally, a call to everybody.

Lobby your governments to support inclusion of refugees and national systems, help refugees learn new languages and skills, speak up on refugees issues and tackle xenophobia.

And lastly, to all our students globally, welcome refugees into your schools, communities, and your life.

Thank you for coming together for refugees.

[Other language spoken]

And now we're going to Mom and do John.

Oh, oh, I'm so sorry.

We're going to Becky Telford first in Copenhagen.

Becky, are you online?

Thank you so much and Sajjad and and colleagues have set out some of the reasons why education for refugees is so vital.

And now in the time of COVID more than ever, as well as talking about some of these stories and really expressing a call to action and how people can come together even more effectively to support education for refugees.

The report aims to bring some of the new data from 2019 so we can globally understand the scale of the issue and some of the places where we are also making traction.

It's important to note that this year the report has moved to a different methodology for analysing the data.

So this year uses gross enrolment ratios and these effectively count every child in school, even if that child is in the wrong grade or even if they're repeating a year.

So that means a child who is 15 years old but is in first grade for the first time is considered in school.

We've changed to this methodology partly because it expresses more of how refugees are actually accessing school and it helps us to understand the kind of programmes and the kind of advocacy which is needed to help them transition all the way through the school life cycle.

We've also changed to work on a sample of countries rather than looking for global figures, and that just helps us to create data which is more robust and where we're more able to understand the kind of trends which are coming out in refugee education.

The challenge with a shift in analysing the data to this way is that it's you can't compare the data to the 2019 report, but what the trends do show is that there are gains still being made, even though sometimes these can feel quite small.

48% of children are still out of school and that represents a huge number.

77% of refugee children are enrolled in primary school, but less than half of those children are expected to make it to secondary school.

We really see continued drop off as children go through the life cycle of education and so the numbers get lower for secondary where it's only 31% of refugees who can access secondary education.

Whilst we can't compare this to the 2019 report figure, comparing it to the same sample of gross enrolment data for those 12 countries does show a 2% increase in previous on the previous year and that is an increase that represents 10s of thousands of additional students getting into school.

I think it's really important, you know, UNHCR recognises that secondary education is really life changing for students and particularly for adolescent girls.

With that figure of 31%, only 27% of girls were enrolled in in education at secondary level compared to 36% of boys.

The importance of of secondary education for girls really can't be overstated.

Secondary education is where girls become able to marry later to have fewer children.

It's where you get gains in lifetime economic engagement and in achievement of other activities, particularly around livelihoods, as well as supporting their own children to enrol in school and to continue through the education life cycle themselves.

So Unhi really calls on all actors to come together and work even more effectively in this area.

As you now said, one of the the pieces of work we've done around COVID has been to work with the Malala Fund to model some of the data and understand what the impact might be on the students that we work with.

And even with the small numbers of girls who are currently enrolled in secondary, they've concluded that 50% of those girls might not return when classrooms open.

The potential impact of that for the future, you know, for those girls who are going to grow up to have their own children to struggle to engage economically really is potentially enormous.

And if you think back to to Rena, the young girl who, and I was talking about her ability to reach that dream of becoming a doctor and potentially be supporting her community in future pandemics or supporting her community to come together and inspire other girls will be really seriously undermined.

So whilst we're looking at some gains and some some staying static in terms of the data, I think it's also crucial to really highlight, as it's as it's done in the report, the potential impact that COVID-19 will have on backtracking from those gains.

Where you might have students who, you know, are unable to, to return to school because of social distancing.

Working around the policy environment and understanding that refugees must not be kind of targeted to, to miss out where schools can't take all the, all the students in is really important.

As is looking at where we can build back better.

Taking this opportunity to look at WASH facilities, to look at infrastructure, to look at teacher training and support to families so that schools can welcome even more students who can make a positive difference to their future.

[Other language spoken]

Thank you, Becky.

And before we wrap up and take some questions, just to note again, as as Sajjad mentioned, our collaboration together with Mosala, who is Vodafone's Instant Network Schools Ambassador, really wants to stress the importance of everybody taking a role in helping refugee children access education.

And this means obviously governments and private and public sector, it means the students and teachers themselves, the families, the communities that support them.

And as Sajjad also mentioned, there are so many different actions that can be taken at the very local and the global level.

So whether it's volunteering at your local school to help refugees and other displaced people and students and families learn the native, the local language, or whether it's lobbying your government for additional funding to support refugee education.

Whether it's making sure that you are using your consumer power to sponsor those private sector companies that are doing a lot to help promote and move forward refugee education.

And whether it's also you using your own network, challenging and amplifying and using your social media to tag either your own universities, your **** schools, Community Schools to do more to make sure that refugees are integrated into national systems and welcomed by the community.

There's always more that we can all do.

And particularly for those children, many of whom are living in urban settings, as mentioned, the cities, the mayors, the local municipal governments can can also be activated to to ensure that we reach as many refugee children both during the COVID pandemic and and after to ensure that everyone has access to education.

And we're going to open now for questions.

If you could Please remember to introduce yourself and the publication or network you're with.

Let's start with.

I see Christian has her hand up from DPA.

[Other language spoken]

I'm not sure whether I missed something, but we are talking about report that we know nothing about.

We don't have any material.

Did you send out something?

It's very difficult to, to ask questions on something that I personally don't know anything about.

I, I believe that we have, have already shared the, the media kit which is linked to the press release that we gave the, the report itself is embargoed until the 3rd of September when it's being launched globally.

But all of the materials are available.

So I'll, I'll make sure that a copy gets to you again, Christian.

A press release was shared a few hours ago.

And in that press release there, there's also links to a media page where you'll have the actual report itself, as well as the press release and and multimedia content that's available to support the release once the embargo is lifted on on Thursday.

Let's go to Peter Kenny.

OK, I think, I think you're unmuted.

[Other language spoken]

If you want to ask a question, we don't hear you at the moment.

[Other language spoken]

Perhaps we can come back here if there are any other questions first.

I don't see any.

So Peter, I'm sorry we couldn't hear your question.

If you're able to to to unmute then please go ahead.

But otherwise we see no other questions.

So perhaps we we wrap it up there.

[Other language spoken]

And again, look out for the materials that should be in your inboxes as well as the media resources which are attached in the link.

And as mentioned, the report will be launched on the 3rd of September and the 9th will be the International Day to Protect Education from Attack.

Thank you all so much.