Losing out on Learning: Providing Refugee Children the Education they Were Promised

Around the world, there are too many refugee children who haven’t just lost their homes, they’re also losing their futures every single day.

More than half of all the refugee children in the world – 3.5 million children – aren’t in school.

Last year world leaders made a promise: that all refugee children would be in school and learning within a few months of becoming refugees. One year on that promise has been broken. Since that promise was made, refugee children have lost out on over 700 million days of school. Every day another 1.9 million school days are lost.

The time to act is now. Millions of the world's out-of-school refugees have already lost years of learning. In fact, many have never had the chance to go to school. They cannot afford another year of inaction.

Refugee children and their parents consistently identify education as a priority. They see schooling as a source of hope and opportunity - and they are right. It is time for the international community to listen to them.

In our new report ‘Losing out on Learning’ we assess progress in implementing the education-related commitments made in the New York Declaration on Migrants and Refugees and at the 2016 Leaders’ Summit on Refugees.