Lebanon’s Education Emergency
Pupils in JCC’s “Children on the Move” class.
Many children in Lebanon are being deprived of vital schooling as crisis grips the education system: teachers have been out on strike; schools are unable to cover the cost of basic supplies and families can’t afford the transport to get their children to school.
Sophia, our Programmes and Partnerships Manager for Lebanon, recently visited the country and witnessed what is happening and how the crisis is particularly affecting those children living on the margins:
Before we had even entered the small classroom, all 20 children had stood up in perfect unison, their expectant faces glancing shyly in our direction. They had been anticipating our arrival – in fact, we were told that they had been practicing all morning for their foreign visitors.
“This class”, our hostess announced proudly, “are the Children on the Move!” The group of adolescents before us ranged in age from 10 to 17 years, and included Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. All of them live close by to this informal education centre, either in the rundown Beirut neighbourhood of Sabra, or the adjoining Palestinian refugee camp of Shatila, which, although just one kilometre square, is home to as many as 40,000 Palestinian and Syrian refugees.
My Embrace colleagues and I listened whilst the students proceeded to tell us, one by one, what they enjoyed about learning. A couple of them showed us their beautifully neat cursive English sentences.
Most of the current cohort are new to the class this academic year, and for some of them, this is the first chance they’ve ever had to learn to read and write. I still struggle to digest that fact.
“Children on the Move” is the appositely named project run by Embrace partner, the Joint Christian Committee (JCC). It started in January 2017 and throughout each academic year offers a weekly programme of educational support and broader vocational training for 20 out-of-school adolescents, as well as recreational activities and the occasional outing.
The programme really is a lifeline for these kids – and it’s becoming even more so.
Lebanon is facing what can only be described as an education emergency. The country’s state education system has long been overstretched, as years of under-investment have left state schools inadequately resourced. The arrival of so many Syrian refugees from 2011 onwards put a further strain on schools’ capacity to cope.
It’s telling that, prior to the recent financial crisis, some 75 per cent of Lebanese parents opted to send their children to private schools. That has all changed now.
In the last few years, the challenges have been mounting: the October 2019 revolution prompted widespread disruption and prolonged school closures, affecting around 1.2 million children. In early 2020, the COVID lockdowns meant that schools stayed closed, and there was a shift to a reduced online curriculum that many poor students simply couldn’t access.
And all the while, the impact of Lebanon’s enduring economic crisis has been catastrophic.
For the first three months of 2023, Lebanon’s state schools were shut due to teachers’ strikes. This wasn’t the first of the strikes over pay. Teachers have been striking periodically since 2019. But the frequency of strikes is increasing across all sectors, and the prolonged nature of this one signals the level of desperation and discontent people are now feeling.
Many teachers simply can’t afford to go to work now. The soaring cost of fuel, food and rent far exceeds the meagre wage they receive in Lebanese Lira. Schools, meanwhile, struggle to cover the running costs of keeping classrooms lit or heated or providing the necessary educational supplies.
Yet even before the 2023 strikes, an estimated 700,000 children were out of school, according to UNICEF, many of them Syrian refugees.
That’s because parents can no longer afford to cover the cost of uniforms, stationery, books, or the transportation to get their child to and from school. What’s more, we heard from several Embrace partners stories of children being pulled out of school, as they are needed to help earn an income for the family. There’s also a rising trend of teenage girls being married off early.
So the part played by informal education centres like the one run by JCC is becoming even more critical. Although far from ideal, such centres are filling a growing gap left by the floundering formal education sector. They faithfully open their doors each day, and the kids turn up without fail.
At the end of our time with JCC, we asked the students what they wanted to be when they were older. One girl wants to be an air hostess. One of the boys said he would like to be a butcher. A couple aspire to be teachers, to help others as their JCC teachers have helped them.
For some though, this was too big and challenging a question, and in retrospect, I regretted asking it: With all the volatility this generation have lived through in the past few years, it’s not hard to see why they now take so little for granted. Even an education. The future is a distant and uncertain prospect. It’s safer to focus on the here and now, the things that are tangible.
I left the JCC centre feeling conflicted. I felt sad and angry for what this generation have had to endure; I felt overwhelmed by the scale of this crisis and how many young futures now hang in the balance because of it. Yet a small part of me felt hopeful. And I hold on to that hope now. It may be a drop in the ocean of need, but the faithful love-in-service of Embrace’s Christian partners is making a difference. To these young lives. Now. Perhaps with that, a mustard seed of faith and a lot of prayer, bigger change can happen.
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