Helping refugee children get back to learning

For so many children around the world, going back to school means the start of a new year, learning new things, and making new friends. It’s a time of excitement and hope for the future.

But for refugee children affected by the crisis in Syria, there’s often no such thing as “back to school,” and it’s possible they never even started. Many of these children, living in refugee camps or informal settlements, don’t have schools to attend. These children are missing out on the sense of normalcy and opportunity that school provides.

Right now, there are almost one million Syrian refugee children out of school. These children have not only faced the hardship of leaving their homes — along with everything they knew — but are now being denied the tools and support they need to one day build a better future.

That’s why Sesame Street and the International Rescue Committee (IRC) have teamed up to provide early education and nurturing care to refugee children and their families. Together with the IRC, we’re creating culturally-relevant educational content featuring our beloved Sesame Street Muppets, providing support for the host communities in the Syrian response region, and helping parents more effectively engage with their children to build resiliency.

Islam (left), Gharam (center), and Mohammed (right)

We know these children want to learn, and their parents are often desperate to keep them in school. Like Islam, who loves to draw and wants be a doctor when she grows up so she can help people. Her brother Mohammed wants to be a police officer and their mother, Gharam, sees education as the key to a better life. A critical aspect of our program is that it engages parents and caregivers, like Gharam, in promoting nurturing care, healthy development, and deepening learning experiences.

The numbers show a program like ours is needed. In recent years, education has received less than two percent of all humanitarian funding — just a fraction of which has gone to early childhood development. And for refugee children, this isn’t a short-term problem, so we need a solution that’s long-term, and durable. Children are remarkably resilient, but they need the knowledge and skills to best equip them for the future — and by reaching them in their early years we give them the greatest chance for success.

Sesame Street has been providing education to children around the world for almost 50 years. We know that, if we can reach children with quality early childhood education, we can help them to learn, to grow, and to thrive.

So this back to school season, please consider supporting refugee children who need to get back to learning. Without education, an entire generation is at risk. How can they be expected to rebuild their society — and what does that mean to the future of the region, and the rest of the world? We believe history will judge us on how we respond to the crisis. An investment in the education of these children is an investment in a more peaceful, stable world for us all.

We hope you’ll learn more about our work for refugees and lend your support at sesameworkshop.org/refugees