Gaziantep, 01 February 2021- Nearly 120 schools have been damaged or destroyed over the last week due to severe flooding, as thousands of families struggle with severe winter storms. At least 21,000 children and more than 980 education personnel have been affected by the recent floods. The current numbers fall short of the actual damage, as many areas are inaccessible and despite efforts, the enormous task of essential rehabilitation of schools damaged by floods remains. At least one million dollars are needed to help education actors respond to the flood crisis.

With more than 2 million children of school age in North West Syria — half of them are estimated to be displaced — the education system in the area cannot cope with another shock. Urgent support is needed to return children to education, according to Education Cluster for northwest Syria.

Between ongoing hostilities, an underfunded sector, COVID-19 mitigation measures and now the floods, hundreds of thousands of children are at risk of falling out of education. Most of the learning facilities are not equipped to provide protection and social distancing, and thousands of teachers continue to work although they have not been paid their salaries for over a year.

The education cluster and partners are responding in northwest Syria, however, additional support is needed to cover the damage of the flood such as psychosocial support to children, urgent rehabilitation of learning spaces, heaters and fuel for heaters, stationery and textbooks to allow children to get regular access to education.

ENDS

Yuka NAKAMURA Education Cluster Coordinator United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) MENA Regional Office, Gaziantep Outpost, Turkey ynakamura@unicef.org

Efsun ILHAN Education Cluster Coordinator Save the Children Gaziantep Hub, Syria Response Office Efsun.ilhan@savethechildren.org