Fewer Syrians in Lebanon are reaching universities

Eight years after Syrians began to enter Lebanon in flight from an uprising that turned into civil war, young refugees continue to struggle for integration into the Lebanese education system at every level – primary and secondary schools and higher education. Indeed, by some measures, the educational outlook for Syrians is getting worse, writes Edward Fox for Al-Fanar Media.

“This year, the number of scholarships available to Syrian refugees to study in Lebanon is decreasing,” said Ben Webster, founder of Mosaik, a United Kingdom-based organisation that helps Syrian refugees reach higher education in Lebanon and Jordan. Webster ascribes the decrease to a combination of donor fatigue, the funding cycles of the large organisations working in the field and a re-orientation towards vocational training.

Fewer young Syrians are eligible for higher education because fewer of them are graduating from Lebanese secondary schools. In Jordan, by contrast, more students qualify for DAFI (Albert Einstein German Academic Refugee Initiative) scholarships because “they graduate from high school with quite good results”, said Maren Kroeger, manager of the DAFI programme at the United Nations refugee agency, one of the largest providers of higher-education scholarships for Syrian refugees.
Full report on the Al-Fanar Media site