“I am so happy having the opportunity to join this programme, learning mathematics and reading with my friends.”
– A 13-year-old girl attending a non-formal education centre in Rakhine.
Key figures
Severity of needs
PiN and target
Needs
Increasingly, more boys and girls across Myanmar are failing to safely gain access to learning opportunities within their communities. This is largely related to a mix of disasters and escalating conflict across the country, leading to increased displacement and reduced safety, including deliberate attacks on education. Conflict, resulting displacement and economic collapse have increasingly had a negative impact on people’s sources of livelihoods, worsening vulnerabilities and further limiting the economic means to afford costs associated with children’s learning. A persistent lack of teachers and the unsafe learning environment have also exacerbated the situation. Children and youth have been increasingly exposed to more protection risks such as child marriage, sexual exploitation and abuse, child labour and human trafficking. While the situation varies across the different population groups, the overall situation is deeply concerning with more than half of the children (579,000) of IDPs, returnees and stateless people not accessing formal education. About 44 per cent or an estimated 43,000 school-aged children from the non-displaced stateless category have no access to any form of education, significantly worse than those in other population groups (17 per cent among other crisis-affected people with humanitarian needs, 20 per cent among returnees and 26 per cent among IDPs).
The lack of access to education for children also varies across the different regions and states, with a strong correlation between conflict and its resulting displacement and rates of education access. More than 80 per cent of IDP and returnee children in Sagaing do not access education due to increased conflict and displacement as well as various access constraints. Sagaing accounts for 23 per cent of the total people in need of education support, followed by Rakhine (13 per cent) and northern Shan (9 per cent). These three areas have a common denominator – increased conflict and displacement.
Response
Among the 4.8 million people in need of education support, 1.3 million people (or 28 per cent) are targeted for assistance in 2025. This includes nearly 628,000 boys, more than 687,000 girls and almost 164,000 children with disabilities, which collectively represent 98 per cent of the target. Adults (educators, school administrators, etc.) represent 2 per cent of the target (almost 14,000 men and more than 15,000 women). The main determinants of the targeting were vulnerability of specific population groups, conflict and displacement dynamics, access and operational capacity. One hundred per cent of all people in need in the three most vulnerable categories (IDPs, returnees, non-displaced stateless persons) have been targeted. This accounts for 74 per cent of the total cluster target – an increase from 51 per cent in the 2024 HNRP. Varying proportions of host communities have also been targeted based on conflict and displacement trends. Assistance will be delivered through a mix of in-kind and cash and voucher programmes, conditional on market functionality and political/conflict dynamics in various parts of the country. To continue to increase the scale of assistance, the Cluster will build upon the already established localization efforts, including onboarding and supporting more local partners to lead the response, especially in locations with complicated access. The Cluster will continue collaboration with other clusters and areas of responsibility. This includes child protection actors to ensure children are safe through effective referral mechanisms and explosive ordnance risk education, and WASH partners for better hygiene practices and increased awareness of AWD, among others.
Monitoring
The Cluster will use the Activity Info platform first introduced in the course of 2023 to track and report progress of the cluster response on a quarterly basis. Activity Info orientation sessions for partners’ reporting focal points will be conducted prior to every reporting period and when there is a change in partner focal point. More frequent sessions will be organized for local partners to also capture child protection concerns within the education response. Every quarter, response data will be collected and dashboards created to generate visualization of the response. Data showing reach versus needs/gaps will guide partners’ targeting decisions. Data collection and storage is undertaken with the security of partners in mind. The dashboards will be available to all cluster partners on the cluster website and MIMU website.
Education Cluster Strategy for Myanmar:
https://reliefweb.int/report/myanmar/myanmar-education-cluster-strategy-2024
Education Cluster at a glance:
https://reliefweb.int/node/4117972