Our camp school grows up
More than 300 Syrian students need your support
On 12 October, our non-formal camp school in Akkar (Northern Lebanon) started its second school year. We have been running this non-formal school for Syrian refugee children throughout the school year 2013/14. And now we have big news to announce. During this summer, the Lebanese charity initiative Malaak provided the funding for building 14 new class rooms. During summer, we started to enroll 200 more kids from surrounding camps who had been out of school for more than 3 years. The extended camp school is now giving daily lessons to more than 300 students..
As from August, the newly enrolled children have received summer intensive classes for catching up with those who had already been studying at the camp school in the last school year. The goal of this camp school is to help refugee children integrate formal Lebanese schools. But besides the lack of space, the main problem is French. Contrary to Syria, where school is in Arabic, the vast majority of Lebanese public schools are taught in French. For giving these children a chance to catch up and to obtain a formal school degree, preparing for the Lebanese French curriculum is the best available option.
Our Lebanese teachers and our Syrian and international volunteers, who are staying at our first R&R Peace Centre nearby, are working day and night for bringing these kids back into school. UNICEF says that out of 400,000 school-aged refugee children living in Lebanon, only 40,000 have so far integrated formal Lebanese schools. We need your help to make this camp school a success and to offer a future to these Syrian children. Many of them have lost half of their family in the war, many are deeply traumatized. We are not receiving any public subsidies for this work and we are relying on your generosity alone. Many thanks for your support!