Education

Sudan is experiencing one of the world’s most severe education emergencies as the war between the SAF and RSF continues to devastate schools, teachers, and student access to learning. A February 2026 humanitarian education brief says the crisis is putting an entire generation’s learning at risk, while a 2026 BTI country report says the destruction of educational infrastructure has left up to 17 million Sudanese children deprived of education. Schools have been closed, damaged, occupied, or repurposed for shelter in conflict-affected areas, and teachers have been displaced or unpaid, further weakening an already collapsing system. The education crisis is tightly linked to the wider humanitarian disaster. The BTI report says more than 14 million people have been displaced, around 25 million are facing acute hunger, and the death toll has exceeded 50,000. UNICEF-linked estimates cited in the same report indicate 17 million children are out of education, with children facing heightened risks of recruitment, child labor, early marriage, exploitation, and malnutrition. The most affected areas include Khartoum and Darfur, along with other conflict-affected states across Sudan, and the crisis is also spreading across borders as displaced families seek refuge in neighboring countries.

Sudan’s war has pushed the country’s education system into one of the world’s most severe crises. Recent reporting from the Global Education Cluster says the vast majority of Sudan’s children have lost nearly two school years since school closures began in April 2023, with 54% of schools in active conflict or unstable zones and 18% being used as shelters, severely limiting access to learning. UNESCO also says Sudan’s education system faces one of the world’s most severe crises, with 19 million children out of school, while UNICEF-linked reporting in 2024 described more than 90% of children as lacking access to formal education. The crisis is nationwide but especially severe in conflict-affected and displacement-heavy areas, including Khartoum, Darfur, Kordofan, and other states where schools remain closed, damaged, or occupied by displaced families. Save the Children reports the conflict has closed 10,400 schools and displaced millions of children, while teachers have gone unpaid for months. Humanitarian response is trying to expand safe learning spaces, remote learning, school reopening efforts, psychosocial support, teacher training, and emergency repairs, but funding remains far below what is needed. For 2025, Sudan’s Humanitarian Needs Response Plan originally allocated USD 108 million for education targeting 3 million school-age children, but the education response was later capped at USD 10.5 million for 2.6 million children, showing a major funding contraction.

Tanzania’s education sector has been disrupted by the violent crackdown that followed the country’s disputed October 29, 2025 general elections. Reporting from Human Rights Watch says security forces used lethal force and other abuses during and after the unrest, and the government imposed a nationwide lockdown that restricted movement and access to public spaces, including schools and transport routes. The U.S. Embassy in Dar es Salaam also warned of unrest, intermittent international flights, and an internet shutdown during the crisis, indicating broader disruption to daily life and public services. The post-election violence has had knock-on effects for children, teachers, and families in affected areas, especially in Dar es Salaam and other cities where protests and security operations were concentrated. While the search results do not provide a verified national count of school closures or a ministry-wide suspension order, they do document closures of schools and universities during the unrest and a security environment that made normal attendance difficult. Given the scale of reported killings and arrests, the crisis likely worsened learning loss, psychosocial stress, and access barriers for students in urban centers and other affected regions.

Education in Tigray, Ethiopia remains severely disrupted despite the end of large-scale fighting and the reopening of schools in May 2023. Recent reporting and assessments still describe extensive conflict damage, with the education system struggling to recover from destroyed or damaged classrooms, shortages of teachers and learning materials, and continued displacement-related pressure on school buildings. A 2024 policy brief reported that 74.9% of schools assessed in 22 woredas were partially damaged and 19.1% had completely damaged classrooms, broken furniture, and destroyed educational materials, while 4.2% of schools in Tigray were occupied by internally displaced people (IDPs). It also reported major access gaps in some zones, including 40.7% of eligible students out of school in the Central zone and 65.8% in the North Western zone. Humanitarian and education actors say the recovery has been slow and uneven. The European Commission reported that roughly 2.4 million school-aged children were denied education for three academic years and that 88% of school infrastructure had been damaged, while only 40% of school-aged children had enrolled after schools reopened in 2023. A more recent 2024/2025 report cited by local media estimated the education sector’s losses at USD 5.38 billion and said more than 1.2 million children were out of school, with over 80% of schools rendered nonfunctional. The problem remains concentrated in Tigray, with spillover effects for displaced families and returnees in other parts of Ethiopia.

Myanmar’s education crisis remains severe and is being driven by the 2021 military coup, ongoing conflict, and repeated attacks on schools. By late 2024, reporting cited 245 attacks on schools in 2022–23, with 190 schools commandeered by the military, and Myanmar Witness recorded 174 reports of serious violence against schools as of July 2024; the military was involved in 90 of 113 primary-dataset cases. These patterns show that schooling continues to be disrupted by insecurity, damage to infrastructure, and military use of education facilities. The scale of educational exclusion remains enormous. A Protect Education report cited by 2022 data said school enrolment had fallen by about 80% compared with two years earlier, leaving 7.8 million children out of school. The same source said over 12 million children and adolescents missed organized learning for at least 18 months due to COVID-19 closures, anti-junta unrest, and conflict. A World Bank analysis found public schools were closed for almost two years after the pandemic and coup, and estimated learning-adjusted years of schooling for the current cohort could fall by 1.9 to 2.2 years. Conflict-affected areas, especially in territories controlled by the military and in areas under the National Unity Government or Ethnic Revolutionary Organisations, are the most affected. Education access is also constrained by teacher shortages, displacement, destroyed infrastructure, and ongoing insecurity. The overall trend remains worsening because violence against schools persists and enrollment and learning losses have not recovered to pre-crisis levels.