Educated in War and Peace

It is self-explanatory that the war on Lebanon has affected extant education systems badly. For different providers in the country’s fragmented educational landscape – one that has long been flagged for “co-existence of multiple systems with sharply different quality levels” (2015 World Bank Lebanon systematic country diagnostic), the 2024-25 academic year was disrupted just as it was about to start or had barely begun. Under the initial conflict shock, institutions at all levels of formal education were mandated by the Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MEHE) to temporarily suspend operations from the first day of intensification of enemy attacks on September 23. An emergency response plan with a projected funding need of $25 million was devised by the ministry with UNESCO collaboration and presented on October 15 to international donors. The plan determined November 4 as the revised start of the academic year. Depending on circumstances, however, the closures