68 | June• 2019Watch. He points out that government
and NGO targets for enrolment overall
are unambitious, given that in 2017
more than 300,000 of 630,000 Syrian
children living in Lebanon were still
not in formal schooling. Greater gov-
ernment action is needed, he says, “or
we will continue to fail these children.”
Like refugees across the country,
this family still faces challenges. Tak-
wa’s mother Rahma is eight months
pregnant and suffers from anaemia.
She is homesick for Syria, and worried
her youngest boy is malnourished. For
now though, says Rahma, the school in
Zefta brings bright spots of pride and
joy – valuable for refugees worn down
by uncertainty.
“The children are so excited to go
and learn,” she says. Her own school-
ing is rudimentary but she’s come to
prize learning all the more.
“Education is light, and ignorance is
darkness,” she says.Maan, aged five, sings the first tentative
notes of a song. Teacher Laura Hijazi’s
heart swells, because during Maan’s
four weeks at the centre he has been
unable to join in with class singing. He
and his mother fled ISIS under heavy
shelling in May last year. But Laura, 30,
paid him special attention, giving him
stars, toys or balloons whenever he got
something right.S
EVEN WEEKS AFTER she be-
gan school, Takwa sits behind
her desk. Her teacher hands
out plastic blocks marked with words
in Arabic. They must match their first
block, which says “the letter R”, with
other words starting with R. It’s learn-
ing by playing, explains teacher Riman
Ezzeddine. “We must help them feel
safe. And confident,” she says.
Across the country, the situation
for refugee children is still “terrible”,
says Bill Van Esveld of Human RightsStudents hanging out in the playground. They feel safe and at home at the school