More than 1,300 schools in Ukraine have been totally destroyed since Russia invaded the country, Reuters reports citing the UN children’s fund UNICEF.
Some schools have suffered direct hits and others have closed down as a precaution in 18 months of missile and artillery attacks on residential areas across the country.
The report claims that only a third of school-aged children in Ukraine attend classes offline, with another third studying through a mixed approach and the rest only taking online classes.
“Inside Ukraine, attacks on schools have continued unabated, leaving children deeply distressed and without safe spaces to learn. Not only has this left Ukraine’s children struggling to progress in their education, but they are also struggling to retain what they learnt when their schools were fully functioning,” said Regina De Dominicis, UNICEF Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia.
In a survey conducted by UNICEF among Ukrainian teachers, 57% said that students showed decreased knowledge of the Ukrainian language, up to 45% reported a reduction in mathematics skills, and up to 52% noted a deterioration in foreign language abilities.
Beyond Ukraine, more than half of the children whose families have fled the conflict to seven countries are not enrolled in national education, Reuters wrote citing UNICEF.
