Knowledge is power
Abdullah’s story of determination to sit for his Grade 12 national exam
“Knowledge is power, and ignorance is weakness. A good education will undoubtably help me secure a better future for myself. Those are the thoughts I kept on repeating every day until I arrived here for my Grade 12 exams.”
Al-Sabkha, Ar-Raqqa, Syria, June 2021 – Abdullah, 19, is one of over 13,000 students who crossed conflict lines around the end of May to sit for their national Grades 9 and 12 exams in Ar-Raqqa governorate. It was escalating violence in his hometown of Jurniya, Ar-Raqqa, northeast Syria, that has forced Abdullah out of school since 2013.
He felt bitter about not having access to education, but following a lull in violence in late 2017, he was determined to go back to learning and pursue his dream of going to university. With the absence of functional schools in his area and lack of educational staff, Abdullah resorted to taking private lessons and courses to remedy his missed learning. “They costed a fortune!” Abdullah says. “I had to work in farming, growing vegetables and cultivating land in order to afford paying for a private tutor,” he adds. Despite the long tiresome working hours, he was happy that he would be able to cover the cost of the lessons to prepare for Grade 12 national exams and pursue his education.
“Dropping out of school in Grade 7 due to the conflict, was a huge setback for me. For a while, I did not have any access to learning, and when I did, I realized that I had a lot of catching up to do before I’m ready to undergo the baccalaureate exams,”
“Knowledge is power, and ignorance is weakness. A good education will undoubtably help me secure a better future for myself. Those are the thoughts I kept on repeating every day until I arrived here for my Grade 12 exams,” he says.
This year, soon after Abdullah registered to take the national exam, he heard about accommodation centres in Ar-Raqqa being set up to receive students like himself also coming from hard-to-reach areas for their national exams. He was ready to embark on this more than 120-kilometer-long journey from Jurniya to Al-Sabkha and is currently undergoing the exams.
“I’m hoping to pass the physics exam. I’m not sure I did it well as there were some topics that I couldn’t fully grasp on my own,” says Abdullah. “I wish no child would have to miss on their education.” Since his arrival in the UNICEF-supported accommodation centre, he has been attending remedial classes and has managed to share knowledge and study with some of the other students preparing for their Grade 12 exams.
In Ar-Raqqa, thanks to generous contributions from Canada, Kuwait, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and the Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA), UNICEF with partners have provided the students, crossing lines of conflict, with remedial classes, helping them prepare for the exams, bursaries, covering their transportation costs, stationery and learning materials, as well as psychosocial support through group and one-on-one sessions. Children and chaperoning teachers also received mine risk education to ensure their safety, when returning to their areas.
To ensure a comfortable stay for students, UNICEF with partners also prepared 41 accommodation centres in the governorates of Ar-Raqqa, Aleppo, Deir-ez-Zor, Hama and rural Damascus through rehabilitation of water, sanitation and hygiene facilities, provision of safe drinking water, installation of windows and doors, and maintenance of electricity, with mobile health teams visiting all the accommodation centers. To raise the awareness of students, UNICEF with partners distributed COVID -19 informative posters and conducted awareness sessions. With a generous support from Education Cannot Wait (ECW), to help keep students safe against COVID-19, UNICEF undertook the daily sanitation of the 41 accommodation centres and over 4,800 exam centres across Syria and supported school health workers, heads of exams and accommodation centres with COVID-19 safety protocol trainings.
