Attachments
Executive Summary
Background and Context:
Returnees’ inflow from Pakistan is a part of the Government of Pakistan’s Illegal Foreigners’ Repatriation Plan to return all undocumented Afghans to their country of origin. A similar repatriation exercise has been ongoing from Iran for a while as well. As of May 4th, 2024, a total of 604,994 individuals (359,980 males and 245,014 females) have crossed back through the Spin Boldak border points in Kandahar, the Torkham border in Nangarhar and Nimroz. Approximately 181,979 school-aged children (98,789 boys and 83,190 girls) have returned and settled with their families across the country as of May 2024.
Currently, the Afghan education system is overburdened and underfunded, which means that its capacity to absorb additional students is extremely limited. While there is great political will to accommodate these children, the realities of non-availability of sufficient and conducive school buildings, shortage of qualified teachers, and lack of teaching and learning materials do not enable the authorities to adequately and timely respond to the influx of returnees in areas of return. It is assumed that many school-aged children returning from Pakistan do not meet the minimum language requirements to attend school in Dari and Pashto (local official languages).
While some of the returnee students may possess greater competencies than their Afghan peers in the same grade, given the relative status of the Pakistani education system, the language barrier may prohibit them from integrating into public schools. However, it is not all the returnee children who had access to education while in Pakistan. It is likely however, that families may be forced to engage their children in income generating activities to help meet the financial burden of the returnee family rather than send them to school.