After years of hard work in Iraq, in the spring of 2016, we finally opened a new office in the city of Sulaimaniyah, in Iraqi Kurdistan, where work began immediately on “Taleem Lil Jameeh” (Education for all) an emergency project for Syrian refugees and host communities in the area, financed by the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS) and implemented by our long-standing Iraqi partner Al Mesalla.

The project goal is to build a Youth Education Centre, where young Syrian refugees from the Arbat camp, about 20 km from the town, will be able to take part in informal education initiatives including sport, circus, music and theatre. 

Arbat camp hosts more than 6,000 people, about 1,000 of them are under the age of 18.

The project includes transport services for children from the city’s two schools. Despite the fact that there are currently 30,000 refugees in the Governorate of Sulaimaniyah, there are only 6 schools for the youngest Syrian refugees, as they have different requirements to their Kurdish peers - both in terms of language and their educational programme.

Most of the refugee families live in the town, where their difficult economic situations often mean children cannot actually get to school. That is why we are providing 7 microbus, to take around 200 children to school every day.

In addition, teachers from schools in Kobani and Verga - which will be the schools served by the transport service, will be trained in in the provision of psychosocial assistance, so they will have the necessary tools to work with children who - despite their young age - have known the trauma of war and displacement.