Methodologies to measure the impacts of internal displacement on education

• In Event: Improving data coordination and data standards for forcibly displaced populations

Proposal

Globally, there were 59.1 million internally displaced people (IDPs) at the end of 2021, the highest figure on record. The exact number of school-aged children living in internal displacement is unknown, but it is estimated that about 17.4 million are between 5 and 17 years old. Internal displacement can affect a child’s education in many ways: it can reduce their access to school, the quality of education they receive, and their learning outcomes.
Despite growing research on the education of children displaced across borders, information on the education of children displaced within borders is limited. The evidence available shows that they are often in need of dedicated support and face several barriers to learning.
Mitigating the immediate and longer-term impacts of displacement on children’s education requires significant improvements in the availability and quality of data on the issue. It also requires a better understanding of how their access to school and education outcomes vary depending on their gender, disability status and other characteristics. Such data is crucial for understanding the scale of the issue, planning and costing effective responses, measuring progress and evaluating the impact of education interventions.
This paper examines promising methodologies to assess the impacts of internal displacement on children’s education. It begins with an overview of the data sources, gaps and challenges when it comes to IDPs’ education. It then critically analyses existing quantitative and qualitative approaches developed by various organisations to address data gaps and enhance evidence-based programming.
As part of this, it presents an original household survey tool, which has been used by IDMC to measure the impacts of displacement on the education of IDPs’ and host communities in nine countries. After discussing the strengths and limitations of each approach, it concludes by identifying ways forward to improve the availability of timely and comparable data on the issue, and strengthen data quality, sharing and interoperability.

Author

• Louisa Yasukawa, Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre