Access to Education in Conflict Crises : The Impact of Education in Emergencies Interventions in Armed Conflict

Abstract: Conflict crises have a devastating impact on education. In response, international organisations have increasingly implemented Education in Emergencies (EiE) interventions in seeking to improve the access to education. However, little is known about the impact of these interventions in the context of armed conflict. The literature has mostly focused on the physical barriers that conflict brings to educational access and most of the previous research on the effectiveness of EiE interventions comes from stable low- and middle-income countries. By answering the question ‘How do Education in Emergencies interventions affect the access to education in conflict crises?’, this study seeks to contribute to this understudied field by first discussing the non-physical ‘opportunity costs’ conflict barriers to educational access. Subsequently, this study moves on to demonstrate the significance of particular components that EiE interventions may hold that are able to address these specific conflict barriers. The argument is tested through a qualitative comparative study of two international organisations that implement EiE programmes in Colombia. The empirical findings demonstrate the importance of a variety of different components of EiE interventions in improving access to education in conflict contexts, with indeed many of these addressing ‘opportunity costs’.