Committee: United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization.

Topic: Achieving Equal Access for the Youth to Affordable Quality Technical,
Vocational and Tertiary Education
Country: The Lebanese Republic
ID Number: 912038

With terrorism invading the universe, education remains the best vaccine to stop this metastatic
disaster. Achieving equal access for all youth to quality and affordable education is a must to
empower this therapeutic intervention.
Lebanon is currently facing a huge economic crash 1. The war in the Middle East along with the
political internal crises made chaos and corruption the rule not the exception at all levels.
Education suffered from all these negative factors. The tuition fees for private education are
inflated. The public schools and universities are not an option because of the suboptimal
educational level and the bad social and environmental conditions. How would public education
improve if almost all public school teachers enroll their children in private ones? Tertiary
education suffered from the emergence of many universities that do not offer quality education
or are not accredited. These “profit institutions “contributed to a decline in the level of tertiary
education all over Lebanon and to an increase in the rate of unemployment.
The Syrian Refugee crisis represented a major challenge for the Lebanese Education Sector.
Accordingly, the Lebanese Government initiated the RACE 1 - Reaching all Children with
Education- initiative. This intervention resulted in a sevenfold increase in the number of Syrian
refugees in public schools from 2011 to 20162. While teaching and learning materials have been
provided by RACE 1, the quality of teaching emerged as a major handicap. Later, RACE 2 was
initiated (2016-2021) by MEHE-Lebanese Ministry of Education and Higher Education- and its
partners. It aims at optimizing access to education and its quality for both Lebanese and Syrian
students. RACE 2 estimated cost is 424 million $/year. The UNESCO report issued 23/11/2018
states that only 55% of Lebanese staff and teachers received professional development in the last
2 years. The report issues strict recommendations to enhance equitable access to quality
education for refugees3.
In conclusion, MEHE believes that these refugees would benefit greatly from vocational and
technical education which enables them to improve their manual skills, respond to the demands
of the labor market and decrease their unemployment. This is especially important for those with
low educational achievements and women4. The more we educate, the more we inoculate our
Youth against extremism and violence5. The MEHE will thrive to improve all level of education
in Lebanon via supporting public education and actively monitoring and evaluating teaching
quality and learning environments all over Lebanon. A close revision of all schools’ and
universities’ curricula by expert panel is a must. An efficient assessment of the Lebanese labor
market demands is essential along with promotion of vocational and technical education for
Lebanese Youth. This will enable us to provide an educated advice for our Youth seeking tertiary
education hoping to decrease their unemployment rate and their immigration from Lebanon.
MEHE will work hand in hand with UNESCO and other international institutions for the “Global
Wellbeing of all Youth”. It remains to say that Lebanon is calling upon all international
community to raise the funds, provide the resources and expertise to achieve all these goals.
Together we can build a Peaceful tomorrow.
References:
1
https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2018/08/30/lebanons-economy-has-long-been-
sluggish-now-a-crisis-looms
2
http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/980641475200856910/Lebaon-RACE2-PforR-Board-
Package-PAD-WB-9-5-16-09072016.docx
3
http://www.unesco.org/new/en/beirut/single-
view/news/new_unesco_report_praises_turkey_lebanon_and_jordan_for_inc/
4
https://unevoc.unesco.org/wtdb/worldtvetdatabase_lbn_en.pdf
5
http://time.com/5255041/education-terrorism-syria-boko-haram-extremism/