According to Human Rights Watch, 273 million children worldwide are out of school. This is a sobering number, and it begs the question—why is this the case?
It’s not because they don’t want to learn. It’s not because education doesn’t matter to their families. And it’s not because they lack potential or intelligence.
Children are kept out of classrooms by barriers that have nothing to do with their ability or desire to learn—barriers like war, poverty, hunger, and discrimination. Barriers that steal futures before they even begin.
But here’s what gives us hope: these barriers aren’t insurmountable. When organizations like ADRA work alongside communities to address the root causes keeping children out of school, remarkable things happen. Children who once had no access to education are thriving in classrooms. Girls who faced impossible odds are graduating and pursuing their dreams. Refugee children who lost everything are finding stability and hope through learning.
Understanding the biggest barriers to education in developing countries is the first step toward removing them. So let’s look at what actually prevents children from going to school, what’s being done to change that reality, and how you can help.
In this post, we’ll cover:
- How conflict and displacement rob children of years of education
- Why extreme poverty forces families to choose between school and survival
- The connection between hunger and learning (and what school feeding programs accomplish)
- The unique barriers girls face and how education transforms their lives
- What distance, language, and other obstacles mean for vulnerable children
Barrier #1: Conflict and Displacement
When war tears through a community, school is often the first thing children lose. They’re not just missing class—they’re running for their lives.
Venancia knows this reality better than most. At 18, she’s a refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo now living in Uganda. By the time she and her mother escaped the violence, all of her siblings had been killed at different times throughout the ongoing conflict. A stray bullet cost Venancia her leg, requiring amputation below the knee. Her mother later passed away after they reached safety.
Left alone in a refugee settlement with a disability, having missed months of school, and facing a complete language shift from French to English, Venancia had every reason to give up on education.
Instead, it became her lifeline.
“I would rather learn English than go back to Congo and risk my life,” she says. Today, Venancia lives in her school dormitory. Her classmates are her family. And education is what she has left—the foundation for the future she’s building.
“Education is important because I can empower myself. I want to be a doctor. I want to help refugees and disabled people like me.”
How ADRA Addresses Conflict as a Barrier
In refugee settlements across Uganda and beyond, ADRA provides education programs specifically designed for children who have fled violence. This includes:
- Schools and learning centers in refugee settlements
- Multilingual teaching support for children learning in new languages
- Psychosocial support to help children heal from trauma
- Safe, stable environments where education can continue despite ongoing conflict in their home countries
- Advocacy for every refugee child’s right to education
For children like Venancia, school isn’t just about academics. It’s protection. It’s stability. It’s hope that a future exists beyond survival.
Barrier #2: Extreme Poverty
Ahmed is 11 years old and walks more than an hour each way to reach the ADRA Learning Center in Baalbek, Lebanon. He’s a Syrian refugee whose family fled the war a decade ago. Today they live in a makeshift tent built from tarpaulins and scrap materials—no electricity, a single solar panel for charging phones, and water fetched from neighbors.
During school breaks, Ahmed and his siblings work on a nearby cashew farm to help pay rent on the small plot where their tent sits. The choice between education and survival is a daily calculation.
This is the reality for children living in extreme poverty: families face an impossible decision between sending children to learn or sending them to work so everyone can eat.
According to the World Bank, learning poverty has increased in low- and middle-income countries, with 70% of 10-year-olds unable to understand a simple written text. With limited or no access to education, statistics like these will only continue to grow, meaning poverty continues into the next generation.
How ADRA Addresses Poverty as a Barrier
ADRA’s approach recognizes that you can’t separate education from a family’s economic reality:
- Learning centers located in or near refugee settlements and poor communities, reducing travel time and costs
- Flexible scheduling that works around children’s responsibilities to their families
- Provision of school supplies, uniforms, and materials so cost isn’t a barrier
- Integration with livelihoods programs that help families achieve economic stability
- Support for the whole family, not just the child, so education becomes sustainable
Education can break the cycle of poverty—but only if children can actually access it while their families are still struggling.
Barrier #3: Hunger and Malnutrition
Try learning algebra when your stomach is empty, or concentrating on reading when you haven’t eaten since yesterday.
For millions of children in Mozambique and neighboring countries, this isn’t a hypothetical scenario. It’s a reality every day.
ADRA doesn’t accept that any child should have to choose between school and food. That’s why we have worked to provide thousands of schoolchildren with school feeding programs—ensuring they receive the nutrition they need to continue their education. Because hunger doesn’t just make it hard to learn. It makes it impossible.
Research shows that malnutrition in childhood affects brain development, concentration, memory, and the ability to process new information. According to the World Health Organization, chronic nutritional deprivation “often results in delayed mental development, poor school performance and reduced intellectual capacity.” Children who are chronically undernourished perform worse academically, miss more school days due to illness, and are more likely to drop out entirely.
But when children receive consistent, nutritious meals at school, everything changes. Attendance improves. Grades improve. Families are more willing to send their children to school because they know their child will eat.
How ADRA Addresses Hunger as a Barrier
ADRA removes hunger as a barrier through programs that provide both immediate support and sustainable change:
- School feeding programs that provide meals to students, removing hunger as an obstacle to learning
- Integration of nutrition education into school curricula
- Support for school gardens where children learn to grow food while improving school nutrition programs
- Partnership with families to address food security at home through agricultural programs
- Connections between education, health, and livelihoods programs for comprehensive support
The link between a full stomach and a full classroom is undeniable.
Learn more about ADRA’s health and nutrition programs →
Barrier #4: Gender Inequality
In Thailand’s rural districts, young girls from poor families face a disturbing reality: without education and economic opportunity, they become targets for human traffickers who lure them into sexual exploitation.
Girls like those ADRA serves through the Keep Girls Safe (KGS) program are among the most vulnerable children in the world. Many come from ethnic minority groups living in poverty along the Thai-Burma border. Their families work as hired laborers, living hand-to-mouth on humble salaries. Without Thai citizenship or educational opportunities, these girls are at extreme risk.
What keeps girls safe? Education.
Through Keep Girls Safe, ADRA Thailand has provided shelter for high-risk girls and offers education scholarships to 100 young women. The program collaborates with government agencies, local organizations, and community groups to raise awareness and reduce vulnerability to trafficking. Over 200 girls, ages 8 to 19, have found safety, education, and hope through this program.
Globally, girls face unique barriers to education that boys simply don’t encounter. These barriers intersect and compound, creating impossible situations:
- Safety and exploitation risks: Girls face higher risks of trafficking, early marriage, and sexual violence—especially in poverty and conflict
- Cultural norms: Many communities prioritize boys’ education over girls’, viewing girls’ futures as centered on marriage rather than careers
- Economic pressure: When poverty forces families to choose which children attend school, boys are often chosen
- Domestic responsibilities: Girls carry disproportionate burdens of household work and childcare
- Early marriage: Expectations that girls will marry young make education seem unnecessary
- Lack of facilities: Absence of separate bathrooms and safe spaces at schools prevents girls from attending
The statistics are stark. Of the 739 million people worldwide who cannot read, two thirds of them are women. Plus, girls are 1.5 times more likely than boys to be excluded from primary school. This limited access to education increases girls’ risk not just of illiteracy, but of early marriage, exploitation, poor health outcomes, and lifelong economic insecurity.
Venancia’s story—the young refugee from DRC we met earlier—demonstrates how these barriers intersect. She fled war, lost her family, survived amputation, faced language barriers, and now lives without her mother. As a disabled refugee girl, she carries multiple layers of vulnerability. Yet education became her refuge, her protection, and her path forward.
How ADRA Addresses Gender Inequality as a Barrier
ADRA’s approach recognizes that protecting girls through education requires addressing root causes of vulnerability:
- Keep Girls Safe program (Thailand) providing shelter, education scholarships, and trafficking prevention for high-risk girls
- Bangladesh project preventing forced child labor through education and social services since 1972
- Educational initiatives in refugee camps worldwide where displaced girls face extreme trafficking risks
- Teacher training on gender-sensitive teaching methods and exploitation awareness
- Community advocacy to shift cultural norms around girls’ education and early marriage
- Safe spaces with separate facilities and protective environments for girls to learn
- Scholarships and financial assistance specifically for girls to remove economic barriers
- Holistic protection addressing safety, nutrition, health, and psychosocial needs alongside education
When girls are educated, the transformation extends far beyond individual lives. Educated women have healthier families, higher incomes, and greater influence in their communities. Their children are more likely to attend school. The cycle of poverty breaks. Entire communities become more resilient.
This is why educating girls globally isn’t just a moral imperative—it’s a proven pathway to stronger families, healthier communities, and more resilient societies.
Barrier #5: Distance and Lack of Access
Remember Ahmed, walking more than an hour each way to reach school? That’s not unusual for children in rural or underserved areas.
In many developing countries, schools simply don’t exist in every community. Children might have to travel miles—on foot, in extreme weather, across dangerous terrain or through areas controlled by armed groups—just to reach the nearest classroom.
For younger children, the journey might be impossible. For girls, it might be unsafe. For children with disabilities like Venancia, it might present physical challenges their communities aren’t equipped to help them overcome.
The result? Millions of children who want to learn simply can’t access the schools that exist.
How ADRA Addresses Distance and Access as Barriers
When distance keeps children from school, ADRA brings education to them:
- Building schools and learning centers in underserved communities
- Mobile learning programs that bring education to remote areas
- Support for safe transportation where needed
- Inclusive education programs designed for children with disabilities
- Community-based education models that work with local leaders to ensure schools are accessible
Access shouldn’t determine whether a child gets an education. But too often, it does.
Barrier #6: Language Barriers
When Venancia arrived in Uganda as a refugee, she faced more than just the trauma of war and loss. She faced a classroom where she couldn’t understand a single word being spoken.
“I speak French back in my country,” she explains. “But I didn’t mind that I couldn’t understand anything at first. I knew I would learn.”
For refugee children, internally displaced children, and children in areas with multiple local languages, language can be a significant barrier to education. When instruction happens in a language a child doesn’t speak, learning becomes exponentially harder.
How ADRA Addresses Language Barriers
ADRA ensures language differences don’t prevent children from learning:
- Multilingual teaching support in refugee and diverse communities
- Transition programs that help children learn the language of instruction
- Teachers trained to work with children who are learning in a second or third language
- Patience, support, and recognition that language acquisition takes time
- Peer support systems where children help each other navigate language challenges
Venancia’s determination carried her through. But not every child has her resilience—and they shouldn’t need it. Quality education should be accessible in languages children can understand.
Why Removing These Barriers Matters
In 2024 alone, ADRA’s education programs reached more than 1.7 million people— providing learning opportunities in refugee settlements, conflict zones, and some of the most underserved communities on earth. Whether through formal schooling, vocational training, or literacy programs, ADRA’s work addresses a simple truth: every child deserves access to education, regardless of the circumstances they were born into.
Because education isn’t just about reading and math. For children like Venancia and Ahmed education is:
- Protection from exploitation, early marriage, and dangerous labor
- Stability in the midst of chaos and displacement
- Dignity when everything else has been taken away
- Hope for a future that once seemed impossible
- Empowerment to shape their own lives and lift up their communities
Every barrier we remove opens a door. Every child who walks through that door carries the potential to transform not just their own future, but their family’s future, their community’s future.
Every Child Deserves a Classroom
The barriers to education in developing countries are real, significant, and often overwhelming. But they’re not insurmountable.
When Venancia says, “Education is important because I can empower myself,” she’s speaking a truth that extends far beyond her own experience. Education empowers. It protects. It transforms.
And when organizations work alongside communities to remove the barriers—whether that’s building schools where none exist, providing meals so hungry children can focus, training teachers to support girls’ education, or creating safe learning spaces in refugee settlements—remarkable things happen.
Children who once had no access to education are thriving. Girls who faced impossible odds are pursuing their dreams. Refugee children who lost everything are finding stability and hope.
The question isn’t whether every child deserves an education. The question is whether we’ll do what it takes to remove the barriers standing in their way.
Do you have a heart for helping those in need around the world? Donate today o become an ADRA Angel and give monthly. Your gift to ADRA helps remove the barriers keeping people out of school, from conflict and poverty to hunger and inequality.
Frequently Asked Questions About Barriers to Education
What is the biggest barrier to education in developing countries?
No single barrier affects all children equally. Conflict and displacement prevent millions of refugee children from accessing school. Extreme poverty forces families to choose between education and survival. Hunger makes learning physically impossible. Gender inequality specifically targets girls. For many children, multiple barriers intersect—making education seem unreachable.
How does poverty prevent children from going to school?
Poverty creates multiple education barriers: families cannot afford school fees, uniforms, or supplies; children must work to help support their families; schools in poor areas lack resources and qualified teachers; families prioritize immediate survival needs over long-term education; and economic instability makes consistent school attendance impossible.
Why is girls’ education particularly important in developing countries?
Educating girls creates a multiplier effect: educated women have healthier families, higher incomes, and more influence in their communities. Their children are more likely to attend school. Education protects girls from early marriage, exploitation, and poor health outcomes. When girls learn, entire communities benefit—but girls face unique barriers that must be specifically addressed.
How do school feeding programs help with education?
Children cannot learn when they’re hungry. School feeding programs ensure students receive nutritious meals, which improves attendance (families send children to school knowing they’ll eat), enhances concentration and academic performance, reduces dropout rates, and makes education possible for families facing food insecurity. Feeding programs transform education access for millions of children.
What happens to children’s education during conflict and war?
Conflict destroys school infrastructure, displaces children and teachers, creates dangerous conditions that make school attendance impossible, disrupts years of learning that are difficult to make up, and forces families to prioritize survival over education. Refugee children face additional barriers including language differences, trauma, and lack of recognized credentials. Organizations like ADRA work to provide education in refugee settlements and conflict-affected areas, but the scale of need is immense.
How can education programs work in refugee camps and settlements?
ADRA and similar organizations establish learning centers within or near refugee settlements, provide multilingual teaching support, train teachers to address trauma and unique challenges refugees face, offer psychosocial support alongside academics, work with host governments to recognize refugee education, and create safe spaces where learning can continue despite displacement. Education in these settings provides stability, protection, and hope for children who have lost almost everything.