4.14.4.2. Education

Challenges for beneficiary children’s inclusion in education begin already during the reception phase (see Section 4.7). Belgian authorities try to facilitate applicant children’s enrolment into school during reception, for example through the expansion of the network of schools offering induction classes to all newly-arrived foreign children with two new institutions joining in Wallonia, Belgium. Schools have been able to enrol children and accommodate all requests since the launching of this initiative, but the number of requests for enrolment increased in 2021.1220

The Romanian Ministry of Education launched a special catch-up programme, open also for applicant and refugee children, to provide support with Romanian language learning and mathematics (see Section 4.7).1221  The civil society organisations Zaedno v chas (Teach for Bulgaria) and EducArt International Association published material to support children whose mother tongue is not Bulgarian to learn the Bulgarian alphabet.1222

The Irish Refugee Council and College Connect launched a new report on barriers to access higher education for refugees and people in the asylum process.1223  The Irish government was aware of some of the barriers, like high education fees, and thus continued to facilitate access to higher education for applicant students (see Section 4.7).

The Ministry of Universities in Spain issued a new decree on the recognition procedure for foreign degrees and shortened the procedure to 6 months.1224