At least 950,000 children in Nepal will not be able to return to school, unless urgent action is taken to provide temporary learning spaces and repair damaged school buildings following the 25 April earthquake – according to UNICEF. Almost 24,000 classrooms were damaged or destroyed in the 7.8 magnitude quake that hit the country 12 days ago, with many suffering further damage in subsequent aftershocks.
The scale of the education crisis is expected to grow over the coming days and weeks as additional information flows in from remote areas. Schools are due to reopen on 15 May.In the severely-affected districts of Gorkha, Sindhupalchok and Nuwakot, it is estimated that more than 90 per cent of schools have been destroyed, while around 80 per cent of school buildings have collapsed in Dhading. In some areas, including Kathmandu and Bhaktapur, approximately nine in ten surviving school buildings have been used as emergency shelters. UNICEF
