【Thailand Archives】

When the harrowing photo of 3-year-old Syrian refugee Alan Kurdi's lifeless body went viral in 2015,Thailand Archives it galvanized the world to start paying attention and talk about the refugee crisis with earnest.

One year later, public discourse on refugees is arguably more frequent and nuanced -- but the crisis is far from over. There are still at least 65.3 million people who have been forcibly displaced from their homes around the world, 21.3 million of whom are refugees. Half of those refugees are children, like Kurdi.

As one of the most vulnerable populations within the crisis, refugee children face various unique challenges, including increased trauma, lack of basic health care and no access to education.

"We have to give them back their childhood," Carolyn Miles, president and CEO of Save the Children, said Sunday at the 2016 Social Good Summit in New York. "Education is a key part of that. It's not good enough to say that we need kids to have shelter and food -- we have to get them back into school."

She explained that, in addition to giving refugee children the skills they need, education is one of the best ways to give them a sense of normalcy. Many young children, especially those born within the last five years in Syria, have known nothing but war.

Miles was joined by Filippo Grandi, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, on Sunday's panel to discuss the dire needs of refugee children around the world. Both agreed that education is an often overlooked piece of the puzzle.

"For decades, we have collectively treated refugee crises as a humanitarian issue," Grandi said. "It is a humanitarian crisis -- but it cannot be handled purely with humanitarian resources ... blankets, medicines and food."

Instead, Grandi said, the international community needs to start at the very beginning of the crisis and "invest in the future."

"And education is a very, very important aspect of that," he added.

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

Save the Children released a new report called "Forced to Flee" earlier this month, which showed that if all forcibly displaced people resettled in one imaginary country, it would be the 21st largest nation in the world. Its population would be greater than the UK's, and nearly three times as large as Australia.

"It's not a country that looks great for children," Miles said. "It's the fourth-worst country in the world for education ... 50 percent of refugee children are not in school, and have really no opportunity to go to school."

According to the report, this "21st largest country" would have the fastest-growing population in the world, and one of the youngest populations in the world. It would rank close to last in terms of school attendance, and would be one of the most dangerous places for human rights issues like child marriage.

It would lose many children to preventable health conditions, too. And if its people had adequate access to employment, it would actually have a middle-income economy -- the 54th largest country in terms of GDP.

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

"Like the citizens of many real countries, the world's displaced are a diverse population -- people from different cultures who practice different faiths and speak different languages," the report said.

"In the same vein as the International Olympic Committee creating a new team to allow refugees to compete, imagining all displaced people as citizens of one 'country' recognizes their value as equal members of a global society and brings attention to the magnitude of their collective plight."

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

On Monday at the U.N. Summit for Refugees and Migrants, the first such summit to focus on this topic specifically, Save the Children will call on all countries to step up and commit to a "New Deal" for every forcibly displaced child. The initiative aims to prevent any child from missing school for more than 30 days.

For the crisis overall, however, there's still a long way to go.

Toward the end of Sunday's panel, when Grandi said the U.N. refugee agency is fighting for refugees everywhere, moderator Alan Kasujja of BBC News asked, "Are you winning?"

"With difficulty," Grandi said. "With difficulty."

About Social Good Summit

The Social Good Summitis a two-day conference examining the impact of technology and new media on social good initiatives around the world. Held during U.N. Week on Sept. 18 and 19, the Social Good Summit unites a dynamic community of global leaders and grassroots activists to discuss solutions for the greatest challenges of our time. You can watch the event live at socialgoodsummit.com.

This year's summit is brought to you by Mashable, the United Nations Foundation, the United Nations Development Programme and the 92nd Street Y. For complete event details, visit https://mashable.com/sgs.