ISTANBUL

Worldwide, some 251 million children and young people still lack access to education, Türkiye’s first lady Emine Erdogan said Friday at the 5th Istanbul Education Summit.

The forum brought together policymakers, academics, teachers, researchers, opinion leaders, and civil society representatives from different countries for two days to discuss contemporary issues in education.

The annual summit organized by the Turkish Maarif (education) Foundation was held this year under the theme “Healing the World Through Education,” with Anadolu serving as one of the global communication partners.

In addition to Erdogan, opening speakers included Syrian first lady Latifa Al-Droubi, Turkish National Education Minister Yusuf Tekin, and Maarif Foundation head Mahmut Ozdil.

In her speech, Erdogan emphasized that the summit would showcase the power of education to “nourish humanity’s soul, heal its wounds, and illuminate darkness.”

“It will remind us that the most beautiful world was created with the pen, and that the scales of justice can only be fine-tuned by those who aspire to such a world,” she said.

- Stark inequality in global education access

Globally, “251 million children and youth are still out of school today,” said Erdogan, citing a 2024 Global Education Monitoring Report.

She underlined that 33% of children in low-income countries lack access to education, while in high-level income countries this rate is only 3%.

"Yet, education is a fundamental right, and until that 33 percent is in school, the scales of justice will remain tilted,” she said.

Syria’s Al-Droubi lamented that thousands of schools in Syria were destroyed over the course of the country’s 13-year civil war and that one in three children still has no access to education.

“Imagine a country where children rushed to schools with no doors, studied in roofless buildings, and wrote their homework by candlelight. Yet, despite all this, they never stopped learning for a moment,” she said.

Droubi stressed that "talent cannot be destroyed, ideas cannot be limited, and the future a child carries in their schoolbag can never be taken away."

Syria will soon rise again with all its people, she said, promising a country ready to tell its story and, together with the international community, open a new chapter for science and life.

On day one of the summit, sessions addressed the strategic direction and policy foundations of education in contributing to a better world, and analyzed the causes and effects of global challenges from an educational perspective.

After the summit, Erdogan wrote on social media that she had met with the Syrian first lady.

"I hope that the bonds of friendship that contribute to peace and stability between our countries will be strengthened, and that joint steps that bring hope and peace to our region will increase, " she said on Turkish social media platform NSosyal.