Addressing School Related Violence in Humanitarian Contexts: An evidence synthesis

Despite its potential to promote positive gains in the lives of children, education also places them at risk of exposure to violence—particularly in humanitarian settings. Save the Children conducted a systematic review of peer-reviewed and grey literature, to clarify the state of the global evidence base around the impact of interventions to address school-related violence in humanitarian contexts. Peer-reviewed literature was identified through a structured search of key bibliographic databases and grey literature was gathered through a call for documents to external organizations as well as a review of relevant reference lists. A total of 4,036 potential articles were identified, and 93 were selected for full-text examination. Five articles met final inclusion criteria and received further analysis.

Most included studies evaluated interventions with secondary school students and/or adults, with only two involving children of primary school age. Only two studies measured reported rates of violence, while the others examined participants’ knowledge, attitudes and beliefs. Among the studies measuring rates of violence against children, only one saw reductions in violence because of program participation, while the other study found the intervention to be ineffective. Included studies also varied significantly in methodological rigor, with only two being peer-reviewed, and others lacking key quality benchmarks. There was a limited focus among included studies on age and gender, and how
these factors impact children’s risk of exposure to violence and other forms of harm. Findings also revealed sexual violence and other forms of gender-based violence (GBV) to be understudied, suggesting less is known about how best to address these issues in and around school settings during times of crisis. Taken cumulatively, findings from this review reveal significant gaps in the evidence base, suggesting additional research in this area is urgently needed.