AKKAR, Lebanon — With children making up nearly half of its casualties — almost 40% of them under the age of 11 — the Syrian war enters its fifth year this week, forcing the world to witness a prolonged global catastrophe, or what the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) calls “the biggest humanitarian emergency of our era.”

For many of these young Syrians, education is the fine line between survival and advancement; to others it is an inaccessible luxury or a lost dream. The education crisis — a calamity whose challenges far exceed funding issues and financial shortcomings — not only poses a threat to a lost Syrian generation, but is also weighing heavily on the educational infrastructure and future of children in Syria’s smallest neighboring country, Lebanon.

“Every time you have war and lack of education, you have years that the country is losing,” Audrey Nirrengarten, the education officer with UNHCR in Lebanon, told Al-Monitor.

“We have realized that the way these people are being taught and educated will affect education in Lebanon and other host communities as well,” she said.