Program Evaluation of the Conditional Cash Transfer for Education for Syrians and Other Refugees in Turkey
Syrian and other refugee children living in Turkey face many obstacles to attending school regularly, including language barriers, cost of transportation, and a variety of household socioeconomic constraints. The Conditional Cash Transfer for Education (CCTE) program for Syrian and other refugee children aims to address the impact of socioeconomic constraints on school attendance.
The CCTE for Syrian and other refugees, implemented in 2017, is an extension of the national program targeting vulnerable Turkish children. The CCTE program distills bi-monthly cash payments to eligible refugee households nationwide, conditional on 80 percent school attendance. The program also provides targeted support in the form of child protection outreach visits, across 15 provinces, to households with children deemed most at risk of truancy or dropping out of school.
AIR conducted a one-year evaluation to assess whether and how the CCTE supported regular (80 percent or more) attendance. The evaluation examined the relevance, efficiency, effectiveness, and sustainability of the program to provide suggestions for improvement and innovative approaches to the cash transfer and child protection components.
Key Findings
- The CCTE program benefitted 614,542 students, with 80 percent of refugee children enrolled in formal education being covered by the CCTE.
- Regular attendance improved over time, with an approximate 5 percent increase in formal education attendance among refugee children between 2017 and 2019.
- The child protection visits assisted 75,390 children between May 2017 and March 2020.
- Beneficiary children in provinces where child protection visits were conducted missed fewer school days than children in provinces where visits did not take place.
- In addition, cash payments to beneficiaries were transferred regularly in the correct amount.
