January 2016 – Over 2 million people have been displaced in Iraq since ISIS violence began in 2014. Over half a million of those Internally Displaced Persons are school children, 70% of whom remain out of school. In Iraqi Kurdistan, a former pastor opened Shivani Medes School for refugee children at Khanke IDP Camp. The school is sponsored by Servant Group International, a ministry based in Nashville, Tennessee, and is the first school to be built for Yazidi refugees who live in the camp. Yazidis are a small religious group targeted by ISIS for annihilation.
“[ISIS] is the enemy of education,” said the assistant manager of the Khanke camp. “It’s very important to plant a school while ISIS is attacking us.”
Shivani Medes School has over 1,000 children in attendance.
