Dear Editor,
Cleider Guzmán is a thirteen-year-old Venezuelan teenager who lives in Cunupia. He came to Trinidad in 2019, and attended a UNICEF-supported Child Friendly Space (CFS) in his community where he received primary-level education free of charge. For five years, he learnt basic English, made friends and was building the foundations for his future.
In 2025, when the community organisation operating the CFS was forced to start charging a fee, his mother, Yusmelis, could not afford to keep Cleider enroled while supporting her other two children.
Cleider has spent much of the last 14 months in his bedroom, scrolling on his phone. At times, he watches YouTube tutorials to try to retain the English he learnt in school.
"I lost contact with most of my friends because I don't get to see them," he said. "I feel stressed because I cannot make friends or keep talking to people."
Yusmelis feels increasingly frustrated as the months go by.
"He is being limited without being able to continue his studies," she lamented.
Cleider is among the thousands of refugees and migrant children in Trinidad and Tobago who remain on the margins of society, excluded from the education system.
UNHCR data indicates that Trinidad and Tobago hosts approximately 30,000 refugees and asylum-seekers, most of whom fled Venezuela in search of safety and stability. Roughly one in five are children.
In 2023, amendments were made to immigration laws to expand access to public education for children registered under the 2019 Migrant Registration Framework. Three years later, only about 50 refugee and migrant children are enroled in national schools.
Recent policy changes offer hope. The 2026 expanded Migrant Registration Framework will give the education system a clearer picture of the scale of the task at hand.
The UN system and humanitarian NGOs fill the gap where they can, despite severe resource constraints and the closure of the UNHCR office in Port of Spain in 2025.
Working together, international partners and local organisations provide complementary learning opportunities for children who are not in formal education. One such initiative is the network of 17 independently operated Child Friendly Spaces supported by UNICEF. Managed by community-based organisations around the country, most CFS activities follow the primary school curriculum of Trinidad and Tobago and, in some cases, the one in Venezuela.
Yet the reality is that most refugee and migrant children remain outside any formal or informal education.
As Cleider knows only too well, social isolation is symptomatic of what exclusion from school does to a child. Beyond academic learning, schools are where children learn social skills and develop a sense of stability and belonging.
Not being in school also compounds the risk of child exploitation. A situational analysis of child labour, prepared with ILO technical support and based on data from the UNICEF-supported 2022 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey, found that children not in school are nearly five times more likely to be engaged in hazardous work than those who are enrolled – 10.1 percent against 2.1 percent. Many of these children live in households where poverty can make a child's economic contribution feel less like exploitation and more like survival.
The ILO’s situational analysis also found that children from refugee and migrant households without formal legal guardianship or documentation face heightened vulnerability to trafficking. In 2024, the Children's Authority of Trinidad and Tobago recorded five suspected child trafficking cases, two involving unaccompanied or refugee minors.
The IOM World Migration Report 2026 is clear that migration contributes to economic growth, development and social stability, but countries can only realise these gains if they work towards inclusion. Ensuring access to education for refugee and migrant children is a critical part of that. Inclusive schools strengthen communities by fostering diversity, intercultural understanding and social cohesion.
Every child doing well at school is a long-term investment in the future we want, and the kind of society Trinidad and Tobago is building. Right now, thousands of children are not in classrooms, leaving them invisible across every system meant to protect them. Addressing this requires coordinated action across government, UN agencies, schools, education stakeholders, communities and civil society.
What children like Cleider need is education and opportunity. His future, and the future of thousands of other refugee and migrant children living in Trinidad and Tobago, will shape the country’s development trajectory. Together, we can make a difference and give these children the chance to shape positive, productive and hopeful futures.
UNICEF Eastern Caribbean
