Northern Ireland lags behind the rest of the UK in offering education to young asylum seekers.
Older teenagers who arrive here to seek asylum often get little or no educational help with language learningHopeless and frozen - that's how some young asylum seekers in Northern Ireland feel with limited access to education and specialised support.The Department of Education said there was no statutory duty to educate beyond 16 years of age.
"I was waiting a whole year just to get language classes and I was struggling," said Afnan-Alislam Elmahina.Unlike England, Scotland and Wales, Northern Ireland has noDeirdre McAliskey, who works with Children's Law Centre and South Tyrone Empowerment Programme, told BBC News NI it was the state which was responsible for children's rights.
The report added: "There were also reports of some schools declining to admit newcomers despite available places."BBC News NI met a group of young asylum seekers and refugees in the office of an organisation that works in this area - they were unanimously despondent about educational options open to them, but they had not lost heart.
For Nafisa, arriving here led to hope that "you are going to maybe change your life or go to your dreams but, you feel like there is something frozen". "I was about to go to university. I struggled with that when I got here. I hoped to go to university or school here but I was waiting for a whole year just to get language classes and I was struggling," she said.
Refugee and asylum-seeking children and young people of compulsory school age have the same legal entitlement to full-time education as other UK pupils.
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