Every Fifth Student: Ukrainian Schools Have Lost 850,000 Children During the War Years

In the 2026/2027 academic year, 3.38 million children are studying in Ukrainian schools. This was announced by Olena Fidanyan, Director of the Education Department of the Kyiv City State Administration (KCGA), on her Facebook account, as reported by RBC-Ukraine. According to her data, this is almost 850,000 students — or 20% — fewer than at the beginning of the full-scale war. Thus, over four years of military actions, every fifth school in the country has effectively lost a portion of its student body: children have left for abroad, moved to other regions, and some territories have found themselves outside the zone of stable education.

Dynamics: The Student Body Is Shrinking Year by Year

The decline in the number of schoolchildren is not a one-time jump — it is of a steady nature. Compared to the previous 2025/2026 academic year, the number of students decreased by another 95,573 people. To illustrate: this is almost as many students as simultaneously attend all schools in the Ternopil region — 94,099. That means in a single academic year, Ukraine has "lost" an entire regional student population. Fidanyan emphasizes that these figures reflect the situation at the beginning of September 2026, when educators input data into the system, and do not take into account subsequent movements caused by changes in the intensity of combat operations.

Regional Picture: Kyiv is the Leader in the Number of Students

The largest number of schoolchildren in the country is in Kyiv: 302.4 thousand students, which accounts for 8.9% of the total number of children studying in Ukrainian schools. The capital traditionally concentrates a significant share of students due to the influx of displaced persons from other regions. According to the KCGA, the top five regions with the largest number of schoolchildren also include other oblasts, although the exact list is not fully disclosed in the published message. At the same time, it is in Kyiv that the share of in-person learning remains the highest among all regions, which indicates a relatively greater stability of the educational process in the capital compared to frontline territories.

Forms of Education: In-Person, Distance, Blended

According to AIKOM data at the beginning of September 2026, an average of 71.7% of municipal school students in Ukraine studied in an in-person format. In Kyiv, this figure was 86.9%. Distance learning was used by 9.6% of schoolchildren nationwide and only 2% in the capital. The blended format covered 11.6% of students in Ukraine and 1.2% in Kyiv. The highest rate of blended learning was recorded in frontline territories at 62.7%, reflecting the forced adaptation of schools to conditions where regular shelling and infrastructure outages make full in-person presence impossible for a significant part of the school day.

Statistical Limitations: Why Numbers Quickly Become Outdated

Olena Fidanyan warns that the provided data does not reflect the current situation at the end of the first quarter of the academic year. Educators enter information into the system at the beginning of September, and due to combat actions, learning conditions in hromadas are constantly changing: schools can switch to a distance format within a single day and then return to in-person. In this regard, statistics on in-person, distance, and blended learning quickly lose relevance and directly depend on the intensity of military actions in a specific region. This means that by November 2026, the real proportions of learning formats may differ significantly from the September figures.

Context: Education Amidst the Ongoing War

A 20% reduction in the student body over four years is not just a statistical shift, but a structural change in the education system. Schools in depressed and frontline regions face a shortage of students, which affects financing, staffing tables, and the ability to maintain a full range of educational programs. At the same time, in large cities, primarily Kyiv, the reverse process is observed — overcrowding of certain schools due to displaced persons. Under such conditions, according to the KCGA, discussions are already underway regarding the organization of school operations during electricity and water supply outages, as well as the quality of food in school cafeterias — topics that parents actively discuss in the public sphere.