WASHINGTON
\nExtreme weather disrupted the schooling of about 242 million children in 85 countries last year \u2014 roughly one in seven students, the UN children\u2019s agency reported Thursday, deploring what it said was an \u201coverlooked\u201d aspect of the climate crisis.
\nHeat waves had the biggest impact, the report showed, as UNICEF\u2019s executive director Catherine Russell warned children are \u201cmore vulnerable\u201d to extreme weather. They heat up faster, they sweat less efficiently, and cool down more slowly than adults,\u201d she said in a statement.
\n\u201cChildren cannot concentrate in classrooms that offer no respite from sweltering heat, and they cannot get to school if the path is flooded, or if schools are washed away.\u201dHuman activity, including the unrestricted burning of fossil fuels over decades, has warmed the planet and changed weather patterns. Global average temperatures hit record highs in 2024, and over the past few years they temporarily surpassed a critical 1.5 degrees Celsius warming threshold for the first time.
\nThat has left the wet periods wetter and the dry periods dryer, intensifying heat and storms and making populations more vulnerable to disasters. The 242 million figure is a \u201cconservative estimate,\u201d the UNICEF report said, citing gaps in the data.
\nStudents from kindergarten to high school saw classes suspended, vacations moved, reopening delayed, and timetables shifted and even schools damaged or destroyed over the year due to climatic shocks, the available data showed. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WASHINGTON Extreme weather disrupted the schooling of about 242 million children in 85 countries last year \u2014 roughly one in seven students, the UN children\u2019s agency reported Thursday, deploring what it said was an \u201coverlooked\u201d aspect of the climate crisis. Heat waves had the biggest impact, the report showed, as UNICEF\u2019s executive director Catherine Russell […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":457444,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-457424","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n