Barriers to realising the right to education: displaced Ukrainian university students under temporary protection in the EU

This mixed-methods study examines barriers to realising the right to education among displaced Ukrainian university students under temporary protection in the European Union (EU), following Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. The study focuses on students from temporarily occupied territories who continued higher education online from abroad. Data were collected through an online survey in 2023 of 224 respondents from 10 EU host countries, predominantly female (84.8%) and Bachelor’s students (78.6%). Most were single (71.4%) and combined study with employment (72.3%). The questionnaire combined a set of 26 barrier items, a self-assessment item on awareness of European cultures, a multiple-response item on informational support needs, and two open-ended questions. The salient barriers were linguistic, legal-bureaucratic, psychosocial, financial, and time-related. Qualitative findings showed that students viewed intercultural communication as practical institutional navigation. The study argues that educational continuity requires rights-based, trauma-sensitive support, including language provision, legal guidance, information access, and socio-material assistance.