Editorial: Learning on the edge: EdTech in conflict-affected and fragile regions

The aim of this special issue is to explore how students and educators sustain learning in the face of crisis, and how educational technology (EdTech) can support, enable, or, at times, distract from that process. We take a deliberately broad view of EdTech. Bozkurt et al. (2026) define EdTech as “a field of inquiry and practice, encompasses the research, understanding, design, orchestration, and evaluation of entangled human-technological systems—spanning analog, digital, organizational, social, and agentic dimensions—through which learning and meaning making are enabled, mediated, supported, and transformed” (p. 192). In this framing, EdTech is not reducible to devices or platforms; it also encompasses the human systems, tools, and techniques through which people acquire skills, make meaning, and adapt to changing circumstances.

Through our work with colleagues and students around the world, we have become acutely aware of how armed conflicts, climate change, environmental disasters, health crises, and political upheaval can abruptly disrupt access to formal and non-formal education. Re-reading the accepted papers in this special issue while writing this editorial was, at times, an emotional experience. What emerges repeatedly is the creativity, endurance, and commitment of students and educators, and the importance of allowing participants’ voices to resonate through the studies themselves. Collectively, the contributions show that continuing one's education within conflict-affected and fragile regions can be an act of resilience and hope, as well as a means of sustaining cultural and linguistic identity and psychological well-being. As George et al. write, being a student in an armed conflict requires intention and dedication. Although online learning in crisis conditions can become an additional source of stress, it is also a critical source of educational continuity (Khasawneh et al.).

The ten papers in this issue span a diverse range of geographic contexts, with two studies each conducted in Pakistan and the Philippines, and one study each from Lebanon, Colombia, Algeria, Somalia, Sudan and Palestine. Methodologically, the collection is equally varied, drawing on qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-methods approaches, including experimental, survey-based, case study, interview, ethnographic, phenomenological, and thematic-analysis designs. Sample sizes range from five to 3,430 participants, reflecting both the breadth of the questions posed and the very different conditions under which the studies were undertaken.

Across the ten papers, five directly address how students and instructors cope with, adapt to, and continue educational activity during armed conflict in Sudan, Colombia, Gaza, and Lebanon. Four offer insights into education for disaster preparation and management in Pakistan, Algeria, and the Philippines. The collection also includes a sustained reflection on educational leadership during the COVID-19 crisis in 2020 and the forced pivot to remote learning in Pakistan, alongside a study of how young people can be better supported to find employment amid limited formal employment services in Somalia. Across these different contexts, a consistent message emerges: locally grounded solutions are essential in responding to deeply contextual and affective challenges, chiming with previous research (e.g., Park, Freeman and Middleton, 2019; Smith et al., 2024).

Many contributors to this special issue highlight the relative scarcity of research conducted in regions that are remote, fragile, and/or experiencing crisis. Much of the existing evidence base has been generated within comparatively stable economic, environmental, and political settings. The closer we attend to each local context, the more apparent it becomes that assumptions embedded in Western, Global North models and frameworks may be inappropriate, or at best only partially useful, when transferred elsewhere. One of the contributors, Adnan, writes about “the systematic misalignment of dominant global EdTech paradigms with the conditions of education systems in the Global South [in which there is] exclusion, staggering inequality, inadvertent harm, and the elevation of learning models that put machines and profit before people” (p. 9). The implication running through this collection is clear: responses must be grounded in geographic, environmental, cultural, linguistic, political, and socio-economic realities rather than imposed independently of them.

Recurring themes across the collection include the need for leadership models tailored to local contexts, cultural competence in EdTech implementation, and close attention to structural inequality. The studies identify systemic inequities, power outages, and inadequate infrastructure, including unreliable access to the Internet, hardware, software and learning resources. In Gaza, the destruction of universities and loss of faculty also require students to adapt to volunteer faculty from outside the immediate context and to diverse teaching approaches (Khasawneh et al.). These examples underline a central point: access to technology alone is insufficient unless the wider educational, institutional, and social conditions required for meaningful participation are also sustained.

Context is not simply background in these studies; it actively shapes what education, technology, and resilience can mean in practice. Across the papers, community influences the uptake of technology, the use of media, and the functioning of institutions such as schools. Physical space also remains significant, even when EdTech is central to educational continuity. Such spaces are symbolic as well as functional, carrying meanings connected to identity and belonging (Mateus, 2026). A school that once represented social encounter, continuity, and safety can become a site of danger during armed conflict. War can undermine educators’ and learners’ mental health and contribute to academic underachievement and financial stress (Kharroubi). Displacement can further intensify problems of access, affordability, and poor living and study conditions. The significance of physical space therefore cannot be overstated; a participant in Kharroubi’s study commented that a return to the classroom would provide a sense of normalcy.

Recent tragedy in Nepal has again drawn attention to the speed and scale of risks associated with climate change. Alongside ongoing armed conflicts and wider global economic and political uncertainty, these conditions raise further concerns about displacement, migration, and associated violence. Educational institutions and services therefore need to plan proactively for emergency response, flexible and adaptable learning environments, crisis-assistance programmes, and mental-health support (Kharroubi). Khasawneh et al. recommends creating supportive, equitable, and forgiving environments. Novel approaches to sustaining engagement through gamification (Jan et al.) and possibly GenAI (Othman, et al., 2026), the integration of media and educational systems (Touati), enhanced leadership (Jemsy et al.), and careful instructional design (Mutya et al.) can all contribute to disaster preparedness and educational continuity in societies experiencing crisis or its aftermath.

Taken together, the papers in this special issue resist the idea that EdTech itself produces resilience. Rather, its value depends on how technologies are embedded within relationships, institutions, communities, physical spaces, and locally meaningful practices. The central lesson is therefore not the need for a universal technological solution to crisis, but for educational responses that are flexible, humane, contextually grounded, and capable of sustaining learning when familiar systems are disrupted.

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Footnotes

Edited and Reviewed by: Margaret Grogan, Chapman University, United States