Qusai's dream of becoming a lawyer was shattered when the Syrian war erupted in 2011. He was only in the first year of a law course at a university in Deraa.
In 2013, Qusai's family fled to Jordan and moved into the remote refugee camp of Azraq, where the young man's hopes of continuing his education slowly faded.
Then he heard about InZone, an initiative backed by the University of Geneva that was launched in the camp in September last year with a degree-level history course devised by Princeton University in the US.
“I hadn’t thought about studying history before but there were prestigious institutions involved and I really wanted to take it,” Qusai said.
The course has given Qusai hope and kept him intellectually stimulated as well.
“Studying with top universities and being connected to the outside world of academia makes you feel part of something bigger – not just a number in a refugee camp,” he said.
It has also given him a fresh perspective on the future.
“We learned about how the countries of Europe rebuilt after World War Two," he said. " And that gave me hope that we can do the same in Syria.”
