More than 3,000 schools were looted or damaged

But much work remains to be done to restore the country's crumbling, overcrowded classrooms.

Iraq's education system was one of the best in the Middle East in the 1980s, but spiralled downwards as investment dropped from $620 per year per student in 1988/89 to $47 in the late 1990s.

Sanctions hit the economy and schools were left short of basic supplies such as chalk and blackboards, and poverty forced many children out of education.

Until last year, very little money had been put into construction or repair work since the 1991 Gulf War, resulting in a shortage of buildings.

Big task

Unicef estimates that more than a third of schools operate a shift system where two groups of children share one classroom. Some schools operate three shifts a day.

Many schools teach two shifts of children a day

During and after the latest war, more than 3,000 schools were looted, destroyed or burned in southern and central Iraq - and 60 in Baghdad suffered bomb damage.

The Coalition Provisional Authority says 2,500 schools across the country have now been rehabilitated, with work on a further 869 underway and a target of a total of 4,000 set for the end of the year.

But the task is bigger still. According to a World Bank report in October 2003, in total more than 10,000 schools and institutions need significant renovation, and 4,500 new ones are needed to meet demand.

The CPA says teachers are returning to the profession and earning salaries increased from just $3-$5 a month to up to $120.

USAid has also supplied 8.7 million revised schoolbooks, trained over 32,000 teachers and education administrative workers, and distributed 1.4 million secondary school kits and thousands of desks and chairs throughout the country.