The COVID-19 pandemic led to school closures around the world, affecting almost 1.6 billion students. The effects of  disruptions in a child’s schooling on their learning and well-being are acute and long lasting. Through a rapid review drawing on pandemics and epidemics with associated school closures, this project aimed to understand the state of the evidence on impacts of school closures on select child protection outcomes and how governments have responded to school closures to protect the most vulnerable children.  Important lessons from this project have been recommended for the COVID-19 response, particularly the inclusion of the most vulnerable children in programming, policy and further research. Funded by UNICEF Office of Research Innocenti.