According to Section 29(e) (iii) of the Refugees Act, a recognized refugee shall receive at least the same treatment accorded to aliens generally in similar circumstances relating to education, other than elementary education. Hence, recognized refugees are allowed to access tertiary and post-secondary education in Uganda as any other non-national in the country.  In line with this provision of the Refugees Act, public and private universities and other tertiary level institutions in Uganda treat refugees as international students. Furthermore, refugees are not eligible for the Higher Education Students Financing Board. The Board is established to provide loans and scholarships to Ugandan students who have qualified to pursue higher education but are unable to support themselves financially. However, organizations such as DAFI and Windle Trust provide scholarship awards for higher studies to refugees, but such opportunities are provided for limited number of refugee students and beneficial to refugees who attended secondary school in Uganda and have a better command of English.

The Ministry of Education and Sports adopted the Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Policy (2019). While the policy mainly targets Ugandan nationals, it also aims to ensure that young people in refugee settlements and host communities acquire productive skills that can enable them to engage in a meaningful occupation and earn a living. As of March 2021, there were a total of 29 vocational training institutions located in refugee-hosting districts, with 2 districts not having any vocational/technical schools. Only 1,820 refugees and 2,091 nationals were enrolled in TVET in the refugee-hosting sub-counties, which equates to 0.4 per cent of refugees and 0.8 per cent of nationals in the target population aged 13–24 years old.