The Republic of Yemen has a very high number of working children, employed in a variety of occupations, ranging from street vending to guards on farms, and domestic labour. Including these children in formal education is a major challenge facing the Republic, which has one of the lowest rates of female participation in primary education in the world, and a very underdeveloped non-formal sector. In a context where poverty levels are very high, particularly in rural areas, families remain under significant financial pressure to rely on children's work to supplement, or indeed provide, their income and survival. This broader context challenges school-based efforts to include working children, particularly where initiatives aiming to improve the quality of the formal system are only just beginning to make an impact. This paper discusses key challenges of providing education to working children in Yemen, focusing on the work of the International Labour Organisation's International Programme for the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) and some of the issues that it faces in using schooling as a strategy to prevent child labour.