The past few decades have witnessed a notable escalation in the frequency and severity of natural disasters, significantly impacting the infrastructure, particularly in the realm of building construction. Among the various structures susceptible to such events, educational institutions, notably schools, emerge as particularly vulnerable. The repercussions are profound, with an estimated 175 million students globally finding themselves excluded from educational opportunities annually due to the aftermath of natural and human-induced calamities. Given the vulnerability of children in disaster scenarios, the uninterrupted provision of educational services assumes paramount importance. In Syria, following 11 years of conflict, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic and economic turmoil, the educational landscape for Syrian children and youth has suffered substantial disruption, resulting in over 2.4 million individuals being deprived of schooling. The disruption in educational programming carries immediate and long-term adverse effects for both Syrian children and the nation’s future trajectory. To address these challenges, it is imperative for governments and donors to initiate robust measures aimed at fostering a sustainable and high-quality educational response, thereby contributing to Syria’s stabilization and recovery endeavors. This research endeavors to scrutinize the impact of post-disaster school initiatives, employing a comprehensive assessment framework encompassing life cycle energy and carbon emissions analyses, alongside a life cycle cost evaluation to provide decision-makers with cost-effective solutions for post-disaster schools design and construction. Utilizing two software platforms, Edupack and DesignBuilder, the study conducts an in-depth analysis of a representative school case study situated in Damascus post-conflict. The assessment encompasses the totality of energy and emissions across the school’s life cycle, including embodied and operational aspects. Findings reveal that operational energy overwhelmingly dominates the total energy consumption, accounting for approximately 95%, whereas embodied energy constitutes a mere 5%. Similarly, operational emissions constitute the bulk of total emissions, comprising 96%, while embodied emissions represent a marginal 4%. Integration of renewable energy sources (Solar Photovoltaics) notably diminishes operational energy consumption and carbon emissions, leading to a reduction of 38% and 53%, respectively. Furthermore, the study elucidates the economic dimensions, indicating that maintenance costs exert the most substantial influence on total life costs, constituting 77%, followed by material costs at 21%. Integrating circularity principles for school’s building material selection is proposed to directly impact life cycle energy, emissions, and costing footprints. This approach serves as a flexible and effective decision-support tool for post-disaster recovery, with applicability across diverse disaster types and relevance to the reconstruction challenges faced in Syria and comparable regions.