In a photo taken on Friday, Hussein Al-Shamali, a 20-year-old, from the northern city of Idlib in Syria, held up his school identity card which has become one of his most prized possessions.
The graduate, who was resting after crossing from Serbia to Roszke, Hungary, protects his valuable card with a plastic carrier bag. Along with the card he carries in his backpack, is his academic transcript and the second-level certificate he earned in science.
In his backpack, Hussein carries what he hopes is the key to his future: all the records of his learning.
Al-Shamali, who studied three years of civil engineering, hopes he will be allowed to pursue a postgraduate degree in medicine once he reaches Germany.
"I really do not know what they will think of my school work. I hope it will be enough," he told the Associated Press. "Many people have spent thousands of dollars on me, to get me this far.
"I have to give back. It is expected of me."
Al-Shamali hopes his school work "will be enough"
In another picture, taken on the same day, Wafaa Bukai, 25, a student from Damascus, Syria, holds a photograph as she waits for her brother to cross the border from Horgos, Serbia to Hungary.
Wafaa Bukai, 25, a student from Damascus, Syria
Unlike many trekkers, who carry precious photos only electronically on a mobile phone, Bukai thumbs through her personal album of childhood images, including her pre-teen self in school uniform and trips with family to the beach.
The photographs emerging from the refugee crisis, including one of a drowned toddler who was washed ashore as his family tried to reach Greece from Turkey, has prompted both the British press and public to pressure David Cameron to act.