As the former European Commissioner for International Partnerships, I have witnessed firsthand both the transformative power of education and the devastating consequences when it is denied. From the child in rural Papua New Guinea who walks hours to reach a school with no books, to the refugee girl in Jordan whose education was interrupted by conflict, and the young person in Uganda whose family cannot afford school fees, they all deserve better.

Yet our commitment to ensure quality education for all by 2030 is hanging by a thread. There are currently 272 million children, adolescents and youth out of school – 21 million more than we previously estimated, according to new figures from UNESCO. In low-income countries, only one in ten students achieve minimum proficiency in reading by the end of primary school. These children are not failing, I hasten to add. We are failing them.

There is no lack of commitment or understanding of education’s importance. What we have is a fundamental breakdown of our financing architecture. Countries have written national commitments to bring down the population of those out of school by 165 million by 2030, but low- and lower-middle-income countries face an annual financing gap of at least $97 billion to achieve their targets. In the poorest countries of this group, half of the cost to meet national education targets remains unmet.

In such contexts, external assistance represents a lifeline. In countries like Gambia and the Central African Republic, international aid accounts for up to half of all public education spending. Yet this critical support system is not only inadequate; it is actively deteriorating.

First, there is a stark mismatch between need and allocation. Only one-fifth of education aid reaches low-income countries, precisely where the financing gaps are most severe. Support for basic education, which covers the formative primary years, is waning and attention shifting to secondary or tertiary education. Meanwhile, we can see an 80% increase in scholarship spending since 2010. This is a worthy investment, but one that primarily benefits middle-class students who can navigate higher education systems, not the millions of children who cannot yet read.

Perhaps most alarming is what lies ahead. A new paper by the Global Education Monitoring (GEM) Report at UNESCO shows that, wrapped up in global politics, aid to education is projected to fall by a quarter between 2023 and 2027. These projected cuts could halve education spending in some low-income countries like Liberia and Chad.

The shift among donors from grants to loans compounds this crisis. Currently, 60% of education aid comes through grants – far more than for most other sectors – but the growing preference for loans threatens this balance. This trend risks adding to the debt burden many countries are already struggling with: 2.1 billion people live in countries that spend more on debt service than on education. How can we ask countries to invest in their children’s future if they are grappling with fiscal survival?

While donations are always welcome, the way they are disbursed is not always very effective. Bilateral aid increasingly bypasses national systems, leaning towards funding projects instead, which are easier to measure, monitor, and account to taxpayers at home. Only 17% of funds from bilateral donors are channelled through recipient governments, compared to 60% from multilateral organizations. In the most extreme examples, such fragmented disbursement means that the number of donors per country is in the high twenties, leaving a huge administrative headache for ministries to manage.

As humanitarian crises multiply globally, donors are understandably redirecting resources to emergency response. Therein lies a misunderstanding, however. According to new research by the GEM Report and Education Cannot Wait, a growing share of development aid is being directed to education in emergencies and protracted crises. In 2021, nine out of every ten dollars being spent on education in emergencies came from development aid. In a time of reduced finances, clarity like this is critical.

The upcoming Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development taking place later this week offers a crucial opportunity to address some of these challenges, but only if we are willing to fundamentally rethink our approach.

Don’t think that we don’t have the resources. We do. Just two and a half days’ worth of annual military spending equals the amount going on aid to education per year. But we need political will. The international community must recognize that education financing is not charity, it is an investment in our shared future, and a more peaceful one at that.

The outcome document for this month’s conference that world leaders will be discussing includes a commitment to support adequate financing for inclusive, equitable, and quality education for all. This needs to be carefully monitored. Donor countries have not honoured their commitment to dedicate 0.7% of their gross national income to official development assistance but are also on course to reduce their contribution to levels not seen since 2000. It is never too late to learn from past mistakes, of course. All those working on education in country and at a global level must remind donors to respect the principles of the Paris Declaration on aid effectiveness, especially ownership and alignment.

The outcome document crucially also calls for reforming the international financial architecture and addressing the crushing cost of borrowing. Since 2015, the average share of education in total public expenditure has fallen by 0.7 percentage points, and in middle-income countries by as much as 2 percentage points, under the pressure of rising debt. Such reforms cannot come early enough.

We owe it to the world’s poorest countries to find ways to lower their lower borrowing burdens. Debt-for-education swaps have already been successfully implemented between Indonesia and Germany (2002-2011), Peru and Spain (2006-2017), and Côte d’Ivoire and France (2023). Such innovative methods must be expanded and explored.

The point to understand is that the cost of inaction extends far beyond individual tragedy. Countries with better-educated populations are more resilient, more innovative and more peaceful. They are better equipped to address climate change, reduce inequality, and build sustainable economies. Education is the foundation upon which all other progress depends. The question is not whether we can afford to properly fund education globally. It is whether we can afford not to.

This blog post was originally published in Modern Diplomacy on 1 July 2025.

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The event recalled the countries’ collective commitment to reduce the out-of-school population in Africa by 58 million by 2030. This is a continental target that represents the aggregation of national SDG 4 targets. While it does not represent a commitment to universal schooling, it reflects a powerful drive towards inclusion.  

But the challenge is large – and, in fact, larger than previously thought. This is a key conclusion of the 2025 SDG 4 Scorecard, the annual publication that takes stock of countries’ progress towards their national targets, which – this year – has focused on the out-of-school rate. The Scorecard provides updated out-of-school estimates by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) and the Global Education Monitoring (GEM) Report. 

SDG 4 benchmarking is the largest-ever country-led education target-setting exercise. To date, 74% of African countries have submitted national targets for at least some of the eight SDG 4 benchmark indicators, including the out-of-school rate. This is just below the global average of 80%. These targets demonstrate ownership of the agenda and strong political will to contribute towards the achievement of the global goal. This process links the national, continental and global education agendas. 

The Day of the African Child is an annual observance, with a theme set by the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child and adopted continentally by the AU. This year it focuses on ‘Planning and budgeting for children’s rights: progress since 2010’. Activities around this day stress the need to address the educational challenges faced by African children and reinforces the commitment to ensuring their right to quality learning, because every child is truly #BorntoLearn.  

To mark the occasion, a new brochure on Africa based on the 2025 SDG 4 Scorecard, has been released by the UIS and GEM Report. The Scorecard is a country-owned tool, as it tracks progress on the education commitments countries have made – first and foremost to their people. It has been aligned with the monitoring framework of the Continental Education Strategy for Africa (CESA 16-25), an alignment intended to continue in the next decade, as the upcoming strategy for 2026-2035 develops its monitoring framework. It serves as a critical tool both for fostering accountability and for helping countries improve the targets they set in their national education sector plans.

This year’s edition focuses on the out-of-school rate, one of the eight benchmark indicators. According to these latest estimates, there were 118 million children, adolescents and youth in Africa in 2023. The analysis shows that, despite commitments, out-of-school numbers have been increasing since 2010. Among children of primary school age, the out-of-school population fell from 49 million in 2000 to 42 million in 2015 but has increased to 44 million in 2023. Among youth of upper secondary school age, the out-of-school population has been increasing throughout: from 32 million in 2000 to 33 million in 2015 and 41 million in 2023. 

Out-of-school population in Africa, 2000–2023 

Beyond what administrative school records and household responses reveal, conflict in many parts of Africa prevents the systematic collection of comparable education data. Using multiple external evidence, mainly from humanitarian agencies, it is in fact estimated that at least 10 million more children, adolescents and youth are out of school in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, South Sudan and, especially, Sudan, where the estimated out-of-school of 6.6 million may in fact be underestimated by 4.8 million. A first estimate is also made for Somala, where the out-of-school population is estimated to be 3.7 million. 

Interventions at the event from the ministers of Rwanda and Sierra Leone, two countries that have bucked the slowing trend, spoke to the importance of political leadership and continued investments in national institutional and data system capacity to translate these commitments into tangible results. UNESCO emphasizes the need to address persistent data gaps, and to better align ambitious but feasible benchmarks with financing and implementation mechanisms.

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Countries have collectively committed to reduce their out-of-school population by 165 million by 2030 in their SDG 4 benchmark targets, as we reported in the 2025 SDG 4 Scorecard released last week. But the challenge they face is larger than previously thought. The global out-of-school population is now estimated to have been 272 million in 2023, 21 million more than the last estimate, based on the UIS and GEM Report model results, also featured in the Scorecard.

Two reasons explain this upward adjustment. First, new enrolment and attendance data account for 8 million, or 38%, of the increase. The ban on girls attending secondary school age in Afghanistan in 2021 also contributes to this increase.

Second, updated UN population estimates account for 13 million, or the remaining 62%, of the increase. Compared to the estimates last used in the out-of-school model, the 2024 World Population Prospects estimate that the number of 6- to 17-year-olds in 2025 (a proxy of the school age population) is higher by 49 million (or by 3.1%).

The change in the global population estimates impacts out-of-school rate and population estimates – but the magnitude of that impact depends on the source of data on enrolment and attendance. If the source is administrative data, then the full increase of the population is passed on to the out-of-school population because there is no fresh information on enrolment. But if the source is survey data, then the increase of the population is passed on to the in-school and out-of-school populations proportionately. As the model relies on survey data for many countries with large out-of-school populations, only part of the increased school-age population is estimated to be out of school.

In total, around 11% of primary school-age children (78 million), 15% of lower secondary school age adolescents (64 million) and 31% of upper secondary school age youth (130 million) are out of school.

Source: UIS and GEM Report out-of-school estimation model.

These updates can be found on VIEW, a website managed by the UIS and the GEM Report, which features the out-of-school rate model results. The model, introduced in 2022, uses multiple data sources (i.e. administrative, survey and census) to generate internally consistent trends of regional and global averages.

The model at the country level reconciles different sources, imputes values on years when there are no data, and involves short-term projections. Therefore, they are not the same as countries’ official out-of-school values, which are based on a single source on a given year. It is these latter values, which are the basis for countries’ out-of-school rate targets to be achieved by 2025 and 2030. Collectively, as the SDG 4 Scorecard shows, countries will reduce their out-of-school population by 165 million by 2030 if they meet their targets. However, it is projected that by 2025 countries will be off track by four percentage points among those of primary and lower secondary school age and by six percentage points among those of upper secondary school age. In total, this means that, already by 2025, countries will be off-track by 75 million relative to their national targets.

The impact of conflict on out-of-school populations is being underestimated

The out-of-school model estimates assume stable patterns of school-age population progression through the education system. However, this methodological strength becomes a weakness in the case of emergencies and crises when school attendance changes suddenly. Not only can it not be assumed that long-term trends will continue, but there is usually no information or insufficient information to understand crises’ short- and medium-term impacts. Conflict hampers data collection on school participation and therefore is likely to lead to an underestimation of the out-of-school populations.

In February 2024, the Education Data and Statistics Conference decided that model estimates be complemented with external information with guidance from established a task force. In March 2024, a blog proposed a way to assess the extent to which out-of-school populations were underestimated.

Accordingly, the 2025 SDG 4 Scorecard reports the results of an analysis that tries to reconcile the model estimates with external information in the 10 countries most affected by conflict following the International Rescue Committee’s Watchlist classification. Information from humanitarian or other sources was compiled and reviewed with reference to the population described (e.g. a report may cover a population larger than that of school age), the measure of education participation (e.g. a report may describe a population whose education is ‘at risk’ which is not the same as not being in school), and geographic coverage.

This analysis, which is presented in the SDG 4 Scorecard, indicates that almost 13 million more would need to be added to the estimated global out-of-school population. This number includes large underestimates in Myanmar and Sudan (where there have been no data since conflict began) and a first estimate for Somalia (3.7 million) where no data had ever been available before. Next steps will involve an expert review of the estimates suggested for these 10 countries and a process by which these ad hoc estimates will become a regular feature of reporting on out-of-school populations.

Global out-of-school population, model estimate and adjustment for conflict, 2023

Source: Analysis of documents from 10 conflict-affected countries: Burkina Faso, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Mali, Myanmar, Niger, State of Palestine, Somalia, South Sudan and Sudan.

Consult the VIEW website on the out-of-school model estimates.

Read the 2025 SDG 4 Scorecard, which focuses on the out-of-school rate.

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As we bring out our new report, “The price of inaction: The global private, fiscal and social costs of children and youth not learning,” we are alarmed over the looming financial costs of children not attending or leaving school early and not acquiring basic skills, such as literacy and numeracy. At the same time, we can see the massive benefits of investing in education across the globe and the huge gains from achieving the education Sustainable Development Goal (SDG 4) of inclusive and equitable education for all.

Our findings reveal a stark reality: if no action is taken, the world could face over $10 trillion in losses by 2030 due to unmet educational needs. This encompasses not just economic costs but also broader social setbacks, including rising adolescent pregnancies, poor mental health, social fragmentation, and higher crime rates. 

Afghanistan, for example, faces severe challenges exacerbated by recent policies excluding girls from secondary and higher education. If these policies remain in place, the economic costs borne by society of girls leaving school early are estimated at US$1.5 billion per year by 2030. Reversing these policies is urgently needed to ensure the right to education for all and could also catalyse substantial economic recovery and societal benefits. 

Of the countries that we studied, Chad faces the highest potential social costs (costs borne by the government and society), with the economic burden of uneducated children rising to nearly 58% of its 2030 GDP and thus significantly constraining the country’s development. This underscores the urgent need for investing in inclusive and quality education and ensuring that all children and youth acquire basic skills and the necessary socio-emotional skills to thrive.  

In our rapidly changing world, the role of socio-emotional skills in the educational landscape is becoming increasingly significant. These skills, which enable individuals to manage emotions effectively, forge positive relationships and cultivate meaningful interpersonal connections as well as exercise sound judgment and make responsible decisions, are critical for success in the contemporary economy. As technological advancements continue to redefine traditional job roles and workplace dynamics, the significance of socio-emotional competencies have become even more pronounced.  

In essence, as the landscape of work and society continues to evolve at a rapid pace, the role of socio-emotional skills in education becomes increasingly vital. By nurturing these competencies, educators lay the foundation for students to thrive in an interconnected world, where success is contingent not only on technical proficiency but also on emotional intelligence, interpersonal skills, and ethical decision-making. 

As explained in the report, students equipped with strong socio-emotional skills tend to do better at school, demonstrate greater employment rates and more effective workplace performance. This highlights a crucial opportunity for educational systems globally to integrate socio-emotional learning into their curricula, not only to enhance individual well-being but also to strengthen the economic resilience and innovative capabilities of entire societies. Significantly, the report indicates that insufficient socio-emotional skills come with a hefty global price tag, exceeding US$7.4 trillion or 19 per cent of annual GDP.  

The impacts of early school leaving, and low educational achievement transcend economic losses and lead to wide-ranging societal issues. For instance, we see that early pregnancies and crime rates are significantly higher among early school leavers. To address these issues, countries need to adopt a comprehensive educational strategy that tackles the causes of school dropout and rapidly improves the basic skills and socio-emotional skills of students.  

By ensuring broad access to quality education that encompasses socio-emotional learning, we can build a more prosperous, equitable and just society. 

A unified vision for global education 

Our report is a call to global leaders, policymakers, educational stakeholders, and the international community to renew their commitments to transform education. While countries have made significant progress over the past decade, more investment and action in education is needed.  The report’s recommendations are designed to inspire actionable steps toward achieving SDG4. They include to: 

• Provide 12 years of free, publicly funded, inclusive, equitable, and quality education. 

• Create gender-transformative, inclusive, and empowering learning environments. 

• Invest in early childhood education and development. 

• Avoid early tracking and provide second-chance options. 

• Improve school infrastructure and support a diverse and well-trained teacher workforce. 

• Raise awareness among local communities about the importance of education. 

• Address health and mental well-being through comprehensive school programmes. 

• Connect learning with real-world applications and work opportunities. 

As we continue to navigate complex global challenges, our collective commitment to invest in and strengthen education systems worldwide remains unwavering. Together, we can transform these challenges into opportunities to foster a more just, prosperous and sustainable world. 

The price of inaction: the global private, fiscal and social costs of children and youth not learning

The price of inaction: the global private, fiscal and social costs of children and youth not learning; country profiles

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Produced in partnership with the Association for Development of Education in Africa (ADEA), the report is being launched today, 7 May, at the 2024 Conference of the African Federation of Teaching Regulatory Authorities. Along with the continental report, the country report for Zambia will be launched at the same event, along with H.E Douglas Munsaka Syakalima, Minister of Education, Zambia. It is the first Spotlight session on foundational learning as part of the African Union Year of Education.

One in five children achieve minimum proficiency levels  

Learning Counts compiles the latest out-of-school and completion rate statistics to show the challenge that countries face every day. For every 100 children in Africa, 18 children are out of school– twice the rate of the rest of the world. However, there is sign of improvement, with completion rates growing at a steady pace of almost one percentage point per year throughout the past 20 years. Still one in five children do not complete primary school today. 

Albeit data gaps remain large, what evidence exists suggests that learning rates at the end of primary school have improved faster in Africa than the rest of the world since 2011. However, the challenge remains notable, with at most one in five children attaining minimum proficiency levels in reading and mathematics at the end of primary school today.

There is often a lack of connection between countries’ aspirations and their plans

For instance, having up to date and relevant textbooks is critical. Yet the report found that textbooks are often out-of-date and not available in the languages of instruction. Textbooks were not in the language of instruction for 80% of students in Zambia and in less than half of classrooms visited in Uganda. Given many students have limited reading skills, graphic explanations of mathematics concepts could help, but are often lacking.  

Textbooks and teacher guides may not be fully aligned with the curriculum and their design needs to be reviewed to prevent confusion and improve implementation. In Mauritania, algebra is missing from the lower primary curriculum, while it is covered in textbooks and teacher guides. In Niger, textbooks and teacher guides include statistics and probability but the curriculum does not. Assessments often cover a different set of competencies from those outlined in the curriculum, particularly at the end of primary, where an examination culture prevails, and the level of cognitive difficulty increases. 

Remedial education is highlighted as a critical approach for ensuring that all students are learning with understanding. Yet, of the five countries analysed only South Africa and Zambia contain guidance for teaching students who are falling behind. In Chad, a programme introduced in 2017/8 trained teachers to provide remedial support and they all implemented new strategies, such as rearranging classroom layouts and using more supportive approaches for struggling children, which ultimately saw children’s repetition rates fall.

Many countries need to contend with a teacher workforce whose qualifications and knowledge levels are well below what is required 

Ongoing professional training is also important to improve teachers’ subject knowledge and refresh their qualifications, which the report shows technology is helping with in the case of Burkina Faso, the United Republic of Tanzania and Zambia among others. In Africa, 17% of countries require a bachelor’s degree to teach in comparison to 62% of countries globally, while teachers’ qualifications are also often lower than requirements.  

The importance of training is highlighted in the report. Among surveyed primary school teachers in the 14 countries in the 2019 PASEC learning achievement survey, only 35% mastered basic procedures in mathematics. Differences in teacher subject knowledge accounts for more than one third of the cross-country variation in student achievement. But training approaches need to be sustainable and engaging teachers. Technology can help professional communities emerge, as a case study from Burkina Faso shows.

More funds are needed to bolster foundational learning  

As explained in more detail in the special edition of the 2023 Education Finance Watch for Africa, education is dropping down the list of governments’ priorities despite there being an annual financing gap of USD 28 billion to achieve countries’ own targets to achieve 85% primary completion rate by 2030. External financing is meanwhile declining as a source of revenue for governments, and less likely to support foundational learning as to support secondary education.  This makes it ever more important that it focuses on institutional building and not on short-term projects. 

The report recommends the following: 

At the individual level

1. Give all children a textbook – and all teachers a guide.

Ensure that all children and teachers have teaching and learning materials that are research-based, aligned with the curriculum, and locally developed. 2. Teach all children in their home language – and train teachers accordingly.

Give all children the opportunity to first learn to read in a language they understand and all teachers the confidence to support them.

3. Provide all children with a school meal.

Give all children the minimum conditions to learn at school. 

At the system level

4. Make a clear plan to improve learning.

a. Develop a common continental framework to monitoring learning outcomes.

b. Establish clear learning standards and align assessments to evaluate how well students meet them.

c. Ensure learning is not abstract; children need full understanding before moving to advanced concepts.

5. Develop teacher capacity.

Ensure all teachers use classroom time effectively through cost-effective training.

6. Prepare instructional leaders.

Restructure support mechanisms offered to teachers and schools. 

At the continental level

7. Learn from peers.

Reinvigorate mechanisms allowing countries to share experiences on foundational literacy and numeracy. 

At the international level

8. Focus aid on institution building.

Shift from projects to provision of public goods that support foundational learning. 

Download the report: https://bit.ly/2024-spotlight 

Download social media cards and materials: https://trello.com/b/1CYw5ork/spotlight-report  

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The UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) releases data in September and in March. The latter data release finalizes the processing of data collected by UIS surveys in the last reference year. Each release is a complex technical process, involving multiple data sources (administrative, survey/census, learning assessment, and expenditure data) and multiple data producers.

A lot of new data points have been added, especially on educational attainment.

About 112,000 data points were added to the UIS database, of which 76% are for SDG indicators and 24% for other policy relevant indicators. The increase has been mainly related to the following indicators:

• education attainment rate (SDG indicator 4.4.3), which accounts for the bulk of new data points (76%, including points for its parity index);
• out-of-school rate (4.1.4; 9%);
• tertiary education gross enrolment ratio (4.3.2; 6%); and
• minimum proficiency level in reading and mathematics (4.1.1), over-age attendance rate (4.1.5), early childhood education participation rate (4.2.2), youth/adult literacy rate (4.6.2), and students taught in their home language (4.5.2), each of which contributed about 2% of new data points.

In the case of indicator 4.4.3, the new data points were added by tapping on the International Labour Organisation’s repository of labour force surveys, which record educational attainment by level, sex and urban/rural location. Importantly, 21 new countries and territories have been added to the UIS database (bringing the total from 174 to 195), of which 9 are in Oceania and 5 in sub-Saharan Africa. Data from the 2020 Census have been used to update estimates for China.

Globally, 84% of adults have completed at least primary education. The SDG regions that fall below the global average are Latin America and the Caribbean (77%), Central and Southern Asia (67%) and sub-Saharan Africa, where just over half of the adult population has completed primary education. Differences become more acute at higher levels of education. For instance, there are 35 countries and territories where fewer than 1 in 5 adults have completed at least upper secondary education and just 28 countries and territories where more than 4 in 5 adults have done so.

Percentage of population 25+ years that completed at least upper secondary education.

Source: UIS database

But some data gaps remain a concern.

The Inter-agency and Expert Group on SDG Indicators (IAEG-SDGs), which is the inter-governmental body responsible for the development of the SDG monitoring framework, has set specific criteria for the 2025 comprehensive review of indicators: ‘available data or a link to where the data can be located; data must be available for at least 40 per cent of countries and of the population across the different regions where the indicator is relevant; and a plan for how data coverage will be expanded must be included if current data coverage is below 50 per cent’. There are clear process guidelines and an invitation from IAEG-SDGs to custodian agencies for indicators that are below 40% to present a data plan to reach 50%.

There are two global indicators with low coverage in population terms:

• Children developmentally on track (4.2.1) at 35%, none of which is a high-income country.
• Functional literacy and numeracy proficiency (4.6.1) at 7%, all of them upper-middle- and high-income countries. Given very low coverage, the youth/adult literacy rate (indicator 4.6.2) may be proposed as a replacement global indicator, as its coverage is high (81%), except in high-income countries (27%) where literacy rates are close to universal and therefore the indicator is less relevant.

Three global indicators have relatively higher coverage that still falls below 50%:

• Minimum proficiency level in reading and mathematics (4.1.1);
• ICT skills (4.4.1); and
• Extent to which global citizenship education and education for sustainable development are mainstreamed in policy, curricula, teacher education, and assessment (4.7.1).

Population and country overage of global SDG 4 indicators

Source: UIS based on UIS database March 2024 release and IAEG-SDG Report to the UNSC (2024).

Coverage of indicator 4.1.1 is sufficiently high at the end of primary/lower-secondary education (4.1.1b and c), at 46% of the population and 60% of countries. But it is low at grades 2/3 (4.1.1a), at 16% of the population and 20% of countries. Coverage is related to the level of income. The percentage of population in countries covered with at least one data point between 2018 and 2022 is 33% in low-, 35% in lower-middle-, 50% in upper-middle- and 92% in high-income countries.

In early December 2023, the UIS convened a meeting of the Global Alliance to Monitor Learning to define minimum acceptable criteria for reporting indicator 4.1.1a that ensure comparability at the minimum proficiency level for different types of assessments. These criteria include a refined definition of decoding and a scoring model for assessments of individual children. The UIS set a Technical Advisory Group that met on 4–6 March to decide upon further operational aspects such as:

• locating precursor reading skills on a learning progression continuum to facilitate comparability for assessments that are not aligned to the minimum proficiency level; and
• identifying benchmarks for each of the precursor skills by language.

What solutions are there to close data gaps?

Ahead of the 2025 SDG indicator review, various steps are needed to make progress with some of the persistent data gaps, depending on the indicator.

First, some indicators will need to be replaced with related ones that have higher coverage, such as in the case of the youth and adult literacy rate.

Second, following the decisions of the Conference on Education Data and Statistics, consensus is needed on re-defining the qualified and trained teacher indicators. Lack of shared understanding among countries is the main reason for remaining gaps – and for limited comparability.

Third, coverage on indicator 4.1.1a is expected to increase, as countries that have participated in the Pacific Islands Literacy and Numeracy Assessment (PILNA) and the Assessment for Minimum Proficiency Level (AMPLa) (in sub-Saharan Africa) release their results at the national level. But more coordinated international support will be needed to fill the gaps in data on learning outcomes in low- and lower-middle-income countries.

Fourth, some indicators can be informed by multiple data sources, but this potential has not yet been tapped, except in the cases of out-of-school and completion rates. We have proposed, and the Conference on Education Data and Statistics has decided, to explore this potential further.

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In 2022, the UIS and the GEM Report proposed a major improvement in the way out-of-school rates and populations are estimated, making efficient use of different sources of information. Yet, the model has a weakness: when crisis strikes, estimates cannot be updated without new information. Sometimes such new information is collected. For instance, UNICEF carried out a household survey in Afghanistan in 2022/23 shortly after the new regime banned girls from attending school. This information enabled an updated estimate of the global out-of-school population, showing that it had increased to 250 million. Yet, this was an exception. In most cases, monitoring efforts break down in crisis contexts. Lack of security and urgent humanitarian priorities do not allow the usual data collection processes to continue. How can we make sure that children in these countries are counted in our global reporting?

At the UNESCO Conference on Education Data and Statistics last month, a session was dedicated to this issue: how to improve official education statistics and SDG 4 reporting to take into account crisis-affected populations. Two approaches were discussed.

First, a bottom-up and systematic approach would try to improve the annual UIS survey administered to governments so that it captures the impact of crises. Governments need guidance on how to document whether their education data collection is comprehensive or excludes particular regions and populations. Stronger collaboration among government institutions but also between government and humanitarian agencies would be called upon. In its decision, the Conference has requested the Technical Cooperation Group on SDG 4 indicators (to be renamed Education Data and Statistics Commission) to focus efforts on developing protocols and standards to capture the impact of emergencies and crises on affected populations. This sustainable approach will nevertheless require considerable efforts until government systems can adopt such protocols.

Second, a top-down and ad hoc approach would try to provide a short-term solution. It would focus on using documentation from humanitarian agencies to suggest by how much high-level estimates of flagship indicators such as out-of-school rates and populations would need to be adjusted to reflect the situation on the ground. Such adjustments would focus on the crises with the potentially strongest impact. How could that work in practice?

What do we know about five large humanitarian crises?

The International Rescue Committee has been publishing a list of the gravest humanitarian crises. In its most recent watchlist, the top five crises were Sudan, Palestine, South Sudan, Burkina Faso and Myanmar.

The largest displacement crisis in the world is in Sudan since civil conflict erupted in April 2023. More than 8 million people, about 15% of the population, have either been internally displaced or fled to neighbouring countries. According to the UIS/GEM Report model, there were 5.4 million, or 41% of children, adolescents and youth out of school in 2022, prior to the conflict. The GEM Report has confirmed this estimate was accurate following a recent analysis of a 2022 nationally representative household survey.

Civil conflict affected mostly the regions of Darfur, Kordofan and Khartoum. Of their respective school age populations, about 60% in Darfur and Kordofan and 18% in Khartoum were out of school in 2022. Assuming that no children went to school in the latter two thirds of 2023 in these three regions, 4.2 million would need to be added to the out-of-school population, bringing the total to 9.6 million. A widely circulating estimate that 19 million children are out-of-school appears exaggerated, considering that the school age population is about 13.3 million. It appears that some schools opened in Darfur in January, but at the same time other provinces are being dragged into the conflict.

In Palestine, all the estimated 0.55 million children aged 6-17 years in Gaza have been out-of-school since October 2023 and would need to be added to the global estimate. By late January 2024, it is estimated that 4,500 students have been killed and 9,100 injured. It is also reported that 76% of schools have been damaged. Even damaged schools are still used as shelters: more than half of school buildings are used for this purpose. Another 20% have been used for military operations.

South Sudan has suffered from a seemingly endless spiral of conflict and vulnerability to natural disasters. There are no easily accessible data for triangulation. The UIS/GEM Report out-of-school model estimated that there were 2.1 million children, adolescents and youth out of school n 2022. An estimate by the education cluster in December 2023 raised that estimate to 2.8 million. If verified, an additional 0.7 million children would need to be added to the global estimate.

In Burkina Faso, a crisis of insecurity due to continued attacks has been spreading to almost the entire country although 5 of the 13 administrative regions are disproportionately affected: Boucle du Mouhoun, Centre-Nord, Est, Nord and Sahel. The UIS/GEM Report out-of-school model estimated that there were 2.9 million children, adolescents and youth out of school in 2022, of which the five most heavily affected regions accounted for 1.5 million. Data from two surveys in 2019 and 2022 were used so the estimate is up to date, although it is hard to know how representative enumeration was in the affected areas.

An estimate by the education ministry in May 2023, with the support of the education cluster, found that more than 5,000 primary and secondary schools were forced to close in these regions, with almost 900,000 students losing access to education. Most likely this estimate overlaps with the existing higher estimates of the out-of-school population; it might be therefore safer to assume that no further upward adjustment is needed for Burkina Faso.

In Myanmar, it is more difficult to assess the situation. The last available official data are from 2018. The model projects that the improvement observed around 2015, when the total number of out of children, adolescents and youth was reliably estimated at around 2.9 million, would have continued, leading to an estimate of just 1.2 million out of school in 2022, but this is less reliable. The latest education factsheet published by UNCEF suggested that 3.7 million lacked ‘access to learning’, which is not the same as saying this population is out of school. It is unlikely that the out-of-school population would have increased by so much. In other words, it is not possible to make an informed suggestion.

In brief, evidence from three out of five major crises for which reasonably reliable and comparable information is available, suggests that the out-of-school population may be underestimated by 5.5 million.

Global out-of-school population adjusted by evidence from three large humanitarian crises

A way forward

Each crisis is different, in terms of characteristics such as intensity, spread and duration, but also in terms of data availability. Education clusters, which are mandated to coordinate humanitarian response in areas where the state may be absent, party to the conflict or not have the resources to identify needs and provide education services, are tasked with estimating the number of People in Need (PiN) of education.

It is important to remember that this is a different definition to being out of school. Clusters, after all, are assessing education needs for purposes other than global reporting. The result is that it is hard to combine and integrate their findings in official statistical reports. But more can be done to cross-check and take into account the data they provide when they can be triangulated with other sources.

There will always be a margin of error when it comes to reporting on education in crisis-affected situations. But the more we know, the less speculation there will be. And, as discussed a few days ago in a webinar organized by the Education Research in Conflict and Protracted Crisis (ERICC) Consortium and the Interagency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE), the more that an approach can be agreed upon by all parties, the easier it will be to ensure the publication of education statistics that reflect the situation of crisis-affected children and can inform policies and programmes.

Building on the UNESCO Conference on Education Data and Statistics, and under the framework of the Education Data and Statistics Commission, the next steps would involve the following:

• A task force that would propose by the end of this year a process on how to take supplementary information into account for estimating a margin of error in out-of-school population calculations, for a limited number of the most severe humanitarian crises.
• Based on these recommendations, introduce an annual process that will make these margin-of-error estimates.

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Working out how to monitor the ambition in our global education goal, SDG 4, required a certain amount of innovation back in 2015. One of the key suggestions made at the time was that ‘the more data can be combined, the more useful they are’. Data integration, in other words.

Even before the SDGs, other sectors had faced similar challenges to combine different data sources and types together. Wasting and stunting, for instance, which are ways of measuring malnutrition, were calculated thanks to a Joint Child Malnutrition Estimates group in 2011. In health, multiple administrative and survey data sources were combined by the UN Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation, which created a new model to generate annual estimates for under-5 mortality, and by the Inter-Agency Group for Maternal Mortality Rates.

Which parts of SDG 4 do we monitor with data integration?

Data integration can either involve merging different sources of the same type, or by merging different types of sources. This requires education statisticians to increasingly work out how to incorporate these sources in the estimation of indicators. It is not always simple.

An example of the first is learning outcomes from different assessments, which are the same source, but often have slightly different methodologies. This requires integration in the sense that the results are not immediately comparable and may require further analysis. An example of the second is the out-of-school rate, which can rely on both administrative and survey data, as seen on the VIEW website, or teacher continuous professional development, which can draw on administrative and learning assessment data.

Distribution of SDG 4 global and thematic indicators, by potential data source

Integrating data to monitor completion rates

In 2020, a review of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on SDG Indicators approved the completion rate at three levels of education (primary, lower secondary and upper secondary) as a global indicator. It was one of only six among more than 200 proposals to be successful. Estimating completion rates requires some form of integration in order to be flexible around the fact that many children enrol late, and some may repeat years, especially in poorer countries.

One of the benefits of combining multiple survey data sources is that it can fill in the gaps as a result of infrequent survey cycles or sampling errors. The approach taken borrows from similar solutions in health statistics but has been adapted to the education context. It estimates an underlying trend. Late completion is explicitly modelled by specifying the magnitude of the delay as a function of age. Age misreporting concerns are also addressed. By addressing various data quality concerns associated with survey data, these estimates are also less sensitive to individual surveys, the year in which they were conducted, and the type of survey that happens to be the latest available in a given country.

Combining data sources to estimate out-of-school rates.

The need for a methodology that combines data sources to estimate out-of-school rates was recognized 20 years ago, when it was acknowledged that ‘some sort of composite approach may be needed for estimating time series and producing estimates for the most recent year’.

In the absence of such an approach in the past, measurements were done using enrolment records from school censuses. But there were three challenges with this approach: enrolment records are often incomplete or inaccurate; those records needed to be combined with population estimates, which come from a different and often inconsistent source; and schools were not always able to determine students’ ages accurately.

In recent years, many of these countries have carried out household surveys which, despite their own weaknesses, can help fill some gaps and address challenges related to age and population.  A model was accordingly developed to add these sources to the administrative ones in order to get a better picture. The results of this model were reported for the first time In September 2022, and visualized in the VIEW website. Thanks to the new approach, new out-of-school rates were produced for countries such as Nigeria and Ethiopia that hadn’t had data reported for over a decade. The latest data release using this approach has estimated there are still 250 million children, adolescents and youth out of school.

What are the challenges associated with data integration?

When combining data, the methods must be understood so that that they can be accurately interpreted. Even more critically, although these models can only be estimated at a global, central level, it is important to ensure that countries participate in the process and engage with it. This is important not only to make sure they feel ownership of the results but also to help develop the capacity of national statisticians so that they can feed into the model. As things stand, there is no systematic mechanism for countries to seek clarifications, understand the methods underpinning the estimates, contest results that contradict their own understanding of the actual situation, but also proactively contribute data sources and ideas for the development of the models.

There are also technical  issues that need to be ironed out and which will also be discussed at this week’s conference, such as how female and male rates should be estimated, and how to align the estimates of the out-of-school and completion rate models.

What further developments are needed?

We need to formalize good practice for the way estimates are reported with guidelines similar to GATHER, an approach followed in health statistics.

We need to build the participation of countries in these new models. Countries should review model results in a systematic way, familiarize themselves with the rationale and implications, identify errors and seek clarifications, contribute ideas to potential areas of model development, and provide additional and up-to-date data sources. Familiarizing ministries of education and the expert community with estimate-based SDG 4 indicators as a new way of monitoring progress requires extensive communication. The suggestion is that the same approach as in health is taken in education so that the UNESCO Institute for Statistics covers the models in the workshops it is already running with countries. An inventory of surveys that will support data integration, ensuring countries are involved in the data inputs used, is also recommended.

A joint model combining the out-of-school and completion rates should be developed. The GEM Report and the UIS are currently working to develop a model that integrates the completion and out-of-school rate estimates to ensure they are consistent with each other.

New ways of integrating data should be considered to estimate other elements of SDG 4. The suggestion is that similar models could be used that draw in data, for instance on children who are over-age for their grade, those learners in non-formal education, and more.

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At present, a little over half of girls complete primary school on time in Pakistan, according to the VIEW website. In Sindh Province, especially, only one third of the primary school-age population is enrolled; only half of those enrolled progress to lower secondary school. This article investigates the root causes of their dropouts and presents policy solutions to consider. The detailed report has been published at the GPE library.

To conduct a deeper analysis of the underlying factors impeding girls’ primary completion, we focused on Dadu and Larkana, two rural districts in Sindh Province. School Education Management Information System data from 2020 and 2021 was used for the analysis. The data do not include private schools. In these two districts, boys are 20% more likely to be enrolled in, and 10% more likely to complete, primary school than girls.

Our analysis was supported by an adaptation of UNESCO IIEP’s policy diagnostic tool for school completion to identify the bottlenecks affecting low primary school completion rates and propose policy alternatives.

Factors contributing to dropout appear on both the demand and the supply side. On the demand side, socio-economic, ethnic, and cultural barriers are the factors; on the supply side, school location, distance, transportation, facilities, and teacher recruitment and retention need addressing. For the sake of brevity, the two most significant contributing factors were elaborated further. On the demand side, the lack of safety and security; on the supply side, the shortage of female teachers.

Addressing the lack of safety and security within schools

This challenge is a prominent concern for parents, students, and teachers. Approximately 50% of schools do not have boundary walls. Local culture considers chaddar (head cover for girls) and char deewari (boundary walls of the home) as essential protective covers, both symbolically and materially. Since students spend a substantial amount of time in schools, parents prioritise protection within school premises.

The frequent incidents of crime against girls have created a sense of mistrust among parents and females, including students and teachers. A preference for schools with boundary walls is driven by the need for female safety and security. To address this concern, the proposed policy solution is to guarantee well-functioning buildings with boundary walls and to encourage the community around schools to share the security responsibility for girls.

Addressing the shortage of female teachers

Although provincial data show that female teachers comprise half of the teaching force in Sindh, there are only one-third of all teachers in these two districts. This shortage of female teachers hinders parents from sending their daughters to school due to cultural barriers and concerns.

The importance of female teachers for girls’ enrolment and completion can be illustrated by the example of a Pakistani educational foundation, which operates mainly in rural areas and slums. Its work focuses on providing female teachers even in remote areas by providing safe transportation for female teachers. Primary schools in rural settings provide few incentives for females, as there is no security, no housing, and no transport.

Our research argues in favour of village-based internships to female secondary school graduates in their respective localities as a relevant policy solution. Promising interns can subsequently be hired with the condition that they complete their educational qualifications. Further incentives could be provided in the form of transport facilities, ongoing learning opportunities and sponsorship of their professional qualification acquisition. This can provide a good set of incentives for females to join particularly in rural settings.

There is an urgent need to improve girls’ primary school completion given their intense marginalisation. It is noteworthy that, despite their disadvantages, girls are performing better in learning assessments. There can be an economic argument made here for policy makers. These enrolment, completion, and achievement patterns need serious attention to retain our female students who not only fight for their basic educational rights but also prove their commitment to learning.

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“Leaving no one behind” is a central principle in the mission of the Global Partnership for Education (GPE), the world’s only partnership and fund on providing quality education to children in lower-income countries. Through the GPE 2025 strategic plan, the partnership aims to transform education systems in ways that achieve education outcomes at scale, address systemic inequities and focus financing on the poor and the most marginalized children, with gender equality at the heart of planning and implementation. GPE’s mission

Increasingly, conversations among governments and development partners have rightly recognized that access to basic education alone is insufficient to ensure that all children can learn. Through the Incheon Framework and Declaration for Action, agreed in 2015, countries and development partners have raised aspirations, agreeing to ensure all children could access 12 years of free, publicly funded, equitable quality primary and secondary education, and achieve relevant learning outcomes. But is there a danger that in shifting the conversation towards learning and quality of education, we lose sight of the children not in school in the first place?

The new GPE working paper ‘Leaving No One Behind: Transforming Education Systems, Equitably and Inclusively’ asks how countries can manage this risk and move towards all children learning without leaving any of them behind, by understanding the links between access, equity and learning.

Progress on access in low-income countries has stalled

The reality is that, as of 2021, some 250 million children, adolescents and youth remain out of school. In many GPE partner countries, large barriers to universal access to basic education remain. In 25 partner countries, more than 20% of children are out-of-school at primary or lower-secondary age, and in a further 25, more than 20% do not complete even primary education.

These challenges reflect a global slowing of progress. Dramatic progress was made in expanding educational opportunities between the 1990s and 2010, but since then, progress on access has slowed to a near halt. Moreover, the data available now were mostly gathered before the COVID-19 pandemic, which disrupted the education of millions more children and left many at risk of dropping out even when schools reopened. There is an urgent need for reforms that can bring all children back into the classroom, as well as ensure that they learn when they are there.

How countries can work with GPE towards all children learning

GPE 2025—GPE’s strategic plan for 2021–2025—works toward the goal of all children learning through a system transformation approach. The approach aligns partners around “catalytic” reforms to remove existing barriers and lead to wider system transformation. Each element of GPE’s operating model includes mechanisms to ensure these reforms leave no one behind. Systemwide reforms that improve efficiency, enrollment at an appropriate age, school readiness and the flow of learners through the system are likely to be important to addressing issues of access and completion.

Faced with an ongoing learning crisis, countries may choose to prioritize reforms that focus on school quality, teaching and learning. Governments and development partners need to be accountable not just for children being in school, but also learning at the expected level. But to achieve these goals, they need to apply a holistic system lens that understands links between access, equity and learning. Reforms need to be driven by inclusive policy dialogue wherein the voices of different groups, including the most marginalized, are heard.

Principles for leaving no one behind

The working paper suggests 4 principles for governments and international development partners to consider so that no one is left behind in GPE partner countries:

1. Retain a strong focus on access and completion in education policy and planning, at least in GPE partner countries that have either low access or low completion. In Uganda, for example, a partnership compact between the government, GPE and other partners recognizes that persistent low enrollment and completion rates still stand in the way of the goal of all children learning, and plans a reform focused on both access and quality of primary education, including for vulnerable groups.
2. As education systems expand toward universal enrollment, they will need to adapt to the needs of an increasingly diverse body of learners. This will require fundamental changes in how schools and teachers work and equipping them to cater to a wider range of learning needs. Disability inclusion is a necessary part of this adaptation. Countries such as Tanzania have sought to advance disability inclusion across the GPE-funded activities, such as improving teachers’ instructional practices.
3. Focus on all children learning—not just those who are currently completing school. This means understanding potential unintended consequences when activities and indicators focus only on in-school children, and how these can be avoided or offset. It also means considering how the effects of learning interventions may differ between learners, and the implications for equity.
4. Focus public resources where the needs are greatest—in particular, by carefully considering trade-offs when support is directed to higher levels of education, such as upper secondary, when there remain large numbers of children not completing primary education. In countries that are making secondary education free, such as Ghana, it may be important for development partners to retain a strong focus on equity and quality in primary education – as support from GPE and other partners through a Multiplier grant has done.

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As the head of the Tigray  Bureau of Education, I am appealing to the international community to help our campaign to bring the children of Tigray back to school after 7 consecutive semesters (4 years) of interruption.

Schools in Tigray were first shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic and then continued because of the devastating war, which has caused widespread and extensive damage, destruction, loss, and long-lasting negative impacts on the education system. Moreover, the children of Tigray have themselves been victims of terrible atrocities during the deadly war. They were exposed to widespread and systemic  sexual violence and rape, mass displacement, and a humanitarian siege and blockade leading to manmade famine.

Before the war, the education system in Tigray was making significant progress in terms of access and equity. Education was a priority for the regional government, and, thanks to those clear direction and hardworking educators, and support from our national and international reliable partners, access to primary education was enhanced. At the time, the average distance children had to walk to primary and secondary school was 2.5 and 7.1 km respectively. The class-to-student ratio in primary and secondary education was 1:39 and 1:43 respectively.  Tigray was one of the regional bureaus in the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia that achieved great success towards meeting the Sustainable Development Goal 4.

As a result of the war, not only was instruction disrupted leading to significant learning losses and gaps in learning time, but school buildings have also deliberately been destroyed. School infrastructure and educational materials have been completely looted and burned. The human resources (teachers, assistants, school leaders, librarians, and administrative staff) have been severely affected, including denial of their  salary for 2-3 years.

As a result of all of these issues, currently, the education system has almost completely collapsed and everything we had gained as a result of a lot of hard work in the last three decades has been completely ruined. There are now 2.4 million children out of school.. Following the signed Pretoria Peace Agreement, we are now working to bring them back to school. We are, however, facing enormous challenges.

• Many schools are occupied by internally displaced people.
• In addition, 552 schools are still not accessible because they are occupied by Amhara and Eritrean military forces though they should have withdrawn from Tigray as per the Pretoria Peace Agreement
• The presence of unexploded ordnances and other weapons around schools poses a significant threat to the safety of students and teachers.
• A significant difficulty is the loss of teachers as a result of displacement and war casualties. The lack of salary payment has also understandably eroded confidence, leading many teachers to seek other means of income and employment.
• Before the war, Tigray had: about 40,000 classrooms across almost 2,500 schools; two teacher training colleges; 30,000 different electronic devices, including computers, printers, plasma TVs, and heavy-duty photocopying machines; and 300,000 pieces of laboratory equipment and teaching aids. Unfortunately, much of this has been destroyed or looted, leaving the difficult task of rehabilitation, maintenance, and reconstruction. The resources needed will be significant, but can be found if there are committed partners in the international community, for example through school twinning. The items we urgently need include desks, blackboards, chairs, tables, electronic materials such as computers, and printers, materials for special need students, including braille paper and selate and styles, books, pens pencils and menstrual pads for girls.
• Families are struggling to provide teaching and learning materials for their children. The economy of Tigray has collapsed leaving the entire population dependent on food aid to make ends meet, making it difficult for them to afford basic school supplies, posing serious challenges for their children’s learning.
• School communities are traumatized, with many students having witnessed violence at a very young age. A study by the Luminos Fund examined the levels of learning loss, trauma, and resilience in children, parents, and teachers in Tigray. The study surveyed 600 internally displaced children enrolled in grades 2-4 at the time of school closures in 2020, as well as 450 parents and 400 teachers. The study indicated significant learning loss and evidence of substantial psychological trauma. As we work towards reopening schools in Tigray, it is important to address this trauma, which will require significant resources to ensure that students and teachers, and their extended families, feel safe and supported as they return to school.
• Number of students and teachers with special needs caused by the war has significantly increased.
• Tigray has been facing severe famine and famine-like conditions, reported to affect 90% of the population as a result of the war and blockade to humanitarian aid. A recent decision to halt humanitarian assistance that had started to flow following the Pretoria Agreement has further compounded this problem. School feeding programs will be an essential component for many students in Tigray who do not have access to regular meals at home. The program would ensure that students receive at least one nutritious meal a day to help them concentrate on their studies and improve their overall health. The program would also encourage parents to send their children to school, especially in areas where education  not be prioritized due to the dire situation as a result of the war.

The support of the international community in efforts to bring children back to school will go a long way toward restoring and revitalizing Tigray’s educational system. We need your assistance in:

• School rehabilitation, maintenance, and construction
• Mental health and psychosocial support programs for students and teachers
• Curriculum development, in the form of Accelerated Learning Programs to catch up, including through technology supportSchool feeding programs

Finally, I would like to reiterate that we fully appreciate all of your previous support and appeal for your further assistance at this dire time that will enable us to give Tigrayan children new hope for the future. Should you require further information, I am available at kirosgu@gmail.com

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By Mary Joy Pigozzi, PhD., Executive Director of Education Above All Foundation’s Educate A Child Programme

As we reach the halfway point to realising the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), it is a good time to reflect on progress and consider the challenges that lie ahead.

SDG 4 – “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all, ” established in 2015, has a deadline of 2030. Though progress has been made, the sobering reality remains: worldwide, over 244 million children and youth, aged 6-18, are still out of school.

Whilst 67 million Out of School Children (OOSC) at the primary level are still excluded from education and the journey to Zero OOSC is seemingly daunting, some positive strides have been made. Let’s reflect on where we are, and the journey ahead.

The goal of ‘education for all’
While SDG4 may be the ‘home’ of education, quality education plays a vital role in achieving many of the other 16 sustainable development goals. Education is a human right, enabling healthy, prosperous lives and peaceful communities, alleviating poverty and promoting gender equality. Early and consistent access to and participation in quality learning positively changes the futures of the poorest and most marginalised children, families, and .  For instance, a child born to a literate mother has a 50% higher chance of surviving beyond age five than the child of a mother who cannot read.

A lingering and unprecedented education crisis
The global challenges of the past few years, including the COVID-19 pandemic, have massively impacted this basic right that has already been denied to so many due to endemic poverty and other significant barriers. Some children have yet to return; the longer they remain outside the system, the less likely they are to re-enter.

Adding to the range of barriers children face accessing education, conflicts and natural disasters have further disrupted education. Especially for some of the most marginalised and vulnerable communities in countries- from Afghanistan and Pakistan to Sudan and Nigeria, Turkey and Syria.

This complex situation requires a sophisticated approach. We need a robust partnership approach, placing education at the forefront of development efforts. Impressive progress has been made, showing what can be achieved with the right action, approach and partners.

Aim big, act bold
Setting brave and audacious targets is critical to driving real change. Ten years ago, through EAA Foundation’s Educate A Child Programme (EAC), we launched a bold initiative to enrol 10 million children in quality primary education—an unprecedented goal many thought was impossible. To date, along with partners, we have committed to enrolling over 14.5 million out of school children and youth at the primary level. Concurrently, EAC is engaged in additional bold strategies–ramping up global advocacy for educationally excluded children, addressing the funding crisis in education, and supporting selected countries to reach Zero OOSC.

Scaling success through partnerships
Our worldwide partnerships have demonstrated it is possible to enrol the hardest to reach OOSC. Essential to our success has been recognition that “one size does not fit all”.  A key element of our approach was to work with known partners at scale, asking them to build on their experience.  Sometimes that means knocking on families’ doors with an enrolment clipboard, and sometimes banging on the door of global policy institutions. We’ve implemented creative and innovative methods to make a difference.

Through partnership, we’ve been able to exceed targets and enrol over 12 million OOSC in primary education in 57 countries across the world. Additionally, the governments of Djibouti, Rwanda, The Gambia and Zanzibar, have joined our fight against exclusion by committing to reach Zero OOSC.

Nevertheless, the need to double down on efforts at pace and scale remains.  We don’t have a second to lose.

Protecting education from attack
Protecting schools and universities in times of conflict is a crucial part of the global strategy to reach SDG4 and achieve universal education.

Encouragingly, the UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) unanimously adopted a resolution in 2020 (UNSCR 2601), condemning attacks on educational institutions and civilians connected to schools. This landmark agreement highlights worldwide consensus to protect education.

Yet, attacks on education, schools, students, and teachers have significantly increased in the last two years. To tackle this, we need the international community to collectively unite against such violence.

Emphasising accountability and advocacy
It is important to hold attackers accountable through built-in mechanisms for monitoring and reporting on attacks, consistent with UNSCR 2601, which urges states to adopt laws and policies that hold attackers on schools and education accountable while supporting victims, including marginalised groups like refugees. Empowering local communities in data collection offers victims some justice by contributing their stories, challenging stereotypes, and advocating for their right to education-.

Youth empowerment as agents of change
The next major leap forward in achieving the SDGs may well come from the world’s young people. At the Transforming Education Summit in 2022, young people took centre stage to demand the future they envisage.

By active involvement in civic engagements and volunteerism, youth can become advocates and peacebuilders in their communities. At EAA Foundation, we have long believed that empowering youth through quality education and leadership skills is crucial for driving positive change and sustainable development.

Alongside partners, EAA has trained thousands of young people.  Through its Protecting Education in Conflict (PEIC) Programme, working on the frontline in conflict-affected countries like Uganda and South Sudan, youth are constructing a peacebuilder network.

Our Reach Out To Asia (ROTA) programme offers workshops and training that inspire youth with a spirit of citizenship, belonging, and volunteerism whilst mobilising this influential group as advocates and peacebuilders, particularly in regions of insecurity and conflict. The programme has also been adapted to tackle climate issues by equipping youth with green skills for the future, helping to support their future lives and livelihoods.

Innovation is vital to effectively address educational challenges worldwide. Digital inequality increasingly hinders access for many learners. EAA’s Internet-free Education Resource Banks (IFERBs), which emphasise context-appropriate and adaptable approaches, provide basic learning resources, offering access to educational support materials in a wide range of contexts.

The power of engagement
We see how our collective investment in education is contributing to breaking the cycle of poverty and demanding social change. Now it is the global education community’s duty to honour their commitments to the rights of all by helping all young people access and climb the education ladder.

A pause for thought
This halfway point in the mission to achieve education for all calls for deep reflection on lessons learned as well as renewed determination.

Although the fulfilment of the SDGs may still seem distant at half time, we have seen that leveraging the efforts of governments, organisations, communities and individuals genuinely does work.

As we prepare for the few remaining years on route to 2030, our Foundation will continue seeking exponential strides forward in education, bringing us closer to success across the SDGs.

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