At the height of nationwide lockdowns due to the COVID-19 pandemic, up to 1.6 billion children were affected by school closures, causing the largest mass disruption of education in modern history. This joint report by UNICEF and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) presents new insights into children and young people's access to digital…

This report, which has been developed through a partnership between the African Union Commission (AUC) and UNICEF, aims to: (1) track the progress that African nations have made in education, especially in relation to Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG4) and the Continental Education Strategy for Africa (CESA) goals; (2) identify the challenges…

The purpose of these guidelines is to provide methods for comprehensive education sector analyses to support the preparation and monitoring of education sector plans. They are an update of a 1999 document that has been used to support the preparation of approximately 70 Education Country Status Reports (CSR) in more than 40 countries. The goal of…

The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Institute for Statistics (UIS) launched the joint Global Initiative on Out-of-School Children in 2010 to accelerate efforts towards the goal of universal primary education by 2015. The goal of the…

This report delves into a rich new body of data and analysis from the Global Initiative on Out-of-School Children (OOSCI), which confirms that the task of achieving education for all is far from over. The government-backed national studies carried out under the Initiative have marshalled a wide range of data sources for innovative analyses,…

Education is in crisis worldwide. Millions of children, especially the most marginalized, are excluded from school. Many millions more attend school, but they do not learn basic reading and math skills. In addition, international funding for education is on the decline. "The Investment Case for Education and Equity" explains the global…

The purpose of these guidelines is to provide methods for comprehensive education sector analyses to support the preparation and monitoring of education sector plans. They are an update of a 1999 document that has been used to support the preparation of approximately 70 Education Country Status Reports (CSR) in more than 40 countries. The goal of…

Reports such as this typically begin with a statistic designed to highlight a problem. The girls and boys to whom this edition of "The State of the World's Children" is dedicated are not problems. Rather, each is a sister, brother or friend who has a favourite dish, song or game; a daughter or son with dreams and the desire to fulfil…