Education data highlights

Global data on why education is a good investment

Global data on the missed opportunities due to the lack of education

Data for GPE partner countries

COVID-19 and education

As of January 14, 2021, nearly 214 million children are out of school worldwide due to nationwide school closures linked to the coronavirus pandemic.
Source: UNESCO
As of January 14, 2021, 126million students from pre-primary through secondary are out of school due to nationwide school closures in developing countries.
Source: GPE Secretariat calculations based on data from UNESCO
On June 1st, GPE doubled its COVID-19 emergency funding window to US$500 million to help developing countries mitigate both the immediate and long-term impacts of the coronavirus pandemic on education.
Source: GPE Secretariat
As of January 14, 2021, nationwide school closures in 6 partner countries affect 100 million children, of whom 48 million are girls.
Source: GPE Secretariat based on data on school closures from UNESCO and on school-age population from the World Bank

More data on COVID-19 and education

On April 1^st 2020, just three weeks after COVID-19 was declared a pandemic, GPE unlocked US$250 million to help 67 developing countries mitigate the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on education.
Source: GPE Secretariat
On March 25, GPE provided US$8.8 million to UNICEF to kickstart education systems’ response to COVID-19 in 87 developing countries.
Source: GPE Secretariat
2.7 million teachers are affected by school closures in partner countries as of January 14, 2021.
Source: GPE Secretariat calculations based on UNESCO data
Two thirds of the world’s school-age children – or 1.3 billion children aged 3 to 17 years old – do not have internet connection in their homes.
Source: UNICEF and ITU. How many children and young people have internet access at home? - December 2020
In advanced economies, the gross domestic product (GDP) is expected to decline by 8% in 2020.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 1)
Squeezed budgets could translate into a fall for aid to education of up to US$2 billion by 2022. It may be six years until 2018 levels are reached again.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 1)
If school closures last for three months, then the effect on participation might be zero and the effect on learning no more than that of an end-of-year break. If school closures extend over a full school year, their effects might resemble those of humanitarian crises.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 1)
An estimated 42 to 66 million children could fall into extreme poverty as a result of the crisis, adding to the estimated 386 million children already in extreme poverty in 2019.
Source: The impact of COVID-19 on children. UN Policy Brief, April 2020, p. 2
368.5 million children across 143 countries who normally rely on school meals for a reliable source of daily nutrition must now look to other sources.
Source: The impact of COVID-19 on children. UN Policy Brief, April 2020, p. 9
20 million more secondary school girls could be out of school following the pandemic.
Source: Malala Fund
If the lockdown continues for 6 months, 31 million additional gender-based violence cases can be expected
Source: UNFPA, April 2020
Due to pandemic-related disruptions in prevention programs, 2 million cases of female genital mutilation could occur over the next decade that would otherwise have been averted
Source: UNFPA, April 2020
An additional 13 million child marriages could be taking place that otherwise would not have occurred between 2020 and 2030
Source: UNFPA, April 2020
Only 15 countries are offering distance instruction in more than one language.
Source: The impact of COVID-19 on children. UN Policy Brief, April 2020, p. 8
Worldwide, 50% of students don’t have a computer at home. In sub-Saharan African, 89% of learners don’t have a computer at home.
Source: UNESCO International Teacher Task Force, April 2020
COVID-19-related school closures are forcing countries even further off track from achieving their learning goals. The students currently in school stand to lose $10 trillion in labor earnings over their work life.
Source: Brookings

Gender equality

One additional school year can increase a woman's earnings by 10% to 20%
Source: World Bank, Returns to Investment in Education (2002)
129.2 million girls worldwide are out of school (2018). This includes 32.3 million girls of primary school age, 29.9 million girls of lower secondary school age, and 67 million girls of upper secondary school age.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet 56, p.2, September 2019
Twice as many girls are on the path of gender equality in partner countries.
Source: GPE Secretariat
67% of GPE partner countries have as many girls as boys completing primary school in 2016, compared to 42% in 2002.
Source: GPE results report 2019, p.36
46% of GPE partner countries improved equity for girls, rural and poor children between 2010 and 2017, compared to 32% between 2010 and 2014.
Source: GPE results report 2019, p.9

More data on gender equality

73% of girls finished primary school in 2018 in partner countries compared to 70% in 2013.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.21
50% of girls completed lower-secondary school in 2018 in partner countries compared to 46% in 2013.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.21
There are 37% more girls than boys out of primary school across GPE partner countries affected by fragility and conflict, compared to only 4% more girls in other GPE partner countries.
Source: Data from the UNESCO Institute for Statistics for 2014
Each year of secondary education reduces the likelihood of marrying as a child before the age of 18 by five percentage points or more.
Source: Economic impacts of child marriage: Global synthesis report (2017), p.5
Human capital wealth could increase by almost 22% globally with gender equality in earnings.
Source: Unrealized potential: the high cost of gender inequality in earnings, p.7
Educating girls averted more than 30 million deaths of children under five years old and 100 million deaths in adults 15 to 60 years old.
Source: The Learning Generation, p.34
Universal secondary education could virtually end child marriage.
Source: Missed opportunities: the high cost of not educating girls, p.52
If every girl worldwide received 12 years of quality education, lifetime earnings for women could increase by US$15 trillion to US$30 trillion globally.
Source: Missed opportunities: the high cost of not educating girls, p.5
Women with primary education (partial or completed) earn 14% to 19% more than those with no education at all. Women with secondary education may expect to make almost twice as much, and women with tertiary education almost three times as much as those with no education.
Source: Missed opportunities: the high cost of not educating girls, p.4
Girls are 1.5 times more likely than boys to be excluded from primary school. That's 15 million girls of primary school age who will never have the opportunity to learn to read and write in primary school, compared to about 10 million boys.
Source: UIS/GEM Report Policy Paper 27/Fact Sheet 37, p.5
Some countries lose more than US$1 billion a year by failing to educate girls to the same level as boys
Source: Plan International: Paying the price: The economic cost of failing to educate girls, p.10
In low income and lower-middle income countries, women account for only a third or less of human capital wealth.
Source: Unrealized potential: the high cost of gender inequality in earnings, p.5
Globally, 9 in 10 girls complete their primary education, but only 3 in 4 complete their lower secondary education. In low-income countries, less than two thirds of girls complete their primary education, and only 1 in 3 completes lower secondary school.
Source: Missed opportunities: the high cost of not educating girls, p.2

Education in crisis situations

Each year of education reduces the risk of conflict by around 20%.
Source: World Bank. Doing well out of war (Paul Collier), 1999 , p. 5
Children in fragile, conflict-affected countries are more than twice as likely to be out of school compared with those in countries not affected by conflict; similarly, adolescents are more than two-thirds more likely to be out of school.
Source: GEM Report, Policy Paper 21, June 2015, p.2
68.4% of children completed primary school in partner countries affected by fragility and conflict in 2018 compared to 66% in 2013.
Source: GPE Results Report 2020, p. 21
76% of GPE implementation grants were allocated to partner countries affected by fragility and conflict in 2019 compared to 44% in 2012.
Source: GPE Secretariat
In GPE countries affected by fragility and conflict, the number of girls completing school for every 100 boys rose from 74 to 88 for primary, and from 67 to 83 for lower-secondary between 2002 and 2015.
Source: GPE estimate based on UIS data

More data on education in crisis situations

106 million more children enrolled in school in partner countries affected by fragility and conflict since 2002.
Source: GPE Secretariat
18.5 million children were supported by GPE in partner countries affected by fragility and conflict between 2015 and 2018.
Source: GPE Results Report 2020, p.30
US$125.5 million in accelerated funding has been allocated to ensure education continues during crises in 14 countries.
Source: GPE Secretariat
31 GPE partner developing countries are fragile or affected by conflict in fiscal year 2021.
Source: GPE Secretariat based on UNESCO and World Bank classifications
GPE partner countries affected by fragility and conflict are home to more than 200 million children of primary and lower secondary school age.
Source: GPE Secretariat
GPE partner developing countries are home to almost 4 million refugee children, about 45% of the world’s refugee children population.
Source: UNHCR and GPE data as of 2016. UNHCR data only accounts for refugees for whom demographic data is available.
Developing regions hosted 92% of the world’s school-age refugees in 2017.
Source: UNHCR. Turn the tide: refugee education in crisis (2018), p.14
If the enrollment rate for secondary schooling is 10 percentage points higher than the average, the risk of war is reduced by about 3 percentage points (a decline in the risk from 11.5% to 8.6%).
Source: World Bank. Understanding Civil War, 2005 , p. 16
An estimated 128 million primary and secondary-aged children are out of school in crisis-affected countries, including 67 million girls.
Source: Plan International, Left Out, Left Behind: Adolescent girls’ secondary education in crises, Plan International, UK, 2019, p.30
Education’s share in global humanitarian aid has tripled from 1% 2014 to 3% in 2019 and quintupled in 5 years.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 9)
In the past five years, funding requests for education in emergencies have increased by 21%.
Source: GEM Report, Policy Paper 31, p.7
Girls are almost two and a half more likely to be out of school if they live in conflict-affected countries, and young women are nearly 90% more likely to be out of secondary school than their counterparts in countries not affected by conflict.
Source: GEM Report, Policy Paper 21, June 2015, p.3
From 2013 through 2017, there were more than 12,700 attacks on education, harming more than 21,000 students and educators.
Source: Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack. May 2018
Over the last five years, 41 countries suffered at least 5 attacks on education
Source: Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack. May 2018
Four million refugee children are out of school. An increase of half a million in one year.
Source: UNHCR (2017)
Less than a quarter of the world’s refugees make it to secondary school, and just 1% progress to higher education.
Source: UNHCR. Turn the tide: refugee education in crisis (2018), p.8
By the end of 2017, there were more than 25.4 million refugees around the world. More than half of the global refugee population – 52%– were under the age of 18.
Source: UNHCR. Turn the tide: refugee education in crisis (2018), p.10
In 2017, 61% of refugee children were enrolled in primary school, compared to 92% globally.
Source: UNHCR. Turn the tide: refugee education in crisis (2018), p.13
In 2017, 23% of refugee children were enrolled in secondary school, compared with a global rate of 84%.
Source: UNHCR. Turn the tide: refugee education in crisis (2018), p.13
Higher education opportunities for refugees have historically been extremely limited with less than 1% of refugee youth able to access universities.
Source: GEM Report/UNHCR policy paper 26, p. 10
There are 17 million school-age refugees and internally displaced children in countries affected by conflict.
Source: ODI Education cannot wait. Proposing a fund for education in emergencies, p. 7
20 years on average: length of forced displacement due to crises and conflicts.
Source: UNHCR, 2016, Global trends – Forced displacement in 2015, p.20

Inclusive education

In low and lower-middle income countries, around 40% of children with disabilities are out of school at primary level and 55% at lower secondary level
Source: UNICEF, Towards Inclusive Education. The impact of disability on school attendance in developing countries. 2016
GPE supported the education of nearly 25 million children between 2015 and 2018.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.19
69% of partner countries were at or close to gender parity in primary completion.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.22
US$379 million in GPE funding supported activities promoting equity, gender equality and inclusion in 2019.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.19

More data on inclusive education

In 40% of partner countries, the GPE grant funds one or more activities relating to children with disabilities.
Source: GPE Secretariat
Out of 35 countries with active grants in 2018, 34 mention disability, special needs, or inclusive education in education sector analyses and plans.
Source: GPE Secretariat
Almost 40% of partner countries provide pre-service or in-service teacher training on inclusive education.
Source: GPE Secretariat
One third of GPE partner countries plan to build new schools or renovate existing schools to make them accessible for children with disabilities.
Source: GPE Secretariat
Approximately one billion people in the world are living with a disability, with at least 1 in 10 being children and 80% living in developing countries.
Source: World Report on Disability
Between 93 million and 150 million children are estimated to live with disabilities.
Source: EFA GMR 2015, p.100
The literacy rate for adults with disabilities is 3%. For women with disabilities the literacy rate is even lower, at 1%
Source: UNGEI. Still left behind: Pathways to inclusive education for girls with disabilities, p.12

Early childhood education

Aid to early childhood development has increased in recent years, from US$1.3 billion in 2002 to US$6.8 billion in 2016. As a share of total ODA, ODA for ECD has increased from 1.7% to 3.8% between 2002 and 2016.
Source: Just Beginning: Addressing Inequality in Donor Funding for Early Childhood Development (2018), p.5
Worldwide, 175 million pre-primary aged children are not enrolled in pre-primary education.
Source: 2019. UNICEF - A World Ready to Learn
41% of children were enrolled in pre-primary education in GPE partner countries in 2019 compared to 19% in 2002.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.19
GPE has invested US$270 million in more than 35 partner developing countries to support ECCE.
Source: GPE Secretariat
Around 90% of GPE grants with an ECCE component provide financial and technical support to countries to strengthen the role of pre-primary teachers through training and learning materials, construction of teacher training centers and by increasing salaries and incentives.
Source: Policy brief: GPE’s work for early childhood care and education, p.6

More data on early childhood education

Pre-primary enrollment is nearly at gender parity, with girls at 40% compared to 41% overall.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.32
In 2017, only 6% of domestic education budgets globally were allocated to pre-primary education.
Source: United Nations Children’s Fund, A World Ready to Learn: Prioritizing quality early childhood education, UNICEF, New York, April 2019, p. 98
Less than 5% of children have access to pre-primary school in some countries affected by conflict.
Source: GEM Report: Education for people and planet: Creating sustainable futures for all (2016), p.428
Only 1% of all early childhood development aid funding goes to pre-primary education.
Source: Just Beginning: Addressing Inequality in Donor Funding for Early Childhood Development (2018), p.5

Learning and literacy

An estimated 53% of children in low- and middle-income countries cannot read proficiently by age 10.
Source: World Bank, 2019. Ending Learning Poverty: What Will It Take?. World Bank, Washington, DC. p. 16.
In 2017, the UIS estimates that more than 617 million – or six out of ten – children and adolescents of primary and lower secondary school age do not achieve minimum proficiency levels in reading and mathematics.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet N°48, February 2018 p.12
Close to 95% of grants supported learning assessment systems or EMIS in 2019.
Source: GPE results report 2020. p.19
Close to 70% of partner countries improved learning outcomes in 2018.
Source: GPE Secretariat

More data on learning and literacy

Close to 48 million textbooks were distributed and 4,115 classrooms built or rehabilitated with GPE funding in fiscal year 2019.
Source: GPE results report 2020. p.76
The global youth literacy rate is 91%, meaning 102 million youth lack basic literacy skills.
Source: Meeting commitments: are countries on track to achieve SDG 4? 2019, p.9
There are 92 literate women for every 100 literate men globally, and in low-income countries, 77 literate women for every 100 literate men.
Source: Meeting commitments: are countries on track to achieve SDG 4? 2019 p.9
In sub-Saharan Africa, only 64% of primary and 50% of secondary school teachers have the minimum required training, and this proportion has been declining since 2000.
Source: Meeting commitments: are countries on track to achieve SDG 4? 2019 p.9
More than 80% of the 617 million children and adolescents who are not learning enough to meet minimum proficiency levels come from low- and lower-middle-income countries, although these countries are home to only 60% of the global school-age population.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet N°48, February 2018 p.12
Globally, two-thirds of children – 68% or 262 million out of 387 million – are in school and will reach the last grade of primary but will not achieve minimum proficiency levels in reading. About 60% or 137 million adolescents are in school but not learning.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet 46, p.10
91% of primary school-age children in low-income countries will not achieve minimum proficiency levels in reading and the rate is 87% in math compared to 5% and 8% respectively in high-income countries.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet 46, p.16
93% of secondary school-age adolescents in low-income countries will not achieve minimum proficiency levels in reading compared to 27% in high-income countries.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet 46, p.11
Low- and middle-income countries spend 2% of their GDP each year on education costs that do not lead to learning.
Source: The Learning Generation, executive summary, p. 7
Approximately 1 in 4 young people in low and lower-middle income countries is illiterate.
Source: GEM Report 2013/2014, p. 208
Women represent nearly two thirds of the world's illiterate (2014).
Source: UIS

Teachers

By 2030, countries must recruit 69 million teachers to provide every child with primary and secondary education: 24.4 million primary school teachers and 44.4 million secondary school teachers.
Source: UIS factsheet #39, October 2016, p. 1
67 million more children have access to quality teachers.
Source: GPE Secretariat
More than 465,000 teachers were trained with GPE funding in FY 2019.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.76

More data on teachers

34% of partner countries had fewer than 40 students per trained teacher in 2019, compared to 25% in 2015.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.39
89% of GPE implementation grants included support to teachers in 2019, totaling US$204 million.
Source: GPE Secretariat
Of the 24.4 million teachers needed for universal primary education, 21 million will replace teachers who leave the workforce. The remaining 3.4 million, however, are additional teachers who are needed to expand access to school and support education quality by reducing the numbers of children in each class to a maximum of 40.
Source: UIS factsheet #39, October 2016, p. 1
In one-third of all countries, less than 75% of teachers were trained according to national standards in 2013.
Source: EFA GMR 2015, p.122
Countries with more female primary teachers are more likely to have higher enrollment rates for girls in secondary schools. Unfortunately, in some countries, less than 25% of primary teachers are female.
Source: UNESCO eAtlas of Teachers

Other data by theme

Child labor

An estimated 150 million children worldwide are engaged in child labor.
Source: UNICEF data
Sub-Saharan Africa has the largest proportion of child laborers (28% of children aged 5 to 14 years).
Source: UNICEF data
In the world’s poorest countries, nearly one in four children are engaged in work that is potentially harmful to their health.
Source: UNICEF data
The majority of children engaged in economic activities also perform unpaid household services. Only 3.7% of children are engaged solely in economic activities.
Source: Impact of unpaid household services on the measurement of child labour. MICS methodological papers. Paper No. 2, 2013. Meltem Dayioğlu. MICS/UNICEF. p.15
Children who work for 43 or more hours per week can hardly find time to attend school. Indeed, less than 15% of them attend school.
Source: Impact of unpaid household services on the measurement of child labour. MICS methodological papers. Paper No. 2, 2013. Meltem Dayioğlu. MICS/UNICEF. p.31

Climate change and environment

Universalizing upper secondary education by 2030 would prevent 200,000 disaster-related deaths in the 20 years that follow.
Source: GEM Report: Education for people and planet: Creating sustainable futures for all (2016), p.33
Nearly 40 million children a year have their education interrupted by natural disasters and subsequent disease outbreaks following extreme weather events.
Source: SAFE SCHOOLS: THE HIDDEN CRISIS - A framework for action to deliver Safe, Non-violent, Inclusive and Effective Learning Environments, Theirworld, 2018, p.11
If education progress is stalled, it could lead to a 20% increase in disaster-related fatalities per decade.
Source: GEM Report: Education for people and planet: Creating sustainable futures for all (2016), p.32

Domestic financing

70% of GPE partner countries have maintained their education budget at or above 20% of public expenditure or increased their education budget in 2018.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.41
On average between 2002 and 2016, GPE partner countries increased domestic expenditure on education at a much faster pace than other developing countries: GPE partner countries increased education expenditure as a share of total government expenditure from 14.9% to 16.9% or by 1.95 percentage point, compared with 0.27 percentage point in other developing countries.
Source: Policy brief. GPE's engagement on domestic financing for education, p.10, November 2018
Developing countries contribute 88% of the financing needed to achieve SDG 4, with external aid needed to cover the remaining 12%.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 18, July 2015, p. 6
Annual spending on education is estimated at US$4.7 trillion worldwide. Of that, US$3 trillion (65% of the total) is spent in high-income countries and US$22 billion (0.5% of the total) in low-income countries, even though the two groups have roughly equal school-age populations.
Source: Meeting commitments: are countries on track to achieve SDG 4? 2019. P.11

Economic development

One extra year of schooling increases an individual's earnings by up to 10%.
Source: GEM Report, Education Counts, Toward the Millennium Development Goals, p.7 (2011)
Each additional year of schooling raises average annual gross domestic product (GDP) growth by 0.37%.
Source: GEM Report, Education Counts, Toward the Millennium Development Goals, p.6 (2011)
A dollar invested in an additional year of schooling, particularly for girls, generates earnings and health benefits of US$10 in low-income countries and nearly US$4 in lower-middle income countries.
Source: The Learning Generation, executive summary, p. 4
A dollar invested in a one-year increase in the mean years of schooling generates more than US$5 in additional gross earnings in low-income countries and US$2.5 in lower-middle income countries.
Source: The Learning Generation, p. 34
The cost of 250 million children not learning the basics is equivalent to a loss of US$129 billion per year.
Source: GEM Report 2013/2014, p.19
Globally, countries are losing US$160 trillion in wealth because of differences in lifetime earnings between women and men. This amounts to an average of US$23,620 for each person in the 141 countries studied.
Source: Unrealized potential: the high cost of gender inequality in earnings, p.19

Education planning

78 education knowledge products were disseminated with funding or support by GPE between 2015 and 2019.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p. 81
Since 2012 through December 2019, GPE has granted US$32.3 million to partner countries to support the education planning process.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p. 52
100% of sector plans from GPE partner countries assessed in 2018 met quality standards, compared to 58% in 2014/15.
Source: GPE results report 2019, p.8

Enrollment

77 million more children were in primary school in 2016 in GPE partner countries compared to 2002.
Source: GPE secretariat calculations. Difference in the number of children enrolled in school between 2002 and 2016. Data from UIS.
24 million more children in GPE partner countries enrolled in lower-secondary school, of which 13 million girls, in 2014 compared to 2002.
Source: GPE estimates based on UIS data

External financing

GPE may account for two-thirds of the growth in aid to basic education with unspecified recipients between the 2000s and 2010s.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 4)
US$566 million contributed by donors in the GPE in 2019.
Source: GPE results report 2020, p.80
Only 20% of aid for education goes into low-income countries, but 70% of GPE’s financing supports children’s education in low-income countries.
Source: GPE calculations
Total ODA disbursements to education reached the highest amount ever recorded, US$15.6 billion, in 2018. This is an increase of 9%, or US$1.25 billion, relative to 2017.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 2)
Between 2017 and 2018, total aid increased by 6% in basic education, by 7% in secondary education and by 12% in post-secondary education.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 2)
Aid to basic education reached US$6.5 billion in 2018, the largest amount ever recorded. Primary education accounts for about 90% of that sum ; the rest consisted of small shares to early childhood education, life skills and school feeding programs.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 4)
Low-income countries received 31% of total aid to basic education, a sharp increase from 2015 when that share was just 23%. Lower-middle-income countries have seen their share decrease from 46% to 33% during this period, equivalent to a decline of US$0.3 billion.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 4)
A large share of the increase in aid to basic education in 2018 is explained by two countries, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which together gave US$627 million in 2018.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 4)
The United States, the World Bank, the United Kingdom and the European Union institutions together accounted for over 50% of total aid to basic education in 2016–2018.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 5)
Aid to post-secondary education reached US$6.1 billion in 2018, also the largest sum on record.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 7)
Compared to 2012, aid to education in 2018 has increased by 29%, while aid to secondary education has grown more rapidly, at 37%.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 2)
In low income countries, education spending increased from on average 3.48% of GDP in 2000 to 3.82% of the GDP in 2015. In lower middle-income countries, the average went up from 4% to 4.64% of GDP over the same period.
Sources: Addressing the learning crisis: An urgent need to better finance education for the poorest children, UNICEF, January 2020, p.2
The share of education in aid that is clearly allocated to sectors (‘allocable aid’) fell from 14.8% in 2003 to 11.7% in 2010 and by another two percentage points to 9.7% by 2013.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 3)
The share of basic and secondary education in allocable aid is 6.3% (Figure 3a). If this share were 10% and all DAC plus selected non-DAC donor countries (Brazil, China, India, Kuwait, Qatar, the Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates) dedicated 0.7% of their GNI to ODA, then the education financing gap would be filled.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 3)
Education continued to lose ground as a donor priority after 2010 and has yet to recover its share.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 4)
The top 10 bilateral donors for education have contributed 85% of total aid to education over the last 10 years. The recession in their economies (from the COVID-19 crisis) is expected to be more than twice as large as it was during the great financial crisis.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 10)
For instance, the United Kingdom’s GDP is expected to fall by 10.2% in 2020, which could lead to a drop of US$100 million in its total aid to education.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 10)
An analysis of crises prior to the financial crisis of 2007–2008 estimated that aid levels were 18% lower 5 years after and 28% lower 12 years after the start of a crisis than they would have otherwise been.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 11)
Prediction: In 2019, aid to education will have increased at the same rate as in 2012–2018. It will stagnate in 2020: even though the need is higher, the ability of donors to spend may be reduced. It will fall by 12% in 2020–2022, more than it did in the aftermath of the great financial crisis in 2010–2012. Finally, from 2023 onwards, it will resume its growth at the average rate of 2012–2018.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 11)
International student mobility, which accounts for US$3.1 billion of total aid to education, will be curtailed.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 12)
There is an annual external financing gap of US$39 billion to provide quality pre-primary, primary and secondary education to all children by 2030.
Source: GEM Report Policy Paper 18, July 2015, p.1
The share of basic and secondary education in allocable aid is 6.3% (Figure 3a). If this share were 10% and all DAC plus selected non-DAC donor countries (Brazil, China, India, Kuwait, Qatar, the Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates) dedicated 0.7% of their GNI to ODA, then the education financing gap would be filled.
Source: GEMR Policy Paper 41 – July 2020 (p. 3)
Less than a quarter of aid to basic education (22%) went to low income countries in 2016, in comparison to 36% in 2002.
Source: GEM Report Policy Paper 36, May 2018, p.5
Low income countries received 19% of total aid to education and 23% of aid to basic education in 2015.
Source: GEM Report, Policy Paper 31, p.4

GPE grants

Since 2009 GPE provided US$66.1 million for the civil society education fund, US$37.1 million for 2009-2015 and US$29 million for 2016-2018 to support 62 national civil society coalitions.
Source: GPE Secretariat
GPE has provided 15 grants worth US$31 million for the Global and Regional Activities program to fund research, capacity development and knowledge sharing on learning, education financing and out-of-school children.
Source: GPE Secretariat
US$5.8 billion in grants have been allocated since 2003.
Source: GPE Secretariat

Health

GPE provides grant funding for health activities in schools in 22 partner countries.
Source: GPE Secretariat
Each extra year of a mother's schooling reduces the probability of infant mortality by 5% to 10%
Source: GEM Report, p.17
A child whose mother can read is 50% more likely to live past the age of five, 50% more likely to be immunized, and twice as likely to attend school.
Source: The Learning Generation, p. 99
Around one-third of the reductions in adult mortality and nearly 15% of the reductions in infant mortality from 1970 to 2010 can be attributed to gains in female schooling.
Source: The Learning Generation, p. 34
One additional year of school reduces the probability of becoming a mother by 7.3% for women who have completed at least primary education.
Source: World Bank policy research working paper, p.3
If all mothers completed primary education, maternal deaths would be reduced by two-thirds, saving 189,000 lives.
Source: Education transforms lives, p.7
Women with post-primary education are five times more likely to be educated on the topic of HIV and AIDS.
Source: UNICEF, The Education Vaccine Against HIV, p. 9
For less than 50 cents per student per year, school-based deworming can reduce absenteeism by 25%.
Source: Optimizing Education Outcomes: High-Return Investments in School Health for Increased Participation and Learning , p. 8
Research shows that the most common poor health conditions in school-age children, including malaria, malnutrition, worm infection and anemia, can reduce their intellectual quotient (IQ) between 3.7 and 6 points.
Source: Optimizing Education Outcomes: High-Return Investments in School Health for Increased Participation and Learning , p. 133
In developing countries an estimated 500 million days of school per year are lost due to sickness.
Source: Optimizing Education Outcomes: High-Return Investments in School Health for Increased Participation and Learning , p. 133
Approximately 400 million school-age children suffer from worm infections, the highest number in any age group.
Source: Optimizing Education Outcomes: High-Return Investments in School Health for Increased Participation and Learning , p. 8

Inequality

In developing countries, the gap in primary school completion rates between the richest and poorest children is more than 30 percentage points.
Source: The Learning Generation, executive summary, p. 10
On average, in low income countries, 46% of the resources went to the top 10% of students with the highest levels of education. In lower middle-income countries, the percentage was 26%.
Source: United Nations Children’s Fund, The Investment Case for Education and Equity, UNICEF, New York, January 2015, p. 59
In poor countries with available data, on average primary-school age children from the wealthiest 20% of households are four times more likely to be learning at the desired levels than children from the poorest 20% of households.
Source: The Learning Generation, p. 41
Young people from the poorest 20% of households are almost six times as likely to be unable to read as those from the richest 20% of households
Source: GEM Report, Policy Paper 20, p. 7
In countries with twice the levels of educational inequality, the probability of conflict more than doubles.
Source: The Learning Generation, p. 14

Mother tongue

Half of all children in low- and middle-income countries are not taught in a language they speak.
Source: The Learning Generation, executive summary, p. 7

Out-of-school children

19.2% of children of primary school age were out of school in partner countries in 2019 compared to 33% in 2002.
Source: GPE Results Report 2020. p.25
30.4% of adolescents of lower secondary school age were out of school in GPE partner countries in 2019 compared to 40% in 2002.
Source: GPE Results Report 2020. p.25
44% of girls and 34% of boys (10 to 19 years old) from the poorest families have never attended school or dropped out before completing primary education.
Source: UNICEF calculations based on household surveys, UIS and World Bank data
In 2018, 258 million children, adolescents and youth were out of school. This includes 59 million children of primary school age, 62 million adolescents of lower secondary school age, and 138 million youth of upper secondary school age.
Source: UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) Factsheet 56 September 2019
After an initial decline in the years after 2000, the primary out-of-school rate has barely moved from around 9% since 2008 and the lower secondary out-of-school rate has been at 16% since 2012.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet N°48, February 2018 p.2
Of the 63 million out-of-school children of primary school age, 34 million, or more than one-half, live in sub-Saharan Africa. Southern Asia has the second-highest number of out-of-school children with 10 million.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet N°48, February 2018 p.7
With 21% of primary school-age children denied the right to education, sub-Saharan Africa has the highest rate of exclusion, followed by Northern Africa and Western Asia (11%) and Oceania (7%).
Source: UIS Fact Sheet N°48, February 2018 p.7-8
Sub-Saharan Africa is the region with the highest rate of out-of-school adolescents (37%), followed by Southern Asia (17%), and Northern Africa and Western Asia (14%).
Source: UIS Fact Sheet N°48, February 2018 p.8
In sub-Saharan Africa, for every 100 boys of primary school age out of school, there are 123 girls denied the right to education.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet N°48, February 2018 p.9
The primary out-of-school rate is 20% in low-income countries and 3% in high-income countries. The lower secondary out-of-school rate is 38% in low-income countries and 2% in high-income countries, and the upper secondary out-of-school rate is 59% and 6% respectively.
Source: UIS Fact Sheet N°48, February 2018 p.10
41% (4 out of 10, or 25 million) of all out-of-school children of primary school age have never attended school and will probably never start if current trends continue. Two thirds of them are girls.
Source: UIS GEM Report, Education for people and planet, p.180 (2016)
Conflict-affected countries have only 20% of the world’s primary-school-age children but 50% of the world’s out-of-school children.
Source: Fixing the broken promise of education for all. Executive summary, 2015, p. 11

Peace and tolerance

Literate people are more likely to participate in the democratic process and exercise their civil rights
Source: UNESCO, 2012
If the enrollment rate for secondary schooling is 10 percentage points higher than the average, the risk of war is reduced by about 3 percentage points
Source: World Bank 2005, p. 16
An increase in secondary school enrollment from 30% to 81% is estimated to reduce the probability of civil war by almost two-thirds.
Source: ABC’s, 123’s, and the Golden Rule: The Pacifying Effect of Education on Civil War, 1980–1999, by Clayton L. Thyne as cited by Rebecca Winthrop, Brookings Institution, in US leadership in global education: The time is now

Poverty

420 million people would be lifted out of poverty with a secondary education, thus reducing the number of poor worldwide by more than half.
Source: UIS/GEM Report Policy Paper 32/Fact Sheet 44, p.11
If adults had just 2 more years of schooling, 60 million would be lifted out of poverty.
Source: UIS/GEM Report Policy Paper 32/Fact Sheet 44, p.11

School completion

75% of children completed primary school in GPE partner countries in 2018 compared to 63% in 2002.
Source: GPE Results Report 2020 p.21
Since 2002 the number of girls completing school for every 100 boys has risen from 83 to 94 for primary, and from 86 to 91 for lower secondary in GPE partner countries.
Source: Population-weighted averages calculated by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics on July 2016 for the 61 members of the Global Partnership for Education as of February 2016.
In GPE partner countries, 52% of children complete lower secondary school, compared to 38% in 2002.
Source: GPE Results Report 2020. p.21

Secondary education

In 2030 in low-income countries, under present trends, only one out of 10 young people will be on track to gain basic secondary-level skills
Source: The Learning Generation, executive summary p. 3

Technology

Less than 10% of schools are connected to the Internet across many developing countries.
Source: The Learning Generation, Executive summary, p. 8

Last updated: January 14, 2021

Focus areas

Our approach

On this page