UNESCO: Global Out-of-School Total Reaches 273 Million for Seventh Straight Year
The number of children and young people out of school worldwide has reached 273 million, rising for the seventh consecutive year, according to UNESCO’s 2026 Global Education Monitoring Report released March 25 and updated March 26.
UNESCO identified population growth, ongoing crises and shrinking education budgets as major drivers of the increase. The report’s findings mark a setback for global efforts to expand access to education after years of overall enrollment gains.
A long-term gain has not prevented a recent reversal
Primary and secondary enrollment has increased by 30% since 2000. But UNESCO says progress has slowed across nearly every region since 2015, with a sharp deceleration in sub-Saharan Africa.
The latest total means roughly one in six school-age children worldwide is excluded from education, according to the report. The measure covers children and young people who are not enrolled in school; it does not by itself describe their literacy or learning levels.
The seven-year rise is significant because it follows a period in which expanding access had been a central international education goal. The new figures show that enrollment growth over the longer term has not been enough to offset the combined pressure of demographic growth, instability and reduced public resources.
Secondary completion remains limited
Access also remains uneven across the education journey. UNESCO’s summary says only two in three students complete secondary school.
That gap matters beyond whether a child enters primary school. Fewer years of completed education can limit young people’s opportunities and weaken the role of schooling as a path to social mobility. The report’s figures point to a challenge that involves both getting children into classrooms and helping them remain there through secondary education.
The global total should not be read as evidence that every region experienced the same absolute increase. UNESCO reports a worldwide figure and identifies a particularly sharp slowdown in sub-Saharan Africa, but the cited summary does not provide a full regional breakdown of the 273 million.
Budgets and crises shape the outlook
UNESCO does not assign the increase to a single cause. Instead, it lists population growth, crises and shrinking education budgets among the major forces behind the trend.
That combination creates different pressures in different settings. Population growth can increase the number of children who need places in school. Crises can interrupt attendance and damage the systems that provide education. Tighter budgets can make it harder to expand classrooms, hire teachers and maintain services, even where governments have made long-term enrollment gains.
The report therefore presents the increase as a broad global problem rather than a single-country failure. Its warning is also two-sided: the world has made substantial progress since 2000, but that progress has slowed enough that the number of children outside school is now rising again for a seventh straight year.
UNESCO’s new figures put renewed attention on the need to sustain education access as populations grow and crises continue. They also underline that enrollment gains alone do not guarantee that students will complete secondary school or that every region will keep pace with earlier progress.
Sources
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