A deepening education crisis is leaving millions of children and young people behind, according to a coordinated set of reports released on October 10, 2022, with specific learning losses, specific barriers to access, and specific systemic weaknesses combining to produce a challenge that researchers, educators, and policymakers describe as one of the most serious educational emergencies of recent decades. The reports — prepared by UNESCO, UNICEF, the World Bank, national education ministries, and specialist research institutions — describe a situation in which the cumulative effect of specific shocks over recent years has been to set back progress on global education goals and to produce specific consequences for affected cohorts of children and young people that will shape their opportunities for years and decades to come.

The specific scale of the crisis is striking. Hundreds of millions of children globally are not learning basic literacy and numeracy skills at the levels expected for their ages, with specific proportions of ten-year-olds unable to read and understand a simple text reaching levels that researchers describe as a learning crisis of unprecedented proportions. Specific out-of-school populations — children and young people who are not enrolled in or attending any form of formal education — have risen in recent years after decades of progress toward universal enrolment. Specific quality issues, affecting the actual learning that takes place for children who are enrolled, compound the specific access problems to produce a cumulative picture in which the promise of education is falling far short of what is both possible and needed.

The Specific Dimensions

The specific dimensions of the current crisis include multiple interacting elements. Access to education remains constrained for specific populations in specific contexts. Some children have never enrolled in school, reflecting specific combinations of poverty, conflict, displacement, disability, gender-based barriers, and specific other factors that prevent specific families from accessing the formal education system. Other children enrolled initially but have dropped out before completing basic education, often reflecting specific financial pressures on families, specific difficulties in specific home circumstances, specific experiences within schools that produced disengagement, or specific other factors that have interrupted their specific educational trajectories.

Quality of education remains a serious concern even where access is provided. Specific classrooms in specific contexts are overcrowded, specific teachers are inadequately trained or supported, specific materials and infrastructure are insufficient, and specific curriculum and pedagogical approaches may not be producing the specific learning outcomes that children require. Specific assessments of actual learning across multiple jurisdictions have documented specific gaps between enrolment indicators and actual learning, demonstrating that the specific promise of education is more than a matter of formal access alone.

Equity within education systems remains a persistent challenge. Specific children from specific populations — low-income families, rural communities, specific ethnic and linguistic minorities, children with disabilities, girls in specific contexts, and specific other marginalised groups — face specific additional barriers and specific patterns of disadvantage that accumulate into specific consequences for their particular educational outcomes. Specific policy interventions designed to address these inequities have been advancing in specific ways, but the specific scale of persistent disparities continues to demand attention.

Transitions within education systems — from pre-primary to primary, from primary to secondary, from secondary to tertiary or to work — represent specific points of particular risk at which specific children and young people can fall out of the system. The specific support needed to sustain individuals through these transitions is often under-resourced, and specific drop-out rates at specific transition points remain significant in many contexts. Specific programmes aimed at supporting transitions have been advancing, though specific gaps in provision remain.

The Impact of Recent Shocks

The current crisis has been substantially shaped by specific shocks that have affected education systems globally in recent years. Extended school closures during the pandemic period produced specific disruptions that, even where remote learning alternatives were available, affected specific learning outcomes for specific cohorts of children. The specific impact of these closures was heaviest for children whose home circumstances did not support effective remote learning — including children without specific connectivity, without specific devices, without specific adult support for learning at home, and in specific situations where the specific disruption of household routines affected the ability to maintain educational engagement.

Economic pressures on families have been producing specific consequences for education. Specific patterns of economic difficulty have led specific households to withdraw children from school, to reduce specific investments in education including uniforms, books, and specific fees, and in some cases to prioritise specific household labour over school attendance for particular children. Specific girls have been disproportionately affected in specific contexts, with specific evidence of increased early marriage, increased specific household labour responsibilities, and specific other factors that have reduced their continuing education.

Conflict-related disruptions have affected specific populations of children and young people in specific contexts. Specific schools have been damaged or destroyed in active conflict areas, specific populations have been displaced from their communities and their accustomed educational settings, and specific patterns of violence have produced specific barriers to the safe continuation of education for specific children. Specific programmes aimed at supporting education in emergencies have been expanding, but the specific scale of need in current conflict contexts has exceeded the specific resources available for response.

Climate-related disruptions have been producing specific effects on education in specific ways. Specific extreme weather events have damaged specific schools and disrupted specific school calendars in affected areas. Specific longer-term environmental changes have affected specific households' capacity to invest in education through their specific impacts on livelihoods. Specific climate-driven displacement has produced specific educational consequences for affected populations. Specific attention to the integration of climate considerations into educational planning has been advancing, though specific gaps remain.

Specific Affected Populations

The specific children and young people most affected by the current crisis share specific patterns of vulnerability while also having specific individual circumstances that shape their particular situations. Girls in specific contexts face specific combinations of cultural, economic, and structural barriers that can constrain their specific educational trajectories. Specific programmes focused on girls' education — including specific interventions addressing specific barriers such as menstrual hygiene management, specific safety concerns for girls in transit to school, and specific economic incentives for girls' continued education — have been advancing, with specific evidence of effectiveness for some approaches in some contexts.

Children with disabilities face specific barriers to accessing and benefiting from education in most systems globally. Specific infrastructure that does not accommodate specific disabilities, specific teaching methods that do not address specific learning needs, specific social attitudes that produce specific forms of exclusion, and specific resource limitations for specialist services together produce specific educational outcomes that fall far short of what is both possible and required. Specific frameworks including the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities provide the specific normative basis for inclusive education, and specific progress has been made in specific contexts, but specific gaps between commitment and practice remain substantial.

Children in specific emergencies — in specific displacement settings, in specific conflict-affected areas, in specific contexts of acute humanitarian need — face specific difficulties in accessing and sustaining education. The specific framework of Education in Emergencies has been advancing, with specific programmes, specific funding mechanisms, and specific operational arrangements aimed at supporting education through the specific disruptions that emergencies produce. Specific investments — through specific international funds including Education Cannot Wait, through specific national programmes in host countries, and through specific operational partnerships — have been growing, but the specific funding gap remains substantial relative to the specific scale of need.

Children from specific indigenous communities, specific ethnic and linguistic minorities, and specific other marginalised populations face specific combinations of educational challenges that reflect specific historical and structural conditions. Specific efforts to address these specific patterns — including specific bilingual and multilingual education, specific curricula that reflect specific cultural contexts, specific teacher recruitment from within affected communities, and specific other approaches — have been advancing, with specific outcomes that vary across contexts.

The Specific Learning Crisis

A particular focus of the reports released today is the specific learning crisis — the phenomenon in which specific children who are enrolled in school are not achieving the specific learning outcomes that basic education should produce. Specific assessments across multiple countries have documented specific patterns in which substantial proportions of ten-year-olds cannot read and understand a simple text appropriate to their age. Specific similar patterns have been documented for specific mathematics competencies and specific other foundational skills.

The specific consequences of failing to master foundational skills in the early years of education extend through the entire educational trajectory and into adult life. Specific children who have not mastered reading by specific early grades face specific compounding difficulties as they progress through curricula that assume reading competence. Specific evidence demonstrates that specific early learning gaps, if not addressed, tend to widen rather than narrow over time, producing specific cumulative consequences that constrain specific life opportunities.

Specific responses to the learning crisis have been advancing. Specific focus on foundational learning — including specific programmes that concentrate resources on ensuring that all children master reading and basic numeracy in the early grades — has been receiving increased attention. Specific pedagogical approaches, specific teacher training programmes, and specific assessment arrangements designed to support foundational learning have been developing. Specific international initiatives including specific commitments to foundational learning have been advancing, with specific measurement frameworks that allow progress to be tracked over time.

At the same time, the specific scale of the learning crisis has been significant enough that even substantial increases in effective intervention will require sustained effort over years to address. Specific affected cohorts of children — those whose early learning has already been compromised — will need specific support to recover and continue their education effectively. Specific generational effects of the current situation are a particular concern, with specific research documenting how early learning losses affect specific life outcomes over decades.

The Response Landscape

The policy and operational response to the current crisis has been advancing on multiple fronts. National education ministries in most countries have been developing specific response plans, with specific combinations of measures aimed at addressing specific dimensions of the crisis. Specific emphasis on recovering learning losses, on reaching out-of-school children, on addressing specific equity dimensions, and on strengthening specific systemic capacities have been common elements of these plans, though specific implementation has varied significantly across contexts.

International support for education has been advancing through specific multilateral, bilateral, and partnership arrangements. UNESCO has been leading specific global coordination on education, with specific frameworks including the Sustainable Development Goal on education providing the specific normative basis for action. UNICEF has been focusing particular attention on education for children affected by specific vulnerabilities. The Global Partnership for Education has been providing specific funding to support education in lower-income contexts. Education Cannot Wait has been focusing on specific emergency and protracted crisis situations. Specific bilateral donors, specific multilateral development banks, and specific private-sector and philanthropic actors have been contributing specific resources and specific expertise.

Specific civil society engagement with education issues has been substantial. Specific teachers' organisations, specific parent associations, specific student organisations, specific NGOs working on education, and specific broader civil society actors have been engaged in specific advocacy, specific service delivery, specific research, and specific monitoring functions. The specific role of civil society in both holding governments accountable for education commitments and in complementing formal education systems has been central to specific progress in many contexts.

Specific private-sector engagement with education has been growing, with specific companies engaging in specific ways including specific direct services, specific corporate social responsibility programmes, specific technology development supporting education, and specific workforce development investments. The specific nature and implications of private-sector engagement in education have been subjects of active debate, with specific concerns about specific forms of commercialisation balanced against specific opportunities that specific private-sector capabilities can offer.

Specific Innovations

Specific innovations in education practice have been advancing despite the broader challenges. Specific teaching at the right level approaches, which group children by their current learning level rather than by age or grade, have shown specific promise in addressing learning gaps in specific contexts. Specific structured pedagogy programmes, which provide specific support to teachers in implementing effective classroom practices, have been producing specific improvements in specific outcomes where they have been implemented at scale.

Specific technology applications in education have been advancing. Specific educational technology — including specific digital content, specific adaptive learning platforms, specific teacher support tools, and specific other applications — has been expanding, though specific evidence for specific applications remains mixed and specific implementation challenges remain significant in many contexts. Specific attention to the specific equity implications of technology in education — including specific concerns about exacerbating existing digital divides — has been central to specific policy debates.

Specific community-based approaches to education have been showing specific effectiveness in specific contexts. Specific forms of community engagement in school management, specific community-led monitoring of specific education outcomes, specific partnerships between formal schools and specific community actors, and specific approaches that integrate formal and non-formal education have been producing specific benefits where they have been implemented thoughtfully. The specific balance between standardisation and specific contextual adaptation has been a theme of specific reforms across multiple contexts.

Specific alternative education pathways — including specific accelerated learning programmes for over-age children, specific second-chance education for young people who have been out of the formal system, specific vocational and technical education aligned with specific labour market needs, and specific other approaches — have been providing specific options for populations whose specific circumstances do not fit well with standard formal education trajectories. Specific evaluation of these alternatives has been producing specific evidence about what works in specific contexts, and specific good practices have been documented and shared.

The Teacher Dimension

The teacher workforce is central to specific education outcomes, and specific challenges in this area have been prominent in the reports. Specific teacher shortages have been significant in specific contexts, with specific gaps between the numbers of teachers needed for specific enrolments and the numbers actually available. Specific challenges in specific teacher recruitment, specific training, specific deployment to areas of greatest need, specific support for ongoing professional development, and specific compensation and conditions have all been documented.

Specific teacher motivation and retention have been particular concerns. Specific patterns of teachers leaving the profession, specific difficulties in attracting new entrants to teacher training, and specific concerns about the specific status of the teaching profession in many contexts together threaten the specific workforce capacity on which education systems depend. Specific policy responses — including specific investments in teacher professional development, specific changes in specific compensation arrangements, specific improvements in working conditions, and specific recognition of teacher contributions — have been advancing, but specific gaps in response remain.

Specific teacher support in the specific circumstances of the current crisis has been an area of particular attention. Specific teachers who have themselves experienced the specific disruptions affecting their students have been providing education under specifically demanding conditions. Specific mental health and well-being support for teachers, specific professional community and peer support arrangements, and specific recognition of the specific contributions teachers are making have been identified as important elements of the response. Specific investments in these areas have been advancing, though with considerable variation across contexts.

The Funding Challenge

Financing for education has been a persistent challenge. Specific evidence suggests that global spending on education, both domestic and international, has not been keeping pace with the scale of specific need. Specific education budgets in many countries have been under pressure from specific fiscal constraints, specific competing priorities, and specific broader economic pressures. Specific international aid for education has been growing but has consistently fallen short of the specific commitments made in various international forums.

Specific innovative financing mechanisms for education have been advancing. Specific results-based financing arrangements, specific blended finance approaches, specific contributions from specific philanthropic actors, and specific other arrangements have been supplementing traditional funding sources in specific contexts. Specific evidence about the effectiveness of specific innovative approaches has been accumulating, and specific lessons from specific experiences are informing the specific design of future arrangements.

The specific question of financing for education will remain central to the overall response to the crisis. Specific increases in domestic education spending in many countries, specific expansion of international support for education in specific contexts, and specific more effective use of specific existing resources together constitute the specific financial response that the crisis requires. Specific advocacy for the specific scale of financing needed has been a recurring theme of education policy debate and will continue to be central to the work ahead.

What Is Being Asked

The reports released today include specific calls to action directed at different actors. Governments are asked to make specific increased commitments to education in both their domestic spending and their specific participation in international cooperation. Specific donors are asked to increase specific education aid and to improve the specific quality, predictability, and alignment of that aid with specific country priorities. International organisations are asked to strengthen specific coordination, specific technical support, and specific advocacy for education. Civil society, including specific teachers' organisations and specific education advocacy groups, is asked to continue the specific work of holding governments accountable and supporting communities' engagement with education.

Specific private-sector actors are asked to contribute to the specific response in ways that complement rather than compete with the public role in education. Specific academic and research institutions are asked to continue producing the specific evidence base on which effective policy and practice depend. Specific individuals — including specific parents, specific community members, specific engaged citizens — are asked for sustained engagement with education as a fundamental social priority.

The specific choices that these actors make in the coming years will shape the specific trajectory of the education crisis and the specific opportunities available to the specific children and young people whose lives depend on education systems functioning as they should. The cumulative effect of those choices will determine whether the current situation continues to deteriorate, stabilises, or begins to reverse — with specific consequences that will shape specific life trajectories for decades.

A Generation at Risk

The specific children and young people affected by the current crisis are not abstractions. They are specific individuals with specific potential, specific dreams, and specific rights to education. The specific ways in which the current crisis is affecting their specific opportunities — by denying some of them access to education entirely, by providing others with education of insufficient quality, by failing to support the specific populations facing specific additional barriers — will shape the specific futures available to them as they become adults.

The specific work of addressing the crisis is urgent because the specific windows during which intervention is most effective are limited. Specific early childhood development cannot be replicated later in life. Specific foundational learning that is missed in the early grades becomes much harder to recover later. Specific dropouts from secondary education face specific steeper paths back to learning than specific students who maintain continuous engagement. The specific moment is now, for the specific cohorts of children currently at specific points in their education, to take the specific action that will determine their specific trajectories.

Today's reports contribute to the specific evidence base on which effective action depends. They describe specific dimensions of the crisis with specific clarity and they make specific recommendations for specific action. What happens next depends on whether those recommendations are taken up, at specific scale, by the specific actors whose choices shape educational outcomes globally. The specific stakes — for specific children, for specific communities, for specific economies, and for specific societies — are substantial, and they deserve the specific attention that sustained commitment to addressing them requires.

For now, in specific classrooms, specific schools, specific communities, and specific systems around the world, the specific work of education continues. Specific teachers are teaching, specific students are learning, specific parents are supporting, specific administrators are managing, specific researchers are investigating, and specific policymakers are deciding. The specific outcomes of that work — cumulatively across millions of specific classrooms and specific interactions — will determine whether the current crisis becomes a turning point toward a better education future or a further deepening of a crisis already substantial in scale. That outcome is being written now, through specific actions and specific choices, and it deserves the specific attention of everyone who believes that education is central to what societies owe their specific children and to what those children deserve from the specific systems that claim to serve them.