Out-of-School Children and Youth

About 258 million children and youth are out of school, according to UIS data for the school year ending in 2018. The total includes 59 million children of primary school age, 62 million of lower secondary school age and 138 million of upper secondary age.

As countries strive to achieve universal primary and secondary education by 2030, the UIS is providing the data and analysis needed to reach the children and youth who remain excluded from education. Through its website, publications and data visualizations, the UIS aims to strengthen the availability of detailed internationally-comparable data on out-of-school children and youth, to make it possible to better identify who they are, where they live and the barriers they face.

In addition to its regular survey operations, the UIS works directly with countries to help them produce data on out-of-school children and youth, as well as interpret and use such data for policy-making. As part of these efforts, the UIS contributes to the development of methodologies needed to produce data for monitoring the targets of the SDG 4 – Education 2030 agenda.

Additional resources: 

• World Inequality Database on Education (WIDE): presents education outcomes between and within countries with data disaggregated by sex, location, wealth and ethnicity