Developing Countries: Education

Question

In alignment with the Global Goal for education (SDG4), DFID is helping tackle the learning crisis: millions of children unable to read and do maths despite years at school. DFID works to strengthen the quality of education and the effectiveness of education systems so that all children have access and opportunity to learn.

UNESCO is the UN’s specialized agency for education and UN lead on SDG4. DFID works with UNESCO towards our shared goal of ensuring quality education for all. DFID provides a voluntary contribution of £7.8m to support the UNESCO Institute of Statistics (UIS) and the UNESCO published Global Education Monitoring Report (GEM Report). The UIS provides comparable, publicly available data on learning outcomes. The GEM Report is an independent, policy focused monitoring report, it is a key tool for pushing progress towards the Global Goals.

Our support to the UIS and the GEM Report is being used to create vital data, evidence and tools to assess whether children are learning, who is being left behind and whether SDG4 is being achieved. It allows the international community to report progress on SDG4 education indicators on learning and equity and enables policy makers to know whether SDG4 is on track and where to direct policy intervention.