SDG 4 – Quality Education

Quality education is the foundation for creating sustainable development. In addition to improving the quality of life, access to inclusive education can help provide people with the tools they need to develop innovative solutions to the world’s biggest problems.

Over 265 million children, 22 percent of them of primary school age, currently do not attend schools. In addition, many children who do go to school still lack basic literacy and numeracy skills. Over the past decade, great strides have been made in improving access to education at all levels and increasing enrolment rates, especially for women and girls. Basic literacy skills have improved tremendously, but more efforts are needed for faster progress towards universal education goals. For example, equality between boys and girls in primary schools has been achieved worldwide, but few countries have met this goal at all levels of education.

The reasons for the lack of quality education go back to the lack of adequately trained teachers, poor school conditions and unequal opportunities for children from rural areas. In order to provide quality education to children of poor families, investment in education scholarships, teacher training workshops, construction of schools and better access to water and electricity at schools are needed.

Did you know?
750 million adults are still illiterate, two thirds of them are women.