Policy report: Over 25 million Pakistani children are still out of school

More than 25 million children in Pakistan remain out of school more than two years after the federal government declared a national education emergency. A new policy report says progress is still being hampered by inadequate funding, weak governance and fragmented administrative structures.

Civil Services Academy has prepared a comparative policy review that highlighted deep-rooted structural challenges, persistent financial constraints, poor governance and uneven provincial capacity as reasons for the failure to deliver the desired results in enrolling over 25 million out-of-school children into the education system.

All provinces have produced education roadmaps under the National Education Action Plan (NEAP) 2026, but the key problem is not in policy formulation but in successful execution, the report noted.

The report said Pakistan’s education issue is the result of decades of underinvestment, poverty, fast population expansion and weak governance. As to data of Pakistan Institute of Education (PIE), these causes have continued to aggravate the situation of out-of-school children over the years.

The Academy of Educational Planning and Management (AEPAM) had tracked out-of-school children from the 1990s through the 2010s, but millions remained outside the education system as public education infrastructure failed to keep pace with population growth, leading to the expansion of low-cost private schools, it said.

The report, drafted by five Policy Analysis Groups at the Pakistan Administrative Service Campus, reviewed education policies in Punjab, Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan, Islamabad Capital Territory, Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Jammu and Kashmir, and assessed them on effectiveness, efficiency, equity, ethics and feasibility.

It projected that 25.1 million to 26 million children in Pakistan are currently out of school, placing the country among countries carrying the world’s second-largest burden of educational deprivation despite the constitutional guarantee of free and compulsory education under Article 25-A.

The report indicated that the proclamation of a National Education Emergency on May 8, 2024, attracted major political attention, but observed that provinces have different structural issues, which means that a national strategy that fits all is not enough to deal with the situation.

According to the review, Punjab faces the biggest challenge of a large out-of-school population, Sindh faces post-primary education and climate-related disruptions, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa faces insecurity, difficult terrain and a shortage of female teachers, while Balochistan continues to struggle with weak institutions, vast distances and non-functional schools. It said that federal territories have substantially higher enrolment but nonetheless experience internal discrepancies.

The survey predicted that 9.6 million to 10.4 million children in the state are out of school. Punjab has the largest education load in the country, it added. Keeping pupils in school is as important an issue as getting them enrolled, says the 2026 baseline report of the Punjab School Education Department, which says 6.4 million children have never enrolled in school, and another 3.16 million dropped out.