Investing in the Future: Global Partnership for Education 2021-2025

This week the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) released their case for investment for 2021-2025. During this 5-year period, GPE will need at least $5 billion to support lower income countries to transform education. This ambitious strategy puts gender equity at the center, and GPE is committed to ensuring all girls and boys can learn equally, learn early, and learn well.

Over the past twenty years, the world has made significant progress toward achieving universal primary education. But disparities persist, especially for the most vulnerable children, including girls, children with disabilities, and children from the poorest families. More work needs to be done to ensure that all children receive a quality education. Of the children who have access to schooling, hundreds of millions have not learned basic reading skills by the end of primary school, and governments in lower-income countries need concerted support to accelerate progress. That’s where GPE comes in.

The stakes have never been higher

The combined impacts of school closures and the social and economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic have worsened many existing disparities in education. Worldwide, an estimated 1.5 billion children are out of school, approximately a six-fold increase from the 258 million children and youth who were out of school before the COVID-19 pandemic, and many are at risk of falling behind or permanently stopping their education. According to UNICEF, 90 percent of countries with school closures adopted some form of digital and/or broadcast remote learning. But nearly a third of schoolchildren worldwide (463 million) cannot be reached by the broadcast- and Internet-based remote learning policies either due to the lack of necessary technology at home, or because they were not targeted by the adopted policies. Of those children who cannot be reached, 3 out of 4 are from rural areas and/or belong to the poorest households. GPE is working to ensure that marginalized children will not be left behind – during the COVID-19 crisis and beyond.

In response to the COVID-19 crisis, GPE mobilized their most rapid and largest-ever emergency response to date to prevent loss of learning. GPE is the largest provider of education grants in the global COVID-19 response and distributed $500 million to partner countries to sustain learning for up to 355 million children. This aid focused on those most negatively affected by school closures: girls, children with disabilities, and children from the poorest families.

A fully funded GPE will help millions of children gain access to quality education

The Global Partnership for Education is the world’s only partnership and fund dedicated to delivering quality education and is perfectly positioned to catalyze change over the 2021-2025 period. GPE partners with 87 countries which are home to 82 percent of the world’s out of school children. It has a strong record of success and lasting results, including:

• 160 million more children are in school in GPE partner countries, including 82 million more girls.
• Primary enrollment for girls has increased by 65 percent in GPE countries
• $6 billion saved through efficiencies in education spending

A fully funded GPE can help unlock the future we all want. With full funding, GPE can deliver added value to each dollar invested by leveraging their strength as a partnership, help national education ministries influence budget allocations, and implement innovative financing methods to support national priorities. Full funding will also allow GPE to support partner countries to train 2.2 million teachers, build 78,000 classrooms, and buy 512 million textbooks. Investing in GPE will have a ripple effect that benefits communities for generations by boosting the economy, strengthening gender equality, and helping build more inclusive, resilient, and peaceful societies.

Raise your hand. Fund education. Fund GPE.

The replenishment summit will take place in the United Kingdom on July 28-29, 2021 and will be co-hosted by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and President of Kenya, Uhuru Kenyatta.

The full Case for Investment and the Executive Summary are now available online. In the coming weeks and months, RESULTS will provide more information about how our advocacy can help influence the U.S. to come to the table with a strong financial pledge to support GPE.