Global Education Monitoring Report, 2021/2: Non-State Actors in Education: Who Chooses? Who Loses?

The 2021/2 Global Education Monitoring Report, published by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), assesses global progress toward the Sustainable Development Goal on education (SDG 4) and its ten targets. Alongside this review, this year's report focuses explicitly on the role of non-state actors in education and their impact on achieving global education targets. The report notes that without non-state engagement, the education of 350 million children would fall to the state's responsibility. Non-state actors in education, while widely diverse, are commonly defined by the terms 'non-governmental,' 'non-public,' or 'private.' The report explores the various arguments for and against a non-state provision of education, poses critical questions to be addressed, and examines four types of non-state activities in education: provision of education services, financing, governance, and influence and innovation. The report calls for governments to consider all education institutions, teachers, and students as part of a single system and invites policymakers to consider the role of non-state actors in making key choices in education to protect, respect, and ensure the right to education for all. 

Accompanying the report are two online tools: PEER, a policy dialogue resource describing non-state activity and regulations in the world's education systems; and VIEW, a site consolidating sources and providing new education completion rate estimates over time. The report is also supported by an executive summary, a set of infographics and multimedia, a concept note, a think piece detailing the conceptual framework for the 2021/22 report, a blog, slide deck, and cartoons illustrating key messages from the report. Another supplemental resource is a set of background papers covering a broad range of general educational topics related to non-state actors and their roles.