EDUCATIONAL SUPPORT

According to the FMoE, 26.8 million children are enrolled across approximately 40,000 primary and secondary schools in the country. Enrolment has increased at all levels of schooling, and the gender divide is narrowing. Multiple regions have primary school enrolment ratios above 100 percent; however, there is a large over-age school population. Despite improvements in school enrolment, there is a low transition rate from primary to secondary for both boys and girls, a by-product of factors such as high dropout rates across the primary cycle (less than 6 out of 10 learners complete primary education), and supply-side factors such as the much smaller number of secondary schools relative to primary schools in the country (ratio of 1:10), despite Ethiopia’s young population and the significance of adolescents in national security, growth and development. There are persistent challenges that contribute to low student learning outcomes and the sub-optimal development of foundational and transferable skills that equip children to be productive members of society. FMoE has formulated Phase 3 of its General Education Quality Improvement Programme, which focuses on improving the quality, internal efficiency and equity of the education system