Every October in Kenya, streets fall silent during the KCPE—the national primary exam that decides which secondary schools students may attend. Radios broadcast exam tips. Parents fast and pray.In a system that prizes test results above all, one number determines a child’s future. High-stakes testing was designed to promote meritocracy; instead, it has created a shadow industry. Wealthier families hire tutors and pay for “revision camps.” Rural schools—often under-resourced

Across Pakistan, millions of girls dream of attending school, yet many never make it to the classroom. Despite improvements in enrollment over the past two decades, Pakistan still has one of the world’s highest numbers of out-of-school girls. Poverty, cultural traditions, and security concerns combine to create barriers that keep countless young women from receiving a basic education. For families living on limited incomes, the cost of schooling can be prohibitive. Even where

In Nepal’s remote mountain villages, the path to a classroom is often a literal climb. Children leave home before sunrise, carrying books in plastic bags to protect them from morning mist. Some trek two or three hours along steep trails just to reach the nearest primary school. When the monsoon brings heavy rains or landslides, the route can become dangerous, yet students persist because education is their only real hope for a better future. The financial burden is equally da

Across the mountains of northern Laos, children begin walking before sunrise. Some trek more than an hour on steep footpaths, crossing footbridges made of bamboo or wading through shallow rivers when the bridges collapse during monsoon season. For thousands of rural families, this journey isn’t a dramatic story; it's simply the routine reality of trying to get an education. And it’s one that exposes a fundamental question: what does “access to schooling” actually mean when th

Every afternoon in Cairo, as the final bell rings, students pour out of school buildings only to enter another educational world, one that is unregulated, expensive, and increasingly essential. These “shadow classrooms,” Egypt’s vast private tutoring system, have become so normalized that many students consider school optional and tutoring mandatory. But behind this parallel system lies a troubling truth: relying on private instruction to compensate for public-school shortcom