UNESCO Data Shows Disability Gaps in School Completion
UNESCO's Institute for Statistics released its November 2026 education data update covering 240 countries and territories.
Updated on Nov. 14, 2026 in Education — General
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The UNESCO Institute for Statistics released its November 2026 data update, adding more than 1.39 million data points to its global education database. The release includes school completion data for learners with and without disabilities for 83 countries and territories.
Why it matters
The data shows that in most countries with available figures, children and young people with disabilities are less likely to complete school than peers without disabilities. The update also gives policymakers a wider evidence base on bullying and teacher qualifications across education systems worldwide.
The UIS database now holds 9.7 million data points across 240 countries and territories, with disability completion data available for 83 of them, up from 26 in February 2026. Gaps remain in disability coverage, as the release does not provide figures for most countries.
The players
UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS)
The UNESCO Institute for Statistics is UNESCO's statistical arm, responsible for compiling and publishing internationally comparable education, science, culture and communication data for countries around the world.
Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA)
PISA is an international assessment run by the OECD that measures the skills and experiences of 15-year-old students across participating education systems, and it is the source of the bullying estimates in this release.
The details
UIS calculated its bullying estimates from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2025, in which 37 of 85 participating education systems had at least half of 15-year-old students report bullying in the previous 12 months. The average bullying estimate across all 85 systems is 48%, and teacher qualification estimates for 2025 show 73% of primary, 83% of lower secondary and 87% of upper secondary teachers hold at least a bachelor's degree or equivalent.
Timeline
February 2026: Prior UIS data release, the baseline for the earlier disability completion coverage.
2015: Global upper secondary completion rate stood at 53%.
2025: Global upper secondary completion reached 62%, and teacher qualification estimates were recorded.
November 2026: UIS released its latest education data update.
Education Landscape
The release builds on the PISA 2025 cycle, whose bullying results are now folded into UNESCO's wider SDG 4 indicator set alongside revised teacher qualification measures. Its 33 updated global and thematic SDG 4 indicators place this data within the monitoring framework for the United Nations education goal.
The disability completion gaps and bullying rates in this data point to where schools may need to focus support for students with disabilities and for those facing peer harassment. Parents and educators can use the country-level figures to compare how their education system performs against others.
The takeaway
Countries with more complete disability and completion data are better positioned to target support where students fall behind. Tracking these gaps over time will show whether school systems are closing them.
Further reading
For broader context on global schooling trends, explore Education — General coverage.
More information
Read the full UNESCO UIS November 2026 education data release on the UNESCO Institute for Statistics website.
Source note: This article includes information reported by Unesco.
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