TEHRAN – Approximately 31,000 out-of-school children have resumed education in the past academic year which started on September 22, 2023.

Around  216,000 out-of-school children were identified in the previous academic year, IRNA quoted Rezvan Hakimzadeh, an official with the Ministry of Education, as saying.

Some of the children are grappling with hard-to-treat diseases, she added.

School dropouts have always been one of the challenges in the education system of many countries. Each country follows a specific strategy to deal with the problem.

According to Article 30 of the Constitution, the government must provide all citizens with free education up to secondary school and must expand free higher education to the extent required by the country for attaining self-sufficiency.

Therefore, students should be prevented from dropping out of school and careful planning is needed to bring them back to school. Out-of-school children should be organized.

In this regard, the Ministry of Education is trying to implement the law of free education for all citizens by building and developing state-run schools, recruiting as many teachers as possible to educate students in all parts of the country, and finally developing a positive culture to maximize the attendance of students in classrooms.

Despite the efforts, there are still some children who are missing out on education in all parts of the country, including Tehran.

There are over 20 factors leading to dropping out of school, so not all those who have not enrolled in a school year can be classified as out-of-school, as about 5,000 of them found out to have passed away.

Reforming the primary education administration system, boosting educational equity and opportunities, improving educational quality, and empowering school systems are the key objectives of the Ministry of Education.