TEHRAN — Some 3,843 out-of-school children living on the outskirts of cities nationwide went to school within the past two months and a half, deputy for scientific, cultural and social matters at Budget and Planning Organization has said. 

Out-of-school children are more vulnerable to social harms and going back to school would safeguard them from such harms, IRNA news agency quoted Saeed Namaki as saying on Thursday. 

According to the UNESCO globally about 262 million children and youth are out of school, according to the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) data for the school year ending in 2017. The total includes 64 million children of primary school age, 61 million of lower secondary school age and 138 million of upper secondary age.

Out-of-school rates tend to increase with age as youth find or search for employment. But to what extent do they have the skills to find a first job, for example?

UNESCO urges countries for greater investment in education at the global, regional and national levels, including more resources for data collection and analysis in an attempt to achieve universal primary and secondary education by 2030.

MQ/MG