By Ka Man Mak and Harsh Trivedi
Sunstone Institute conducted a study to map all the schools in 193 countries that are UN classified. The purpose of the study is to build a foundation of education data, with the possibility to measure concepts like education resilience and to provide localized insights into the state of education worldwide, where possible.
As of December 6, 2024, school data was available for 190 countries, resulting in the collection of 207 datasets and a total count of 5,919,463 schools. However, the geospatial mapping of each school was only achievable for 70 countries.
Map captures the latest timeframe of the school data collected from each country. Graphic by Harsh Trivedi. Source: Sunstone Institute. Data as of Dec. 6, 2024.
For this study, ‘school’ is defined as an educational establishment that is either a preschool, primary school, secondary school, or a combination of these. To document the total number of schools (school counts) worldwide accurately, school data is gathered and selected from relevant government authorities, such as the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Statistics, and in some cases, national news outlets. The school count data is then aggregated at the national level, including both private and public schools, where available.
The dataset of school counts for each country is categorised by the year it was collected and by the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) 2011 covering levels 0 to 3 (pre-primary to secondary education). In cases where countries lacked formal alignment with ISCED classifications, schools were categorised based on national definitions of preschool, primary, and secondary levels.
Data Quality and Limitations
The study encountered certain challenges during data collection, including:
- Inconsistent reporting across official portals
- Data loss due to poor government website maintenance
- Missing data for recent years
- Limited data accessibility to specific geographic regions
- Data velocity issues (infrequent updates or changes)
- Inconsistent reporting of ISCED-aligned classifications
- Lack of clarity on school types (public vs. private)
- Lack of specification on education levels (pre-primary, primary, and secondary)
Open-Source Data
Download data source list file: Click here