Education as a Driver for Development

In April, the World Bank held its annual Spring meetings, when global leaders, policymakers, and activists come to Washington, DC, to explore critical global development themes, such as innovations in development financing and investment in fragile and conflict-affected countries. This year, the global learning crisis was highlighted as a human development challenge during the meetings, and global leaders, including Gordon Brown and Julia Gillard, came together to discuss Financing for Learning.

For the first time, the forthcoming 2018 World Development Report (WDR), a flagship publication of the World Bank, will focus on education. According to the WDR concept note, the report, “Realizing the Promise of Education for Development” will focus on the following four main themes: 1) the promise of education as a driver of development in all its dimensions; 2) the scope of the global learning crisis and ways in which learning metrics can be effectively designed to guide reform across all levels of education systems; 3) promising interventions that have shown to advance education, learning, and skills development that include investment in early education and care; and 4) systemic analysis for change in order to advance learning at scale.

The 2018 WDR focus on education signals the growing recognition across the broader development community of the importance of education. The education sector—practitioners, academics, investors, and policymakers—will necessarily stay engaged with the results of the report to assess implications for the advancement of education, such as innovative interventions, relevant livelihood skills for different contexts, and diplomatic interactions in the form of partnerships and to drive sustained political will.

For more information:

Concept Note for the World Development Report 2018: Realizing the Promise of Education for Development, World Bank, accessed May 4, 2017.

World Bank Spring Meetings Special Series, Devex News Coverage, accessed May 5, 2017.