Zimbabwe MICS EAGLE Education Fact Sheets 2021

Zimbabwe Education
Fact Sheets | 2021

Analyses for learning and equity
using MICS data
Acknowledgement
The 2021 MICS-EAGLE Zimbabwe Education Fact Sheets were jointly developed by Photo credits
Niki Abrishamian and Hideyuki Tsuruoka of the UNICEF Zimbabwe Country Office;
Beifith Kouak Tiyab of UNICEF’s Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Office; and @Cover page: @UNICEF/UNI44138/Pirozzi Page 29: @UNICEF/UNI44162/Pirozzi
Sakshi Mishra, Yixin Wang, Suguru Mizunoya, Diogo Amaro and Margaret Kelly of the Title page: @UNICEF/UN050524/Mukwazhi Page 31: @UNICEF/UN050547/Mukwazhi
Education team in the Data and Analytics section, Division of Data, Analytics, Plan- Page 3: @UNICEF/UNI44146/Pirozzi Page 34: @UNICEF/UNI44121/Pirozzi
ning and Monitoring, UNICEF Headquarters, with support from many helping hands. Page 6: @UNICEF/UN052056/Mukwazhi Page 36: @UNICEF/UNI44111/Pirozzi
Page 7: @UNICEF/UNI44120/Pirozzi Page 38: @UNICEF/UNI44153/Pirozzi
We would like to express our deepest gratitude to the Ministry of Education and Page 10: @UNICEF/UNI106362/Brazier Page 39: @UNICEF/UNI44118/Pirozzi
Training officials who provided inputs to the MICS-EAGLE Zimbabwe Education Fact Page 11: @UNICEF/UNI106375/Brazier Page 42: @UNICEF/UNI106372/Brazier
Sheets, with special mention to Cyprian Kent Masocha without whose support this Page 11: @UNICEF/UNI44140/Pirozzi Page 45: @UNICEF/UNI106364/Brazier
initiative could not have advanced. Page 13: @UNICEF/UN050459/Mukwazhi Page 46: @UNICEF/UN062510/Prinsloo
Page 14: @UNICEF/UN050541/Mukwazhi Page 46: @UNICEF/UNI44113/Pirozzi
This work was supported by the Global Partnership for Education Knowledge and Page 16: @UNICEF/UN050534/Mukwazhi Page 48: @UNICEF/UN0410305/Tinago
Innovation Exchange, a joint endeavour with the International Development Research Page 18: @UNICEF/UNI296501/Prinsloo Page 49: @UNICEF/UN0411304/Tinago
Centre, Canada. Page 22: @UNICEF/UN052057/Mukwazhi Page 52: @UNICEF/UN050454/Mukwazhi
Page 25: @UNICEF/UN058700/Mukwazhi Page 53: @UNICEF/UNI37419/Pirozzi
Last but not least, the team would also like to thank Mariam Lelashvili for the editing Page 27: @UNICEF/UNI44110/Pirozzi Page 53: @UNICEF/UNI44152/Pirozzi
and design of the Fact Sheets. Page 28: @UNICEF/UN050501/Mukwazhi Page 54: @UNICEF/UNI106376/Brazier
Table of contents
Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 1
Topic 1 Completion Rates ..................................................................................................... 2
Topic 2 Foundational Learning Skills ................................................................................... 11
Topic 3 Out-of-School Children ............................................................................................ 18
Topic 4 Early Childhood Attendance and Development ....................................................... 28
Topic 5 Repetition, dropouts and non-transitions ................................................................. 35
Topic 6 Child Protection ....................................................................................................... 44
Topic 7 Functional difficulties-inclusive education ................................................................ 47
Topic 8 Remote Learning ..................................................................................................... 52

Introduction
What is MICS? What is MICS-EAGLE? How are fact sheets structured?
UNICEF launched Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys UNICEF launched the MICS-EAGLE (Education Analysis for The MICS-EAGLE Initiative offers activities at
(MICS) in 1995 to monitor the status of children around Global Learning and Equity) Initiative in 2018. Its objective is to improve the national, regional, and global level.
the world. Over the past twenty-five years, this house- learning outcomes and equity issues in education by addressing two crit-
hold survey has become the largest source of statistically ical education data problems – gaps in key education indicators, and lack The seven topics listed below are
sound and internationally comparable data on women analysed through an equity lens (gender,
of effective data utilisation by governments and education stakeholders.
socioeconomic status, ethnicity, etc.):
and children worldwide. MICS-EAGLE is designed to:
MICS surveys are conducted by trained fieldworkers who • support education sector situation analysis and sectorplan develop- Access and completion
perform face-to-face interviews with household mem- ment by building national capacity, and leveraging the vast wealth of
bers on a variety of topics. More than 330 MICS surveys education data collected by MICS6; and
have been carried out in more than 115 countries. It is • build on the global data foundation provided by MICS6 to yield in- Skills
a major data source of information for the Millennium sights at the national, regional, and global level about ways to ensure (learning outcomes, ICT skills and literacy
Development Goals indicators, and continues to inform that each child can reach his or her full potential by reducing barriers rate)
more than 150 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) to opportunities.sign of the Fact Sheets.
indicators in support of the 2030 Sustainable Develop- Inclusive Education
ment Agenda. What is profiling?
(with a focus on disability)
MICS has been updated several times with new and One of the characteristics of these fact sheets is profiling. Profiling illus-
improved questions. The current version, MICS6, was trates the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of children in
a certain category, and answers questions such as “what percentage of a Early Learning
deployed in 2017 and is being implemented in 58 coun-
tries. MICS6 includes new modules that track SDG4 indi- key population group is male and what percentage is female?” or “what
cators related to education such as learning (SDG4.1.1), percentage of a key population group lives in rural and what percentage
Early Childhood Development and Education (SDG4.2.1 lives in urban areas?” Because profiles examine all children within a key
Out-of-School Children
and SDG4.2.2), information and communication technol- population group, the sum of various characteristics always adds up to
ogy skills (ICT—SDG4.4.1), and child functioning (child 100 per cent (although rounding may affect this).
disability—SDG4.5.1) as well as parental involvement in
education. . For example, a profile of children not completing primary education will Repetition and Dropouts
highlight some of the main characteristics of children in the target popu- (internal efficiency)
lation group for this indicator. Primary completion rates look at children
aged 3-5 years older than the entry age for children for the last grade of
primary school, so the target population on this indicator will be children Child Protection
aged 15-17 years who have not completed primary education. (child labour and child marriage)
In Zimbabwe, 11 per cent of children aged between 15 and 17 have not

completed primary education. Among this 11 percent who have not
completed primary education, 65 per cent are males and 35 per cent are Remote Learning
females.
Introduction 1
Topic 1: Completion Rates
What is completion rate?

The completion rate reflects the percentage of a cohort of children or young people three to five years older than the intended age for the last grade of each level of education (primary,
junior secondary, or senior secondary) who have completed that level of education. For example, if the official age of entry into primary education is 6 years, and primary school has
7 grades, then the intended age for the last grade of primary education is 12 years. In this case, the reference age group for calculation of the primary completion rate would be 15-17
years (12 + 3 = 15 and 12 + 5 = 17). This indicator is used to calculate SDG 4.1.2 – Completion rate (primary education, lower secondary education, upper secondary education).
Guiding 1. In which level of education is 2. What are the characteristics of 3. What provinces have the lowest 4. What is the profile of children
questions: completion rate the lowest? children who do not complete completion rates at each level? who not complete each level of
each level of education? education?
Overview
Figure 1 Overview of completion rates Figure 2 Primary education completion rate
92 97 93 98 96 94 92 90
120 100 89 86 86 86 89 86 88 86
81 83
78
100 98 80
97 85
89 60
80 86
78 78 40
60 54 37 Richest
20
29 Urban
40 0
40 15 Total Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other
Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest Zion
20 6 Rural Catholic tant costal sect Christian tional religion religion
19 1 Poorest
Total
0 Sex Area Wealth quintile Religion
Primary Lower secondary Upper secondary
Figure 3 Lower secondary education completion rate Figure 4 Upper secondary education completion rate
100 100
85
78
80 70 70 80
64 62
54 54 54 54
60 47 45 43 44 60
40 36 38 37
40 29 40 29 27 25
19 22 23 19
15 17 14 17
20 20 6 7 9 7
1 2 4 3
0 0
Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other
Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest Zion Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest Zion
Catholic tant costal sect Christian tional religion religion Catholic tant costal sect Christian tional religion religion
Total Total
Sex Area Wealth quintile Religion Sex Area Wealth quintile Religion
2 Zimbabwe Education Fact Sheets 2021 | Analyses for learning and equity using MICS data
Findings:
• Around 89 per cent of children complete primary education.
• However, completion rates decline steeply at higher level of ed-

ucation, with only 15 per cent of all children completing upper
secondary education.
• This implies that compared to primary education, lower and

upper secondary education may have higher rates of dropouts,
repetition or delayed completion, leading to lower completion
rates for those levels.
• Socio-economic disparities influence the share of children

completing a level of education.
• Children belonging to the poorest quintile and those living

in rural areas have particularly low completion rates. At all
levels, rural and poor children have completion rates below
the national average, whereas urban and richer children have
completion rates above the national average.
• The gap between the completion rates of children from the

richest and the poorest wealth quintile widens starkly as they
progress through the education system. While 37 per cent of
children from the richest quintile complete upper secondary
education, only 1 per cent of children from the poorest quintile
do so.
• Expressed as ratios, 1.3 times more children from the richest

quintile complete primary education compared to children
from the poorest quintile, 5 times more children from the rich-
est quintile complete lower secondary education compared to
children from the poorest quintile, and 37 times more children
from the richest quintile complete upper secondary education
compared to children from the poorest quintile.
Provincial disaggregation
Figure 5 Completion rate, primary Figure 6 Completion rate, lower secondary Figure 7
Completion rate, upper secondary
Findings:
• Serious provincial disparities in education exist in Zimbabwe.
• Overall, Bulawayo, Midlands, and Harare have higher completion rate across all levels of education. In contrast, other provinces have much lower completion rate. Mashonaland
Central, Mashonaland East, Matabeleland North, and Masvingo all have upper secondary completion rate less than 10 per cent.
• At primary school level, some provinces are close to achieving universal completion, such as Bulawayo and Harare.
• In particular, Harare has the highest completion rate in primary and lower secondary level, and Bulawayo has the highest completion rate in upper secondary level.
Profiles of children who do not complete school
These profiles are based on the share of children not completing each level of education in Zimbabwe, where 11 per cent of children do not complete primary, 46 per cent do not
complete lower secondary and 85 per cent do not complete upper secondary.
Figure 8 Profile of children who do not complete Figure 9 Profile of children who do not complete Figure 10 Profile of children who do not complete
school, by sex school, by area school, by wealth quintile
Upper secondary Upper secondary Upper secondary
45 55 34 66 18 18 22 25 18
Lower secondary Lower secondary Lower secondary
50 50 17 83 26 25 23 18 8
Primary Primary Primary
65 35 7 93 38 26 21 12 3
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest
Figure 11 Profile of children who do not complete school, by religion
Upper secondary
7 15 17 30 8 3 4 16 1
Lower secondary
7 12 11 34 9 2 5 18 1
Primary
2 9 11 38 11 4 6 18 1
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Roman Catholic Protestant Pentecostal Apostolic sect Zion Other Christian Traditional No religion Other religion
Figure 12 Profile of children who do not complete school, by province
Upper secondary
5 13 11 10 15 5 5 9 10 16
Lower secondary
3 15 14 9 16 7 8 10 12 6
Primary
1 12 15 10 16 7 5 9 23 1
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Bulawayo Manicaland Mashonaland Central Mashonaland East Mashonaland West Matabeleland North Matabeleland South Midlands Masvingo Harare
Findings:
• Boys are less likely to complete primary school, but girls are less likely
to complete an education level as they progress through the education
system.
• Between urban and rural areas, more than two thirds of the children who
do not complete an education level reside in rural areas, and the gap
narrows at higher levels of the education.
• Children from the two poorest wealth quintiles make up over half of
those who do not complete primary and lower secondary education.
• The Apostolic sect are the largest religion group in the country, and so
despite having high completion rates, their numbers mean that they are
overrepresented in this type of profile.
TABLE 1. COMPLETION RATES
Completion rates (%) Headcount of children who did not complete
Shares & headcounts
by various socioeconomic characteristics
Primary Lower Secondary Upper Secondary Primary Lower Secondary Upper Secondary
Total 89% 52% 15% 110,000 399,000 687,000

Male 86% 52% 17% 72,000 197,000 312,000
Sex
Female 92% 52% 14% 38,000 202,000 376,000
Urban 97% 77% 29% 7,000 69,000 234,000
Area
Rural 86% 39% 6% 103,000 330,000 453,000
Poorest 78% 17% 1% 41,000 103,000 122,000
Second 86% 32% 2% 29,000 100,000 122,000
Wealth quintile Middle 89% 47% 7% 23,000 94,000 149,000
Fourth 93% 62% 17% 13,000 71,000 170,000
Richest 98% 84% 37% 3,000 32,000 125,000
Roman Catholic 96% 55% 22% 3,000 26,000 49,000
Protestant 94% 68% 27% 10,000 47,000 102,000
Pentecostal 92% 69% 23% 12,000 46,000 116,000
Apostolic sect 86% 44% 9% 42,000 134,000 208,000
Religion Zion 88% 44% 4% 12,000 38,000 53,000
Other Christian 86% 51% 19% 4,000 9,000 19,000
Traditional 81% 26% 3% 7,000 21,000 25,000
No religion 83% 36% 7% 20,000 72,000 108,000
Other religion 90% 52% 25% 1,000 6,000 7,000
Bulawayo 97% 74% 34% 1,000 14,000 32,000
Manicaland 91% 53% 15% 13,000 59,000 89,000
Mashonaland Central 83% 40% 3% 16,000 55,000 77,000
Mashonaland East 89% 52% 9% 11,000 35,000 69,000
Mashonaland West 86% 38% 10% 18,000 64,000 104,000
Province
Matabeleland North 87% 31% 7% 8,000 30,000 37,000
Matabeleland South 91% 32% 10% 5,000 33,000 36,000
Midlands 90% 54% 21% 10,000 39,000 63,000
Masvingo 79% 45% 9% 25,000 48,000 72,000
Harare 99% 81% 27% 1,000 24,000 109,000
*headcounts are based on UNSD statistics, they can be calculated using other data sources if the country requests
Completion - Shares & headcounts by various socioeconomic characteristics
These charts show the number of children in various groups who did not complete their education (represented by the size of the bubble) and the completion rates for each group (indi-
cated on the y-axis).
Figure 13
Completion rates and headcounts of children who do not complete primary school
100% 97% 98% 97%
96%
99%
94%
95% 93% 92%
91% 91%
89% 90% 89% 90%
92%
90% Total
86% 86% 86% 83%
85% 86% 87%
88%
86%
86%
80% 83%
79%
78% 81%
75%
70%
Mashona-
land West
Matabele-
Traditional
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Male
Figure 14 Completion rates and headcounts of children who do not complete lower secondary school
100%
90% 84%
81%
80% 69% 74%
77% 68%
70%
60% 62% 52% 54%

51% 52%
52% 45%
50%
52% 53% Total
47% 55%
40% 39% 40%
44% 36% 38%
30% 32% 44%
31% 32%
20%
17% 26%
10%
0%
Mashona-
Matabele-
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land West
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Traditional
Male
Figure 15
Completion rates and headcounts of children who do not complete upper secondary school
45%
37%
35% 34%
29% 25%
27% 21% 27%
25% 22%
23%
19%
17% 17%
15%
14% 10% Total
9% 9%
15% 10%
9% 7%
7%
5% 6%
3% 7%
2%
1% 4%
3%
-5%
Other
Christian
Traditional
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
Mashona-
land West
Matabele-
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Male
Findings:
• Across all three levels, completion rates are lower and the number of children not completing each level is higher in rural areas than in urban areas.
• Completion rates in Zimbabwe are strongly associated with children’s socio-economic status. The completion rates for the poorest quintile drop from 86 per cent at the prima-
ry level to less than 1 per cent at the upper secondary level.
• At primary level, the Roman Catholic and Other Christian religion have similar numbers of children who do not complete primary education, but the Roman Catholic religion
has a higher completion rate than the Other Christian religion. In terms of province, Masvingo has both the lowest completion rate and the highest number of children who do
not complete.
• At lower secondary level, Apostolic sect religion has the highest number of children who do not complete lower secondary education, due to its higher share in the population.
In terms of province, Bulawayo and Harare have the highest completion rate.
• At the upper secondary level, the completion rates drop to 15 per cent nationally, with the children from the bottom two wealth quintiles having completion rate lower than
3 per cent. Apostolic sect again has the largest number of children who do not complete due to its larger population base. Harare and Matabeleland West have fairly the same
number of children who failed to complete upper secondary education, but the completion rates is much higher in Harare than in Mashonaland West.
Topic 2: Foundational Learning Skills
What are foundational learning skills?

Foundational learning skills in the MICS module are learning outcomes expected for Grades 2 and 3 in numeracy and reading. They are measured for children aged 7 to 14 years. This
data can be used to calculate SDG4.1.1.a to measure the proportion of children in Grade 2/3 achieving minimum proficiency in (i)reading and (ii) numeracy, by sex.
Guiding 1. By which grade do most children 2. Which characteristics are linked 3. What share of each group of 4. What is the profile of children
questions: acquire foundational learning to higher shares of reading and young people are literate, and who are not learning?
skills (measured at the Grades numeracy skills? what share have ICT skills?
2/3 level)?
Foundational reading and numeracy skills measured at the Grade 2/3 level
Figure 16 Share of children aged 7 to 14 with foundational skills by highest grade attended Figure 17 Share of children aged 7 to 14 with foundational reading skills
77
80 71 80
65 68
70 70
57 58
60
50 60
50 53
48 48 49
50 44 44 44
50 41 40 40 38
37 37 34 36
40 32 40 32
27 25
30 30
19
20 20
10 9
10 2 0 0 0 1 10
0 0
Never attended Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Grade 7 Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other
Catholic tant costal sect Christian tional religion religion
Total
Reading Numeracy
Sex Area Wealth quintile Religion
Figure 18 Share of children aged 7 to 14 with foundational numeracy skills
80
70
60
47
50 41
40 31 35
27 29 29 29
25 23 21 22 24
30
19 21 19 21
17
20 13
10
Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other

Catholic tant costal sect Christian tional religion religion
Total
Findings:
• The Foundational Learning module assesses skills at the Grade 2/3 level. Only 9 per cent of children in whose highest grade attended are Grade 3 have the expected level of nu-
meracy skills for that grade, while 27 per cent have the expected level of literacy skills for the same grade.
• Children learn by staying in school, but only 48 per cent whose highest grade attended is grade 7 have the numeracy skills and only 71 per cent have the reading skills they
should have acquired by Grade 3.
• The share of children with foundational skills, both literacy and numeracy, is higher in urban areas, among richest and among certain religion groups such as Pentecostal and
Roma Catholic.
• The most striking differences in learning are associated with household wealth: the share of children from the richest quintile with foundational literacy skills is three times high-
er than in the poorest quintile. This gap is even wider in foundational numeracy skills, where the percentage of children from the richest quintile who have foundational numera-
cy skills is nearly four times higher than in the poorest quintile.
Completion - Shares & headcounts by various socioeconomic characteristics
How literacy and ICT skills were measured? Literacy was assessed for women and men age 15-24 years on the ability to read a short
simple statement or based on school attendance. Those who have ever attended lower
ICT skills were based on the information of women and men age 15-49 about whether they
secondary or higher education are immediately classified as literate, due to their education
carried out at least one of nine specific computer related activities in the last three months
level and are therefore not asked to read the statement. All others who successfully read
prior to the survey.
the statement are also classified as literate.
Figure 19
Literacy rates among youth aged 15 to 24 years Figure 20 ICT skills among youth aged 15 to 24 years
0 20 40 60 80 100 0 20 40 60 80 100
Total 91 Total 17
Findings:
Male 88 Male 23
Sex
Female 93
Sex
Female 15 • About 91 per cent of 15 to 24-year olds are
literate. However, only 79 per cent of those
98 36
Urban Urban
from the bottom wealth quintile are literate.
Area Area
Rural 87 Rural 7 Females, those living in urban areas and
from the richest wealth quintile have higher
79 3
Poorest Poorest
rates of literacy relative to their peers.
Second 87 Second 3
Wealth quintile Middle 90 Wealth quintile Middle 6

• Only 17 per cent of youth aged 15-24 years
have at least one ICT skill.
Fourth 95 Fourth 19
Richest 99 Richest 47 • Compared to women, men are more likely

to have at least one ICT skill. Such skills are
Roman Catholic 94 22
Roman Catholic
much more present in urban areas (36 per
Protestant 95 Protestant 26 cent) than rural areas (7 per cent).
96 29
•
Pentecostal Pentecostal
Socio-economic status and religion are also
Apostolic sect 88 Apostolic sect 9 associated with ICT skills. Only 3 per cent of
Religion Zion 89 Religion Zion 10 poorest youth undertook any ICT activity,
whereas 47 per cent from the richest quintile
Other Christian 90 Other Christian 17 did so.
Traditional 79 Traditional 5
No religion 89 No religion 14
• The gap is even larger when contrasting ICT
skills based on level of education attended.
Other religion 88 Other religion 16 The share of youth performing any ICT-relat-
Highest level ed activity is almost non-existent in Primary
55 1
of education
Highest level
attained
Primary Primary
or below, and it jumps to 73 per cent for
Highest level
of education Lower secondary of education Lower secondary 14 those who attended higher education.
attained attained
Upper secondary Upper secondary 59
Profiles of children aged 7 to 14 years who do not have foundational skills
These profiles are based on the share of children not demonstrating foundational reading and numeracy skills in Zimbabwe, where 56 per cent of children do not have foundational read-
ing skills, and 75 per cent do not have foundational numeracy skills.
Figure 21 Profile of children who do not have foun- Figure 22 Profile of children who do not have foun- Figure 23 Profile of children who do not have foun-
dational skills, by sex dational skills, by area dational skills, by wealth quintile
Reading Reading Reading
52 48 19 81 28 23 23 15 11
Numeracy Numeracy Numeracy
55 45 14 86 32 27 22 13 6
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Figure 24 Profile of children who do not have foundational skills, by religion
Reading
6 14 13 34 10 3 5 15 1
Numeracy
6 13 11 36 10 3 6 15 1
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Roman Catholic Protestant Pentecostal Apostolic sect Zion Other christian Traditional No religion Other religion
Figure 25 Profile of children who do not do not have foundational skills, by province
Reading
4 17 11 11 13 6 7 12 13 8
Numeracy
2 16 12 11 13 8 7 12 13 6
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Findings:
• Boys are slightly more represented than girls among those who
do not have foundational numeracy and reading skills.
• Most children who are not learning are from rural areas (81 per
cent for numeracy and 86 per cent for reading).
• Socioeconomic status also shows strong inequalities in foun-

dational learning skills, with the gap wider in reading than in
numeracy.
• For example, the poorest two wealth quintile made up oughly

60 per cent of the children who do not exhibit foundational
reading skill.
TABLE 2. FOUNDATIONAL SKILLS Share of children
Headcount of children not learning
aged 7 to 14 who are not learning Findings:
Shares & headcounts by various
socioeconomic characteristics Reading Numeracy Reading Numeracy
• The number of rural children
Total 56% 75% 1,671,000 2,289,000 who do not have foundational
skills is relatively large.
Male 59% 77% 917,000 1,204,000
Sex
Female 52% 73% 754,000 1,085,000
• For both literacy and numeracy,
Urban 32% 59% 233,000 430,000 Zion and Pentecostal religion
Area
Rural 63% 81% 1,438,000 1,859,000 have similar number of children
who do not have foundational
Poorest 75% 87% 543,000 640,000
skills. However, the share of
Second 66% 79% 448,000 540,000 children who are not learning is
Wealth quintile Middle 56% 79% 369,000 533,000 higher for Zion religion.
Fourth 43% 69% 207,000 335,000
Richest 23% 53% 103,000 240,000 • Among all subgroups, children
from the poorest quintile have
Roman Catholic 50% 71% 97,000 138,000
the highest share who do not
Protestant 47% 71% 211,000 322,000 have foundational reading or
Pentecostal 42% 65% 185,000 289,000 numeracy skills.
Apostolic sect 60% 78% 596,000 787,000
Religion Zion 60% 81% 161,000 220,000
• In terms of the province, Mash-
onaland Central has the highest
Other christian 62% 71% 53,000 61,000 rate of children who do not
Traditional 68% 79% 93,000 110,000 have foundational reading and
No religion 64% 83% 254,000 333,000 numeracy skills.
Other religion 51% 76% 19,000 29,000
Bulawayo 31% 63% 39,000 83,000
Manicaland 56% 78% 267,000 378,000
Mashonaland Central 67% 84% 194,000 246,000
Mashonaland East 60% 78% 186,000 243,000
Mashonaland West 60% 77% 220,000 287,000
Province
Matabeleland North 68% 76% 132,000 150,000
Matabeleland South 63% 80% 123,000 155,000
Midlands 56% 75% 199,000 270,000
Masvingo 56% 79% 218,000 309,000
Harare 31% 56% 91,000 168,000
*Headcounts are based on UNSD statistics, but can be calculated using other data sources if the country requests.
Foundational skills - Shares & headcounts by various socioeconomic characteristics
These charts show the number (represented by the size of the bubble) and share (indicated on the y-axis) of children in various group who do not have foundational learning skills.
Figure 26 Headcounts and shares of children who do not have foundational reading skills
90%
80%
75% 68%
70% 68%
63%
62% 67% 60%
66% 60% 64% 60%
63% 56%
60% 59% 60% 56%
56% 56%
Total
50% 52%
51%
43% 50%
40% 47%
42% 31% 31%
32%
30% 23%
20%
10%
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Traditional
No religion
Other
Matabele-
Matabele-
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
Mashona-
land West
land North
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Male
Figure 27
Headcounts and shares of children who do not have foundational numeracy skills
100%
90%
87% 84%
81% 80%
83% 78% 79%
80% 81% 79% 76% 75%
79% 79% 76% 78%
77% 78% 77%
Total
70% 73% 71%
69% 71% 71%
65% 63%
60%
59%
53% 56%
50%
40%
Mashona-
land West
Matabele-
Matabele-
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Traditional
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land North
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Male
Topic 3: Out-of-School Children
Who are out-of-school children?

Out-of-school children are children and young people in the official age range for a given level of education who are not attending either pre-primary, primary, secondary or higher
levels of education. The objective of the out-of-school children rate is to identify the part of the population in the official age range for a given level of education not attending school, in
order to formulate targeted policies that can be put in place to ensure they have access to education. It is used to calculate SDG 4.1.4 – Out-of-school rate for different levels of educa-
tion, including primary, lower secondary and upper secondary.
Guiding 1. Which level of education has 2. How many children are out of 3. Which provinces have the high- 4. Where do most out-of-school
questions: the highest rate of out-of-school school? est out-of-school rates? children live and what is their
children? background?w
Overview
Figure 28 Overview of out-of-school rates Figure 29

Out-of-school population (estimated headcount)
90
80
78 Poorest
Primary, 135,000
70 74 Rural
60 70 Total
50 62 Urban
Upper secondary,
441,000
55 Richest
40 Lower secondary,
325,000
37
30
24
27
20
7
10
2 11
5
4
8
0 5
Findings:
• Nationally, less than 5 per cent of

primary school age children are out of
school.
• Differences among wealth quintile

widen as the children progress the
education system, and at all levels,
children from the poorest wealth
quintile have out-ot-school rates that
are higher than the national average.
• In the lower secondary education age,

the number of out-of-school children
increases, particularly for the poorest
(37 per cent) and the rural (27 per
cent).
• The out-of-school situation worsens

at the upper secondary level, in which
nearly 80 per cent of children in the
poorest quintile and over half of the
children from the richest quintile are
out-of-school.reading and numeracy
skills.
• In total, 135,452 primary school age

children and 325,401 lower second-
ary school-age children were out of
school. At the upper secondary level
the number of out-of-school children
increases dramatically to 440,893.
Out-of-school children by level of education
Figure 30 Primary out-of-school rates Figure 31 Lower secondary out-of-school rates
90 90
75 75
60 60
45 45 37 36
27 29 30
30 24 26 26 26 25
30 21 21 21
18 17 17 18
8 11
15
5 5 4 4 5 4 4 4 4 6 5 5 4 6 5 15 7
2 3 2
0 0
Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other
Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest Zion Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest Zion
Catholic tant costal sect Christian tional religion religion Catholic tant costal sect Christian tional religion religion
Total Total
Sex Area Wealth quintile Religion Sex Area Wealth quintile Religion
Findings:
Figure 32 Upper secondary out-of-school rates
• At the primary education level, 5 per cent of children are out of school, but
90
children from the poorest wealth quintile have higher out-of-school rates
78 78 78
76 74 76 73 75 75 72 74 compared to their peers from other groups.
75
70 69
65 66 64
62
58
60 55
• At the lower secondary level, the national out-of-school rate increases dra-
45 matically to 24 per cent. Some groups, namely the poor and those who are
30
traditional religion, have particularly high out-of-school rates.
•
15
The gap associated with socioeconomic status widens at the lower second-
0
ary level. For example, the gap between the poorest and the richest is 6 per
Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other
Total
Catholic tant costal sect
Zion
Christian tional religion religion cent at the primary education level but increases to 30 per cent at the lower
secondary level.
• Finally, at the upper secondary level, the out-of-school rate doubles for all
groups and the national rate increases to 70 per cent, with more girls having
higher out-of-school rates than boys.
Provincial disaggregation
Figure 33 Share of out-of-school children, Figure 34 Share of out-of-school children, Figure 35 Share of out-of-school children,
primary lower secondary upper secondary
Findings:
• Overall, the primary school out-of-school rate is low in Zimbabwe.
• However, the out-of-school rate increases dramatically in all provinces for lower and upper secondary school.
• Overall, the out-of-school rate is highest in the west part of the country, especially for secondary school.
• At the lower and upper secondary level, Matabeleland North has the highest out-of-school rate, with 44% lower secondary school age children and 83% upper secondary school
age children out of school.
• The rate of schooling is much lower in Bulawayo, where it moves from 3% in primary to 56% in upper secondary.
Profiles of out-of-school children
These profiles are based on the share of children who are out of school by each level of education in Zimbabwe, where 5 per cent of children out-of-school at primary school age, 24 per
cent out-of-school at lower secondary age, and 70 per cent out-of-school at upper secondary age.
Figure 36 Profile of out-of-school children, by sex Figure 37 Profile of out-of-school children, by area Figure 38 Profile of out-of-school children,
by wealth quintile
Upper secondary Upper secondary Upper secondary
48 52 28 72 19 20 25 21 16
Lower secondary Lower secondary Lower secondary
56 44 11 89 34 29 19 13 5
Primary Primary Primary
58 42 22 78 42 19 16 15 7
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Figure 39 Profile of out-of-school children, by religion
Upper secondary
7 17 14 32 9 3 5 13 1
Lower secondary
4 12 10 36 11 2 6 17 1
Primary
4 7 11 43 10 3 4 18 1
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Figure 40 Profile of out-of-school children, by province
Upper secondary
4 10 11 12 14 7 7 10 11 13
Lower secondary
1 8 13 9 20 11 10 12 11 5
Primary
2 11 14 10 18 6 7 9 12 11
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Findings:
• Of the out-of-school children in primary and lower second-

ary level, more out-of-school children are boys. The trend
reverses in upper secondary level, with more out-of-school
children being girls.
• Most of the out-of-school children resides in rural area,

varying from 72 per cent in upper secondary to 89 per cent
in lower secondary.
• Despite being 20 percent of the population, children com-

ing from the bottom wealth quintile are over-represented
in out-of-school children in primary and lower secondary
level.
TABLE 3. OUT-OF-SCHOOL
Out of school rates (%) Headcount of children out of school
Rates & headcounts by various
socioeconomic characteristics Primary Lower secondary Upper secondary Primary Lower secondary Upper secondary
Total 5% 24% 70% 134,000 326,000 435,000

Male 5% 26% 65% 77,000 184,000 208,000
Sex
Female 4% 21% 76% 57,000 142,000 227,000
Urban 4% 11% 62% 29,000 37,000 119,000
Area
Rural 5% 27% 74% 105,000 289,000 316,000
Poorest 8% 37% 78% 57,000 111,000 81,000
Second 4% 29% 76% 26,000 96,000 88,000
Fourth 4% 18% 69% 20,000 41,000 91,000
Richest 2% 7% 55% 10,000 16,000 68,000
Roman Catholic 3% 17% 58% 5,000 14,000 29,000
Protestant 2% 17% 66% 9,000 39,000 73,000
Pentecostal 4% 18% 64% 16,000 34,000 61,000
Apostolic sect 6% 26% 75% 58,000 119,000 138,000
Religion Zion 5% 26% 75% 13,000 36,000 38,000
Other christian 5% 21% 72% 4,000 8,000 12,000
Traditional 4% 36% 78% 5,000 19,000 20,000
No religion 6% 30% 74% 24,000 54,000 57,000
Other religion 5% 25% 78% 2,000 4,000 5,000
Bulawayo 3% 8% 56% 3,000 4,000 20,000
Manicaland 3% 12% 59% 15,000 27,000 45,000
Province
Midlands 4% 25% 62% 12,000 38,000 45,000
Masvingo 5% 21% 70% 17,000 37,000 49,000
Harare 4% 11% 74% 14,000 15,000 56,000
Out-of-school - Rates & headcounts by various socioeconomic characteristics
These charts show the number (represented by the size of the bubble) and rate (indicated on the y-axis) of out-of-school children in various groups.
Figure 41
Primary out-of-school rates and headcounts
10%
8%
8%
7%
6% 7% 5%
6% 6% 5%
5% 5% 5%
5%
Total
5% 5%
4% 4% 4% 4% 3% 5% 4%
4% 4% 4% 4%
3% 4% 3%
2% 2%
2%
0%
Zion
Other
Mashona-
Matabele-
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land West
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Christian
Traditional
Male
Figure 42 Lower secondary out-of-school rates and headcounts

50%
44%
40%
34%
37% 36%
35%
36%
30% 26% 30%
27% 29% 25% 25%
26% 26%
Total
20% 21% 21%
18% 20%
21% 21%
17% 18% 11%
17%
11% 8% 12%
10%
7%
0%
Mashona-
land West
Matabele-
Traditional
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Male
Figure 43 Upper secondary out-of-school rates and headcounts
90%
85%
82%
80% 83%
78% 78%
78% 78% 78%
76% 76% 75%
75% 75% 74%
74% 73% 72% 74%
70% Total
69% 69% 70%
65% 66%
65% 64%
62% 62%
60%
58% 59%
55% 55% 56%
50%
Matabele-
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Traditional
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
Mashona-
land West
Male
Findings:
• At all three levels, out-of-school rates and number of out-of-school children are both higher in the rural area than in the urban area.
• At all three levels, the poorest quintile has both the highest rates and headcounts of out-of-school children across wealth quintile.
• The Mashonaland regions have the highest rates of out-of-school children at all three levels. Except for Mashonaland East when compared to Matabeleland Provinces
• At the primary level, the Apostolic sect children have the highest rates and number of out-of-school children. In lower secondary level, children with Traditional religion have
the highest out-of-school rate.
• At the upper secondary level, the out-of-school rate is high in all subgroups, with children from the richest wealth quintile having the lowest out-of-school rate.
Topic 4: Early Childhood Attendance and Development
What is Early Child Development Index (ECDI)?

ECDI is a 10-item module implemented in MICS6 to measure the percentage of children aged 3-4 who are developmentally on track in 4 domains, namely: literacy-numeracy, physical,
social-emotional, and learning domains.
Guiding 1. Which children are devel- 2. Which level(s) of education 3. Do children attend Grade 1 4. What is the profile of 5. What is the profile of chil-
questions: opmentally on track (as do young children attend? at the right age? children not attending dren who are not devel-
measured by the ECDI)? early childhood educa- opmentally on track (as
tion (ECE)? measured by the ECDI)?
Overview
Figure 44 Share of children aged 3 to 4 years who are developmentally Figure 45 Share of children aged 3 to 4 years attending ECE
on track, as measured by the Early Childhood Development
Index (ECDI)
77 70 64
78 76
76 74
73 60
74
50
46
72
71 40
68 69 68 40
70
67 28 28 29 29
68 30 24 21
66 20
64
10
10
62 0
60 0
ECE, pre-pri-
Male Female Urban Rural 3 4 No Yes Male Female Urban Rural 3 4 Primary Secondary Higher
mary or none
Total Total
Sex Area Age Attending ECE Sex Area Age Mother’s education
Figure 46 Age distribution at Grade 1 of primary education (%) Figure 47 Level of education attended by 3 to 6 years old
0
100% 1
Two or more 14 17
years older, 9 80%
52
69
60%
64
One year 40% 86
One year
older, 23 younger, 16
20% 48 23
19
0% 8
Right age, 52 3 4 5 6
Out of school Pre-primary or ECE Primary
Findings:
• Nationally, 71 per cent of 3- to 4-year-old are developmentally on track, mea-

sured by the Early Childhood Development Index (ECDI).
• The share of children developmentally on track is higher for girls and urban chil-
dren.
• Notably, 77 per cent of children attending ECE are developmentally ontrack, 9

per cent higher than children not attending ECE.
• This is a key difference, given that only 28 per cent of children aged 3-4 years
nation-wide attend ECE.
• Boys and girls are equally likely to attend ECE, and more urban children attend
ECE.
• Roughly two thirds of children whose mother attended higher education are in
ECE, while the number ranges from 21 per cent to 29 per cent for children whose
mother attended secondary education or below.
• Over 80 per cent of children in Zimbabwe are out of school when they are 3 years
of age. By the age of 4 years old, over half of the children attend ECE, with the
other half remain out of school.
• At the age of 6- which is the official starting age for Primary in Zimbabwe, 69 per
cent of children are in primary education, but more than a quarter of 6-year-olds
are in ECE or out of school.
• In Zimbabwe, roughly half of children in Grade 1 are at the right age. However, 32
per cent of children in Grade 1 are one year older (23 per cent) or two years older
(9 per cent) than the official starting age of 6.
Profiles of children aged 3 to 4 years not attending ECE or not developmentally on track
These profiles are based on the share of children who are not attending ECE or who are not developmentally on track in Zimbabwe, where 29 per cent of children are not on track on ECDI,
72 per cent are not attending ECE.
Figure 48 Profile of young children aged 3 to 4 years Figure 49 Profile of young children aged 3 to 4 years Figure 50 Profile of young children aged 3 to 4 years
not attending ECE or not developmentally not attending ECE or not developmentally not attending ECE or not developmentally
on track, by sex on track, by area on track, by wealth quintile
Not attending ECE Not attending ECE Not attending ECE
50 50 24 76 28 23 20 18 11
Not on track Not on track Not on track
54 46 24 76 28 23 20 16 13
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Figure 51 Profile of young children aged 3 to 4 years not attending ECE or not developmentally on track, by religion
Not attending ECE
5 12 14 37 8 2 5 15 1
Not on track
4 11 17 36 11 2 3 17 1
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Roman Catholic Protestant Pentecostal Apostolic sect Zion Other christian Traditional No religion Other religion
Figure 52 Profile of young children aged 3 to 4 years not attending ECE or not developmentally on track, by province
Not attending ECE
4 16 9 11 15 6 5 10 11 13
Not on track
4 21 8 10 10 5 7 9 13 13
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Findings:
• While the same share of boys and girls are not attending ECE, boys have
higher share among children who are not developmentally on track.
• Stark differences exist between the rural and urban area in ECE attendance
and early learning measured by ECDI.
• In terms of socioeconomic background, nearly 30 per cent of children not

attending ECE and not developmentally on track belong the poorest one-fifth
of the population.
• Another group that is overrepresented among both children not in school

and not on track are the Traditional religion group.
• Manicaland children are 16% of those not in school and 21% of those not
developmentally on track.
TABLE 4. EARLY CHILDHOOD ATTENDANCE
AND DEVELOPMENT Share (%) of children (age 3-4) Headcount of children
Shares & headcounts by various

Not on track on ECDI Not attending ECE Not on track on ECDI Not attending ECE Findings:
socioeconomic characteristics
Total 29% 72% 319,000 784,000 • ECE attendance is similar be-
Male 32% 72% 176,000 390,000 tween boys and girls.
Sex
Female 27% 71% 144,000 394,000
Urban 24% 60% 74,000 193,000 • Wealth quintile is negatively as-
Area sociated with ECE attendance.
Rural 31% 76% 245,000 590,000 Children from the lowest wealth
Poorest 34% 84% 87,000 221,000 quintile have highest rates of
Second 31% 77% 77,000 185,000 ECE attendance, and this is
probably explained by the fact
Wealth quintile Middle 29% 72% 61,000 149,000 that poorer children tend to
Fourth 26% 70% 51,000 141,000 attend school earlier than their
Richest 23% 48% 43,000 88,000 richer peers.
Roman Catholic 20% 57% 11,000 33,000
Protestant 23% 65% 30,000 95,000
• Higher shares of boys are not
on track in terms of the ECDI
Pentecostal 31% 64% 55,000 113,000 compared to girls. Additionally,
Apostolic sect 30% 79% 122,000 303,000 higher shares of children from
Religion Zion 37% 71% 30,000 51,000 rural areas are not on track than
urban children.
Other christian 21% (*) 8,000 16,000
Traditional 24% (*) 8,000 41,000 • Zion and Protestant religion
No religion 32% 72% 53,000 121,000 have similar number of children
Other religion -20% (*) 2,000 9,000 who are not developmentally
on track. However, a higher
Bulawayo 23% 54% 6,000 14,000
share of Zion children are not
Manicaland 38% 69% 83,000 160,000 on track than Protestant chil-
Mashonaland Central 29% -81% 19,000 54,000 dren.
Mashonaland East 28% 76% 30,000 83,000
Mashonaland West 22% 78% 38,000 135,000 • Finally, Manicaland has the
Province highest rates and number of
Matabeleland North 25% 79% 8,000 27,000 children who are not on track
Matabeleland South 38% 70% 12,000 21,000 than any other provinces.
Midlands 27% 78% 26,000 72,000
Masvingo 32% 64% 43,000 86,000
Harare 26% 65% 55,000 132,000
Early childhood attendance and development - Shares & headcounts by various socioeconomic characteristics
These charts show the number (represented by the size of the bubble) and share (indicated on the y-axis) of children in various groups who are not attending ECE (top) and not on track
in terms of the ECDI (bottom).
Figure 53 Shares and headcounts of children who are not attending ECE
100%
90%
84% 79% 78%

80% 76%
72% 79% 78%
76% 77% 72%
72%
70% 71% 70% 71% 70% Total
69%
65% 64% 65%
64%
60% 60%
54%
57%
50%
48%
40%
Mashona-
land West
Matabele-
Apostolic
Zion
No religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
sect
Male
Figure 54 Shares and headcounts of children who are not developmentally on track, as measured by the ECDI
45%
40% 38%
38%
37%
35%
34%
32% 32% 32%
31% 31% 31% 30%
30% Total
29% 29% 28% 27%
26% 26%
27% 24%
25% 24% 23% 25%
23% 21% 22%
20% 23%
20%
15%
Other
Traditional
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
Mashona-
land West
Matabele-
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Christian
Male
Topic 5: Repetition, dropouts and non-transitions
What is repetition rate? What is dropout rate? Who is non-transitioner?

The repetition rate measures the share of children in The dropout rate measures the proportion of children from a cohort attending Non-transitioners refer to those children
a given grade in a given school year who repeated that a given grade in a given school year who are no longer attending school in the who attended the last grade of a level but
grade as a percentage of total number of children who following year. It is worth clarifying that children who repeat are still considered did not continue to the next level.
attended the grade in the previous year. to be in school and are therefore not included in the calculation for dropout rate.
Guiding 1. Which level or grade has the 2. What is the profile of children 3. What is the profile of children 4. What is the profile of children
questions: highest rates of repetition, drop- who repeat a grade? who drop out of school? who do not transition to the
outs and non-transitioners? next level of education?
Overview
Figure 55 Figure 56 Figure 57
Repetition rates by grade Dropout rate by grade Rates of non-transition from

the last grade of one level to
the next level
25 25 100
91
90
82
20 20 80
70
15 15 60
13 12
50
10 10 9 40
29
30
5 5
5 5
5 4 4 5 20
3 3 3 3 3 3
2 2 3 3 2 3
2 2 10
0 0 0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 1 2 3 4 1 2 1 2 3 4 5 6 1 2 3 1 Grade 7 Grade 4 Grade 2
Upper Upper Lower Sec- Upper Sec-

Primary Lower Secondary Primary Lower Secondary Primary
Secondary Sec. ondary ondary
Figure 58 Education attendance by age
100% 1 3
4 8
14 17 14
80%
44 30
52
60
69 69 61
60% 1
90 95
64 97 96 96
96 80
86
40%
42 2
16 61
5
48
20% 23
34
1 24 26
19 15
4
8 5 4 5
0% 3 3 4
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
OOS ECE/Pre-primary Primary Lower secondary Upper secondary
Findings:
• Repetition rates remain fairly low from primary to upper secondary, ranging from 2 per cent to 5 per cent.
• For all primary grades, repetition rates are higher than dropout rates, and the repetition rate is particularly high for Grade 1.
• At the lower secondary level, the repetition rate shows a clear pattern of increasing with each grade.
• Non-transitioners are students who attended the last grade of a level but did not continue to the next level. Non-transition rates in upper secondary are extremely high at 91 per
cent. This means that 91 per cent of children who attended the last grade of upper secondary did not continue to higher education.
• Education attendance by age shows high shares of children aged 2 to 3 years not in More than half of the children aged 4 to attend ECE.
• The official starting age for primary education is 6, but 23 per cent of 6-year-olds attend ECE.
• Most children of primary school age attend primary level. However, at the lower and upper secondary levels, out-of-school rates increase, and by age 17, 61 per cent of children
are out of school (OOS).
Profiles of repeaters, dropouts and non-transitioners
These profiles are based on the share of children who repeat grades, who drop out of school, and who are not transitioning into next education level in Zimbabwe.
Figure 59 Profile of of repeaters, dropouts and Figure 60 Profile of of repeaters, dropouts and Figure 61 Profile of of repeaters, dropouts and
non-transitioners, by sex non-transitioners, by area non-transitioners, by wealth quintile
Non-transitioners Non-transitioners Non-transitioners
52 48 32 68 24 22 19 15 20
Dropouts Dropouts Dropouts
54 46 37 63 14 18 20 22 26
Repeaters Repeaters Repeaters
51 49 29 71 20 22 21 17 21
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Figure 62 Profile of of repeaters, dropouts and non-transitioners, by religion
Non-transitioners
6 15 14 34 9 3 3 15 1
Dropouts
7 21 16 30 8 2 3 12 1
Repeaters
6 15 18 31 8 2 4 13 1
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Figure 63 Profile of repeaters, dropouts and non-transitioners, by level of education
Non-transitioners
50 47 3
Dropouts
29 57 14
Repeaters
74 24 2
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Findings:
• A higher share of boys repeat grades, drop out of school, or do not transit to next level of education.
• Most children who drop out or repeat a grade reside in rural area.
• The split among wealth quintile in dropouts and repetition are fairly even, with no over-representation observed in the bottom wealth quintile.
• Roughly 30 per cent of the children who drop out or repeat a grade are Apostolic sect, which is consistent with their representation in the population.
• In terms of the level of education, repeaters are usually younger than dropouts, as most repeaters are repeating a grade of primary education.
• Most children who drop out of school decide to do so at the lower secondary level.
TABLE 5. REPETITION, DROPOUTS AND
NON-TRANSITIONS Share(%) Headcount of children
Rates & headcounts by various

Repetition Dropouts Non-transitions Repetition Dropouts Non-transitions
socioeconomic characteristics
Total 4% 5% 54% 143,000 345,000 218,000
Male 4% 5% 57% 78,000 188,000 113,000
Sex
Female 3% 5% 50% 64,000 158,000 105,000
Urban 4% 6% 54% 51,000 127,000 71,000
Area
Rural 3% 5% 54% 92,000 218,000 147,000
Poorest 3% 6% 55% 26,000 47,000 51,000
Second 3% 5% 51% 29,000 63,000 46,000
Fourth 3% 4% 56% 24,000 76,000 34,000
Richest 4% 5% 54% 35,000 92,000 46,000
Roman Catholic 3% 5% 52% 9,000 24,000 14,000
Protestant 3% 5% 54% 24,000 72,000 34,000
Pentecostal 4% 4% 54% 29,000 56,000 30,000
Apostolic sect 3% 5% 55% 41,000 102,000 73,000
Religion Zion 3% 5% 53% 11,000 29,000 20,000
Other christian 2% 6% 43% 2,000 7,000 7,000
Traditional 3% 4% 67% 4,000 10,000 7,000
No religion 4% 6% 52% 19,000 40,000 31,000
Other religion 5% 4% 55% 2,000 5,000 2,000
Bulawayo 4% 3% 43% 9,000 15,000 6,000
Manicaland 3% 3% 45% 20,000 41,000 22,000
Province
Midlands 3% 4% 46% 12,000 33,000 21,000
Masvingo 4% 4% 46% 19,000 32,000 22,000
Harare 4% 7% 61% 23,000 68,000 40,000
Repetition, dropouts and non-transitions -- Rates & headcounts by various socioeconomic characteristics
These charts show the number (represented by the size of the bubble) and rates (indicated on the y-axis) of children in various groups who repeat (top), dropout (middle) or do not
transition (bottom).
Figure 64 Repetition rates and headcounts
7%
6%
5%
5%
5% 4%
4%
4% 4% 4%
4%
4%
4%
Total
4%
3% 3% 3% 3% 4%
3% 3% 3% 3% 3%
3% 3%
3%
3% 3%
3% 3%
2% 2% 2%
1%
Mashona-
Matabele-
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land West
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Traditional
Male
Figure 65 Dropout rates and headcounts

9%
8%
7%
7%
6% 6%
6%
6%
6% 5% 6%
6% 5% 5% 5%
5% 5% 5%
5% Total
5% 5% 5% 5% 5%
4% 4% 4% 4%
4%
4% 4%
4%
3% 3%
3%
2%
1%
Mashona-
Matabele-
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land West
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Traditional
Male
Figure 66 Non-transition rates and headcounts
70%
67%
69%
65%
60% 61%
60% 60% 58%
57% 56%
55% 55% 55%
55% 54% 54%
54% 53%
Total
52% 53% 52%
51% 54% 54%
50% 50% 52%
46%
45% 43% 45% 46%
43%
40%
35%
Mashona-
land West
Matabele-
Protestant
Pentecostal
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Traditional
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Male
Findings:
• Overall, the dropout rate is higher than the repetition rate.
• The variation among repetition rates and dropout rates across subgroups are
relatively small, with the repetition rate ranging from 2 per cent to 5 per cent
and dropout rate ranging from 3 per cent to 7 per cent.
• On the contrary, there is a dramatic increase in non-transition rates, the share

of children who were in certain level of education and who failed to progress
to the next level of education.
• Across all provinces, Matabeleland North has the highest rate of non-transition
at nearly 70 per cent.
Topic 6: Child Protection
What is child marriage?

Child Marriage is a marriage of a girl or boy before the age of 18 and refers to both formal marriages and informal unions in which children under the age of 18 live with a partner as
if married.
Guiding 1. Which groups have higher rates 2. Which groups of children are 3. How is child labour linked to 4. How does child labour explain the
questions: of early marriage and how does more frequently involved in education attendance and profile of children who are out of
it impact literacy and ICT skills? child labour? foundational learning skills? school or not learning in school?
Overview of child marriage and education
Figure 67 Prevalence of child marriage among youth aged 20 to 24 years, female Findings:
47
50
40 36
40
44
• The share of male entering child marriage is extremely small.
33
28 47 28
30 50
18 40
44 26
16
• However, about 34 per cent of young men and women 20-24
20 40 36
12 33 12 years old married or enter a union before their 18th birthday.
28 8 7 7 28
10 30 6 4 26 4 5.5
2 1 0.6
0 20
18
12 12
16 • Child marriage is strongly associated with other socioeconomic
8 7 7 status. Specifically, youth who reside in rural area and who come
10 6 Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth
4 18
Richest Primary 5.5
Lower secondary Upper secondary
4
Total 2 Before 15 Between 15 and 1 0.6
from poor family have higher chance of getting married before
0 Area Wealth quintile Highest level of education attained
18.
Before 15 Between 15 and 18
Figure 68 Figure 69
• There is also a strong negative relationship between early
marriage and education. Over 60 per cent of girl with primary
Literacy rate by early marriage status, female ICT skill by early marriage status, female education reported to get married before 18, but only 6 per cent
100 95 100 of youth with upper secondary education did so.
88
78
80 80 • In Zimbabwe, female youth who do not marry early have a very
high literacy rate at 95 per cent. In contrast, those who were mar-
60 60
ried between 15 and 18 have literacy rates 7 per cent below their
peers. For youth who got married before 15, their literacy rate is
40 40
even lower, at 78 per cent.
22
20 20
4 5 • The disparity in ICT skills is even more evident. Among female
0 0 who got married early, only 4 per cent have ICT skills, compared
Not married Married between Married before 15 Not married Married between Married before 15
15 to 18 15 to 18
to 22 per cent among youth who did not marry early.
Overview of child labour and education
What is child labour?

In the MICS module, children are considered to be in child labour if they engage in at least one of two categories: economic activities and household chores . For each category,
there is a time threshold based on different age groups.
Figure 70 Prevalence of child labour for children aged 5 to 17 years
45
39
40
36 37 36
35 35
35 33 32
30 29
30 28
25
28 Findings:
24
25 22 22
20
20
15
17 • A total of 28 per cent of all children aged 5-17 years
15 are engaged in some form of child labour, with high-
10 7 7 7 er prevalence in boys than in girls.
5
0 • Compare to children who live in urban area, chil-

Male Female Urban Rural 5 to 11 12 to 14 15 to 17 Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest
Roman Protes-
Catholic tant
Pente- Apostolic
costal sect
Zion
Other
christian
Tradi-
tional
No
religion
Other
religion dren in rural area have much higher share engaging
Total in child labour (7 per cent versus 35 per cent).
Sex Area Age Wealth quintile religion
• Child labour status is also strongly associated with

wealth, as nearly 40 per cent of the children in the
Figure 71 Figure 72 bottom wealth quintile are in child labour, only 7
School attendance by age and child labour status Share of 7 to 14 year olds with foundational per cent of the children in the top wealth quintile
reading and numeracy skills, by child labor are in child labour.
120 status
93 95 97 96 96 95 94
Not in child labor Child labor
• Up to age of 11, school attendance of children who
100
86 60 are working is as high as for those who are not.
83
95 95 96 98 96 94 75
51 However, starting from age 12, engaging in child
50
80
labour is strongly and negatively associated with
61 attendance.
72 40
60 33
48
Not in 29
40
58
child labor
30
• Additionally, a lower share of working children has
43 20 17 foundational reading skill and numeracy skills as
20
compared to the non-working children.
25 10
Child labor
13 11
0
0
6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
Reading Numeracy
Profiles of children not learning and out of school by child labour status
Figure 73 Profile of children aged 5 to 17 years who are out of school or not learning, by child labour status
Numeracy 60 40 Findings:
Not
learning
Reading 56 44
• While nationally 28 per cent of the children are in child labour,
they represent nearly 40 per cent of the child who drop out of
the primary school, suggesting that they leave school earlier
Upper
85 15
than children who are not in child labour.
secondary
Out of Lower
• Children in child labour are also over-represented in share of
school secondary 73 27 children who are not learning. More than 40 per cent of the
children without foundational reading or numeracy skills are
engaged in child labour.
Primary 61 39
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Not in child labor Child labor
Profiles of uneducated or unskilled youth by early marriage
Figure 74 Profile of uneducated or unskilled youth aged 20 to 24 years, by age of marriage, female
Did not attend school 30 70 Findings:
• While 25 per cent of the youth were married before their

Illiterate 40 45 15 18th birthday, they represent 39 percent of the illiterate
youth in Zimbabwe.
No ICT skills 62 32 6 • Furthermore, among youth who do not have ICT skills, 29
per cent of them are in child labour.
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Did not marry early Married between the ages of 15 and 18 Married before the age of 15
Topic 7: Functional difficulties-inclusive education
What are functional difficulties?

MICS collected data on child functioning for all children under 18 through either the questionnaire for children under 5 or the questionnaire for children aged 5–17 years.
In the case of children under 5, data on functional difficulties are collected on the following functional domains: seeing, hearing, walking, fine motor, communication, learning, play-
ing, and controlling behaviour.
For children aged 5–17 years, data on functional difficulties are collected on the following functional domains: seeing, hearing, walking, self-care, communication, learning, remem-
bering, concentrating, accepting change, controlling behaviour, making friends, and affect (or children with difficulties controlling their emotions, which is calculated using metrics
for anxiety and depression).
Guiding 1. Which groups of children 2. What are the most com- 3. How is functional difficulty 4. How is functional difficulty 5. How does functional difficulty
have higher rates of func- mon functional difficulties linked to school attendance linked to repetition and explain the profile of children
questions:
tional difficulty? among children? and learning? dropouts? who are out of school or not
learning in school?
Findings:
• Across the country, 10 per cent of children aged 5-17 years have
at least one functional difficulty.
• The prevalence of functional difficulty is higher for boys (11 per

cent) than girls (9 per cent) and older children (11 per cent) than
younger ones (9 per cent).
• The prevalence of having at least one functional difficulty is

higher in rural (11 per cent) than in urban (8 per cent).
• Across wealth quintile, the share of children with functional

difficulties falls from 13 per cent among the poorest families to 7
per cent among the richest families.
• The most common functional difficulties in the country are

associated with behavioral and cognitive challenges, including
learning, anxiety, and concentrating.
Figure 75 Prevalence of functional difficulties among children aged 5 to 17 years Figure 76 Prevalence each type of functional difficulties
among children aged 5 to 17 years
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
Total 10 9
Any functional difficulty
11
Male 11
Sex 2
Learning
Female 9 3
5-9 9 3
Anxiety
3
Age 10-14 11
2
15-17 11 Depression
2
Urban 8
1
Area Remembering
2
Rural 11
13 1
Poorest Controlling
2
Second 12
2
Wealth quin- Concentrating
Middle 9 2
tile
Fourth 8 1
Accepting
1
Richest 7
1
Bulawayo 6 Seeing
1
Manicaland 12
1
Making friend
1
Mashonaland Central 11
0
Mashonaland East 11 Hearing
1
Mashonaland West 13
0
Province Communication
Matabeleland North 8 1
Matabeleland South 8 1
Selfcare
0
Midlands 9
0
10 Walking
Masvingo 0
Harare 8 0 2 4 6 8 10 12
Female Male
Functional difficulties-inclusive education
Figure 77 Current school attendance by functional difficulty Figure 78 Figure 79
(5 to 17 year olds) ANAR by functional difficulty status Dropout rate by functional difficulty status
(includes dropouts and non-transitioners)
Seeing 80
100 25
91 91
90 86
Hearing 79 83
20
80 20
70 17
Concentrating 79
58
60 15
48
50
Learning 71
40 10
30
Accepting 71
4
20 5 3
10
Selfcare 69
0 0
One year before Primary Lower secondary Primary Lower secondary
primary
Anxiety 69 No functional difficulty Any functional difficulty
No functional difficulties Any functional difficulty
Depression 69
Figure 80 Figure 81
Controlling 68 Repetition rate by functional difficulty status Share of children with foundational skill by
functional difficulty status
Remembering 58
8 50
46
7 45
7
Communication 57 6
40
6
35
31
Walking 49 5
30
25
4 25
Making friends 45 18
20
3 2
15
2 2
No functional difficulties 78 10
1
5
Any functional difficulty 74 0 0

Primary Lower secondary Reading Numeracy
0 20 40 60 80 100 No functional difficulty Any functional difficulty No functional difficulty Any functional difficulty
Findings:
• Children with functional difficulties have a very similar atten-

dance rate in primary education and one year before primary
education. However, there is a strong gap in attendance in lower
secondary education by functional difficulty (10 per cent).
• For children without functional difficulties, dropout in is low in

primary and lower secondary level . However, dropout rates are
comparatively higher for children with functional difficulties.
• In Zimbabwe, there is not a significant gap between children

with and without functional difficulties in repetition rates.
• Among children who don’t have functional difficulties, 46 per

cent have foundational reading skills whereas only 31 per cent
of the children with functional difficulties have foundational
reading skills.
• Similarly, the gap in foundational numeracy skills also favors

children without any functional difficulties over those with func-
tional difficulties (25 per cent versus 18 per cent).
Profile of children who are out of school or not learning, by functional difficulty
Figure 82 Profile of children out of school or not learning, by functional difficulty
Findings:
Numeracy 88 12
Not
learning
• Although only 10 per cent of children in Zimbabwe have any functional difficul-
ties, they are over-represented among children not learning and out-of-school at
Reading 89 11
both the primary and lower secondary level.
Upper
secondary
90 10 • At the upper secondary level, 10 per cent of out-of-school children have func-
tional difficulty.
Out of Lower
school secondary
85 15
• This is probably due to the fact that children with functional difficulties are stay-
ing in school longer, but not necessarily attending the right level.
Primary 86 14
• This suggests that more should be done to accommodate the needs of all chil-
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% dren to facilitate learning.
Does not have a functional difficulty Has functional difficulties
Topic 8: Remote Learning
Guiding 1. What share of students live in households with 2. How is remote learning associated with 3. What are the profiles of children who do
questions: access to remote learning tools? foundational learning? not have access to remote learning tools?
Figure 83 Share of students aged 3 to 24 years with access to remote learning tools
96100 94
100 120 90 88
90 80 84 96100 94
100 90 7488 73
80 84 72
80 65
70 63 64 74 72 73
80
54 54 54 53 65 63 54 56 64
60 52 52
54 54 54 52 53 47 45 45 54 52 56
50 60 42 42 42 41 43 40 47 43 42 43 42 40
3442 3442 42
34 41 43 39 39 40
39 45
39
45 43
33 42 32 43 36 42 40
40 34 34 29 29 30 36
4028 28 34 28 27 26 33 25 32 30
30 28 28 28 27 29 26 29 25
18 18 15 1818 1616
20 15 1212
20
10 4 4 3 3
0 0
0 0
Male Male Female

Female Urban
Urban Rural
Rural Poorest
Poorest Second
Second Middle
Middle Fourth
Fourth Richest
Richest Pre-primary
Pre-primary Primary
Primary Lower
Lower secondary Upper
Upper secondary Higher
Higher
Internet Radio Television Electricity
Total secondary secondary
Total Sex Sex Area
Area Wealth quintile
Wealth quintile Education level level
Education attended
attended in the
in the current
current year year
Internet Radio Television Electricity
Figure 84 Share of students aged 3 to 24 years without access to a radio or television 120Figure 85 Out-of-school children aged 3 to 17 years with access to remote learning tools
120 96
80 73 100
70 96
59 100 75
80
60 52 63 63
80 75
50
41 41 41 43 41 43 60 51
39 63
50 63
45 44
40
60 40 41 40 40 41 38 51 50
35
40 32 45 44
30 22 20 2340 28 41 25 26
40 40 41 25 38 23
14 16 20 32 19 35
20 40 28 26 17 14 13
20 23 25 25 23
3 20 17 14 4 19
10
0 13 3
20
0 0 4 0 3
Pre-pri-
Primary
Lower Upper
Higher 0 Total Male
Male Female
Female Urban
Urban Rural
Rural Poorest
Poorest Second
Second Middle
Middle Fourth
Fourth Richest
Richest
mary secondary secondary
Total Total
Total Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest
Sex Area Wealth quintile
Education level attended Sex Area Wealth quintile
Sex Area Wealth quintile
in the current year Sex Area Wealth quintile
Internet Radio Television
Internet Radio Television
Findings:
• In terms of the share of students aged 3

to 24 years with access to remote learning
tools, there is some variation according
to the type of tool. 41 percent have access
to radio at home while 34 per cent have a
TV at home. About 28 percent of students
aged 3 to 24 have access to internet at
home
• There is no difference in access to remote

learning tools by sex as access is measured
at household level. However, a greater
share of urban children have access to
these tools than rural children. There are
also notable differences by wealth quintile,
as for example, no students from poorest
households have TV whereas 96 percent of
the richest children do.
• By level of education, between 25 to 30

percent of students in pre-primary to lower
secondary have access to internet while
64 percent of students in upper secondary
have access to internet.
• When looking at the share of students

without access to remote learning tools,
23 percent do not have access to internet,
radio and TV while 41 per cent do not have
access to radio and TV.
Foundational skills among children aged 7 to 14 years, by access to remote learning tools
Figure 86 Foundational reading skill by remote learning tools Figure 87 Foundational numeracy skill by remote learning tools
70 65 45
61 38
60 56 40 37
35 31
50 46 45
41 30
26
37 35 25
40
25 21
19 19
30 20
15
20
10
10
5
0 0
No Internet Internet No radio Radio No TV TV No electricity Electricity No Internet Internet No radio Radio No TV TV No electricity Electricity
Internet Radio TV Elecricity Internet Radio TV Elecricity
Findings:
• Access to remote learning tools is associated with

higher shares of children with reading and nu-
meracy skills. One exception is that a larger share
of children with no radio access have higher
foundational numeracy skills.
• The biggest gaps in foundation skills are associ-

ated with access to the internet and electricity,
both of which are strongly associated with
household wealth.
Foundational skills among children aged 7 to 14 years, by access to remote learning tools
Figure 88 No child-oriented books in the household Figure 89 Parent or caretaker helped child with homework
Total 70 Total 88
Findings:
Male 72 Male 88
Sex
Female 69
Sex
Female 88
• 70 per cent of children aged 7 to 14
years live in a household with no
Urban 47 Urban 93
Area
child-oriented books. This means
Area
Rural 80 Rural 86 they do not have access to addi-
tional age-appropriate materials
Out of school 86 Poorest 81
Attendance to read and learn.
status In school 69 Second 84
Poorest 93
Wealth
quintile
Middle 88 • Access to child-oriented books
varies by wealth quintile. On
Second 83 Fourth 93
average, 37 per cent of children
Wealth Richest in the richest wealth quintile do
Middle 72 95
quintile
not have access to child-oriented
Fourth 58 Roman Catholic 88
books at home, while more than
Richest 37 Protestant 89 90 per cent of children in the poor-
Pentecostal
est quintile do not have child-ori-
Roman Catholic 62 91
ented books at home.
Protestant 60 Apostolic sect 89
Pentecostal 56 Religion Zion 86 • Similarly, mother’s education level

Other christian
is also strongly associated with
Apostolic sect 78 85
the ownership of owning child-ori-
Religion Zion 79 Traditional 81 ented books. 92 per cent of chil-
Other christian No religion
dren whose mother’s education
65 87
level is pre-primary do not have
Traditional 86 Other religion 85 books at home, but less than one
No religion 77 Pre-primary 73
in three children whose mother’s
education level is higher than sec-
Other religion Mother/care- Primary 81
77
taker’s level
ondary school do not have books
Pre-primary 92 of education Secondary 93 at home.
Mother/care- Higher
•
Primary 82 96
taker’s level Most students aged 7 to 14 years
of education Secondary 65 receive help with homework in
Higher 32
Zimbabwe.
Profiles of children aged 5 to 17 years with no access to remote learning tools
Figure 90 Profile of children with no access to re- Figure 91 Profile of children with no access to re- Figure 92 Profile of children with no access to re-
mote learning tools, by sex mote learning tools, by area mote learning tools, by wealth quintile
No internet No internet No internet
51 49 10 90 37 31 22 10 1
No radio No radio No radio
51 49 9 91 31 32 26 9 1
No television No television No television
51 49 30 70 26 22 17 17 18
No television AND radio No television AND radio No television AND radio
51 49 19 81 27 26 21 15 10
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Figure 93 Profile of children with no access to remote learning tools, by religion

No internet
6 15 11 39 10 2 5 12 1
No radio
6 14 10 37 11 2 5 14 1
No television
7 17 16 33 8 2 4 11 1
No television AND radio
6 14 13 35 10 3 5 14 1
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Figure 94
Profile of children with no access to remote learning tools, by province
1 22 9 10 12 7 7 12 17 4
1 20 10 12 13 7 7 12 16 4
5 18 7 9 11 5 6 12 14 13
4 17 10 9 14 7 5 11 15 9
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Findings:
• Across all remote learning tools, slightly more boys than girls do not have
access of those remote learning tools at home.
• Rural areas are over-represented in having no access to remote learning

tools, particularly when it comes to having access to television.
• The two poorest wealth quintiles are over-represented among those who
lack access to remote learning tools. Among those lacking access to both
television and radio, the poorest two quintiles form the majority.
• The Apostolic sect religion group has a large population, which may explain
why children of Apostolic sect religion represent the largest share of those
who lack access to remote learning tools.
• The Manicaland region has the largest share of children who lack access to
remote learning tools, while the Bulawayo region has the smallest shares of
children who lack access.
TABLE 5. REMOTE LEARNING Share (%) of students Headcount students
age 3 to 24 (ages 3 to 24)
Shares and headcounts by various
No radio AND televi- No radio AND televi-
socioeconomic characteristics sion sion
Total 40% 1,937,000
Male 40% 989,000
Sex
Female 41% 948,000
Urban 16% 198,000
Area
Rural 51% 1,738,000
Poorest 73% 705,000
Second 59% 595,000
Wealth quintile Middle 43% 420,000
Fourth 24% 188,000
Richest 3% 28,000
Roman Catholic 35% 115,000
Protestant 34% 288,000
Pentecostal 27% 206,000
Apostolic sect 50% 761,000
Religion Zion 49% 201,000
Other christian 29% 35,000
Traditional 46% 88,000
No religion 39% 223,000
Other religion 39% 20,000
Bulawayo 13% 29,000
Manicaland 52% 417,000
Mashonaland Central 44% 170,000
Mashonaland East 40% 197,000
Mashonaland West 43% 225,000
Province
Matabeleland North 51% 126,000
Matabeleland South 48% 129,000
Midlands 45% 242,000
Masvingo 53% 329,000
Harare 14% 72,000
Remote learning - Shares and headcounts by various socioeconomic characteristics
These charts show the number (represented by the size of the bubble) and share (indicated on the y-axis) of children in various groups who lack access to both radio and television.
Figure 95 Headcounts and shares of students who lack access to radio and television
80%
73%
70%
60% 59%
51% 51%
52% 53%
50% 50% 48%
49% 46%
44% 43% 45%
41% 43%
40% Total
40% 39% 40%
39%
35% 29%
30% 34%
24%
27%
20% 16%
14%
10% 13%
Apostolic
sect
Zion
Other
Christian
Traditional
No religion
Other
religion
Bulawayo
Manicaland
Mashona-
land Central
Mashona-
land East
Mashona-
land West
Matabele-
land North
Matabele-
land South
Midlands
Masvingo
Harare
Female
Urban
Rural
Poorest
Second
Middle
Fourth
Richest
Roman
Catholic
Protestant
Pentecostal
Male

Zimbabwe MICS EAGLE Education Fact Sheets 2021

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Zimbabwe MICS EAGLE Education Fact Sheets 2021

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Zimbabwe MICS EAGLE Education Fact Sheets 2021

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Zimbabwe Education

Fact Sheets | 2021

Topic 1 Completion Rates ..................................................................................................... 2

Topic 2 Foundational Learning Skills ................................................................................... 11

Topic 3 Out-of-School Children ............................................................................................ 18

Topic 4 Early Childhood Attendance and Development ....................................................... 28

Topic 5 Repetition, dropouts and non-transitions ................................................................. 35

Topic 6 Child Protection ....................................................................................................... 44

Topic 7 Functional difficulties-inclusive education ................................................................ 47

Topic 8 Remote Learning ..................................................................................................... 52

What is MICS? What is MICS-EAGLE? How are fact sheets structured?

In Zimbabwe, 11 per cent of children aged between 15 and 17 have not

What is completion rate?

Figure 1 Overview of completion rates Figure 2 Primary education completion rate

• Around 89 per cent of children complete primary education.

• However, completion rates decline steeply at higher level of ed-

• This implies that compared to primary education, lower and

• Socio-economic disparities influence the share of children

• Children belonging to the poorest quintile and those living

• The gap between the completion rates of children from the

• Expressed as ratios, 1.3 times more children from the richest

• Serious provincial disparities in education exist in Zimbabwe.

Lower secondary Lower secondary Lower secondary

Primary Primary Primary

Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest

Figure 11 Profile of children who do not complete school, by religion

Total 89% 52% 15% 110,000 399,000 687,000

60% 62% 52% 54%

What are foundational learning skills?

Figure 18 Share of children aged 7 to 14 with foundational numeracy skills

Roman Protes- Pente- Apostolic Other Tradi- No Other

Wealth quintile Middle 90 Wealth quintile Middle 6

Richest 99 Richest 47 • Compared to women, men are more likely

Numeracy Numeracy Numeracy

Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest

Figure 24 Profile of children who do not have foundational skills, by religion

• Socioeconomic status also shows strong inequalities in foun-

• For example, the poorest two wealth quintile made up oughly

Who are out-of-school children?

Figure 28 Overview of out-of-school rates Figure 29

• Nationally, less than 5 per cent of

• Differences among wealth quintile

• In the lower secondary education age,

• The out-of-school situation worsens

• In total, 135,452 primary school age

Figure 30 Primary out-of-school rates Figure 31 Lower secondary out-of-school rates

• Overall, the primary school out-of-school rate is low in Zimbabwe.

Lower secondary Lower secondary Lower secondary

Primary Primary Primary

Male Female Urban Rural Poorest Second Middle Fourth Richest

Figure 39 Profile of out-of-school children, by religion

• Of the out-of-school children in primary and lower second-

• Most of the out-of-school children resides in rural area,

• Despite being 20 percent of the population, children com-

Total 5% 24% 70% 134,000 326,000 435,000

Figure 42 Lower secondary out-of-school rates and headcounts

55% 55% 56%

What is Early Child Development Index (ECDI)?

• Nationally, 71 per cent of 3- to 4-year-old are developmentally on track, mea-