Mohammad Molavi, Vice Chairman of the Education Committee in the regime’s Majlis (parliament), announced on Thursday, July 25, that the number of children dropping out of school in Iran is 911,000, including 400,000 primary school students.
According to Molavi, while 279,000 of these children dropped out due to “financial problems,” the education budget for 2024 has decreased compared to last year.
Experts have cited “poverty” as the main reason for children dropping out of school in Iran.
The Vice Chairman of the Education Committee in Parliament noted that while 12% of the country’s general budget was allocated to education in recent years, this allocation has dropped to less than 10% this year.
This comes despite a 20% increase in the overall budget for 2024 compared to last year.
Recently, Deputy Attorney General Gholam-Abbas Torki described the existence of about one million dropouts as a “significant statistic” and called for a “transformation” in the education system.
The Statistical Center of Iran had reported that the number of dropouts in the 2022-2023 school year was over 929,000, a 2% increase compared to the previous year.
Last year, the representative of Sistan and Baluchestan in the Supreme Council of Provinces announced that annually, 30% of students in this province are forced to drop out due to issues such as school transportation costs.
Farooq Azami stated in an October 2023 interview with the regime’s ILNA news agency, that in just one region of Sistan and Baluchestan, 4,000 students had dropped out of school.
Moein al-Din Saeedi, a representative of Chabahar in Majlis, also emphasized in December 2023 that in Sistan and Baluchestan, southeastern Iran, fewer than 40 out of every 100 students successfully obtain a diploma.
In addition to poverty, issues such as a shortage of teachers and educational facilities also contribute to the increasing number of dropouts in Iran.
Alireza Monadi Sefidan, Chairman of the Parliament’s Research and Education Committee, has predicted that educational facilities will face a shortage of 70,000 to 80,000 teachers in October this year.
Meanwhile, teachers have held numerous protest rallies in recent years to achieve their professional and livelihood demands and have criticized the governing policies on educational matters in the country.
