Education in Cameroon: 2026 state of play

The most consulted country brief on education in Cameroon is UNESCO’s IICBA fiche, dated January 2024. It is a useful link directory, but it is not an analysis, and its data have since been superseded. It cites the 2013–2020 Strategy as the current sector plan — the SSEF 2023–2030 only becoming publicly available in February 2025. It gives 2022 completion rates while UNESCO published a new series in February 2026, and it contains an erroneous formulation that we flag in the Corrections chapter.

This document starts from data quality, not from the data: in Cameroon, the last usable census dates from 2005, the last DHS from 2018, and the last learning assessment from 2019. All enrolment rates are fractions whose denominator is estimated.

It systematically distinguishes what is measured from what is modelled. UNESCO now publishes, for the same indicator and the same year, an administrative value and a modelled value that can vary by a factor of two.

It refuses to arbitrate between contradictory sources when the contradiction itself is the information. The share of the state budget devoted to education is 12.6%, 13.3%, 13.8%, 18.3% or 19% depending on the perimeter retained. Choosing one figure would be more elegant; showing all five is more useful.

It lists what we do not know. The Unknowns chapter lists thirteen data points sought without finding them — probably the most valuable part for anyone preparing a project, funding or advocacy. See also the guide Education in Cameroon.

Cameroon is a country of 29.1 million inhabitants whose last general population census dates back to 2005. The fourth census (RGPH-4) was launched on 24 April 2026; its enumeration has been extended to 15 September 2026, with a mobilised budget of FCFA 13.28 billion against FCFA 64 billion initially planned. No data have yet come from it.

Direct consequence: all enrolment, completion and out-of-school rates are ratios whose numerator is administrative (pupil counts by ministries) and whose demographic denominator is projected from data twenty-one years old. This is the primary cause of anomalies — notably gross rates above 100%.

ECAM6 will not deliver results before 2028. ECAM5 therefore remains, for at least two more years, the only survey source allowing enrolment to be crossed with living standards. The absence of a DHS since 2018 has a mechanical effect: UNESCO series based on household surveys — attendance rates, literacy — are frozen in 2018. A “recent literacy rate” is almost always the 2018 value (81.9% among 15–24 year-olds) or the ECAM5 2022 figure (83.3%).

Ministerial yearbooks exist but are hard to access. MINEDUB validated its 2024/2025 yearbook on 25 February 2026 in Mbankomo; MINESEC published its own for 2023–2024. Their files are not freely downloadable. For 2023/2024 enrolments, the most reliable usable source is paradoxically UNESCO.

Technical note: the country page uis.unesco.org/en/country/cm no longer exists. Data now go through the UIS Data Browser and a public API. Vintage used: February 2026 release. Convention: the UNESCO year designates the end of the school year — “2024” means 2023/2024.

In 2023/2024, Cameroon enrolled 5,289,656 pupils in primary, against 4,731,585 three years earlier — a rise of nearly 12%, or 558,000 additional pupils. At the September 2025 back-to-school, all levels combined, more than 8.7 million pupils returned to school.

The total net primary enrolment rate reaches 96.2% in 2023/2024. On enrolment alone, Cameroon is close to universality — a real achievement, obtained amid rapid demographic growth, armed conflict in two regions and budget pressure. Caveat: this rate is administrative. ECAM5 gives for 2022 a net rate of 89.1% in urban areas and 72.3% in rural areas.

The gross primary enrolment rate is 114.4% in 2023/2024 — the figure shown on Cameroon in numbers. It exceeds 100% when many pupils are outside the official age band (6–11): entered too late, or held back by repetition. In 2023/2024, 13.3% of primary pupils are over-age; 611,326 pupils repeated (11.6% of enrolment); PASEC estimated in 2019 that more than 45% of pupils repeat at least once. From SIL alone, 155,783 repeaters — a quarter of the total. The INS sector report puts waste at 13% of primary resources for repetition and 22% for dropouts.

For the same year 2023/2024 and the same indicator — share of primary-age children out of school — UNESCO publishes two values. The 2025 modelled estimate falls to 5.5% (girls 4.9%, boys 6.2%). The modelled value is the more cautious; it is the one we retain. Out-of-school then explodes: nearly three in four young people of upper-secondary age are not enrolled.

The INS school census gave, for 2021/2022, 446,747 children out of school or never enrolled, of whom only 1.3% were covered by a CEBNF.

Preschool education is the domain where the gap between discourse and real organisation is sharpest. In 2023/2024: 644,367 children enrolled in pre-primary (of whom 322,873 girls); net pre-primary enrolment rate 30.4%; 41.0% of children benefit from at least one year of organised learning the year before entering primary (SDG 4.2.2) — so 497,479 children, or 59% of a cohort of about 843,000, are deprived of it; school-life expectancy at pre-primary: 0.76 year; zero years of free or compulsory preschool in legislation.

The decisive fact: 65.5% of pre-primary enrolment is in the private sector. The state enrols 34.5%. Cameroonian preschool is predominantly a market service — whereas it is the level where the economic literature places the best return of public investment on later inequalities.

The INS school census (2021/2022): 31.7% of 5-year-olds had benefited from at least one year of preschool nationally, but only 7.9% in the Far North, and 14.2% in priority education zones — even though these zones host 45% of the country’s 4–5-year-olds.

The 2013–2020 Strategy had bet on community preschool. Its assessment, in the SSEF 2023–2030, is unambiguous: community provision stayed stuck at 2% of enrolment. The PAREC programme has since enrolled 44,853 children in rural community preschool (target 38,360) — a success at project scale, marginal at country scale.

The pre-primary teaching corps counts 32,512 people, of whom 97.9% are women, and only 57.3% are qualified.

Learning poverty — the share of children who, at the end of primary, cannot read and understand a simple age-appropriate text — is estimated at 72% in Cameroon by the World Bank (2019 data). This figure combines 7.1% of children not enrolled (schooling deprivation) and, among the 92.9% enrolled, 69.8% not reaching the reading threshold (learning deprivation) — i.e. 64.9 points of the total. Of one hundred children in learning poverty, about ninety are sitting in a classroom.

Cameroon sits 14.4 points below the Sub-Saharan Africa average — therefore better than the region — but 11.5 points above the lower-middle-income country average. By sex: 72.7% for boys and 71.2% for girls; girls suffer more schooling deprivation (11.3% against 3.0%); boys, learning deprivation.

The PASEC 2019 assessment evaluated the two sub-systems separately. Mathematics is the black spot: at the end of primary, seven in ten Francophone pupils do not reach the threshold. The Franco–Anglo gap is massive: 22.3% of Anglophone pupils below the reading threshold against 50.2% of Francophones. Caveat: the test could only cover schools that remained functional in the Anglophone regions. The SSEF documents a loss of 37% of primary enrolment, 49% of general secondary and 50% of technical education in these two regions between 2015/2016 and 2017/2018.

More than 65% of the variance in reading scores and more than 68% in mathematics at the end of primary is explained by differences between schools. Among teachers in the Anglophone sub-system: 4.9% needed remediation in reading comprehension, but 45.6% in mathematics.

National INS assessments 2021/2022 — Francophone CM2: 43.7% at threshold in French, 13.4% in mathematics; Anglophone Class 6: 74.0% in English, 47.7% in mathematics. PAREC: share of end-of-primary pupils at the minimum reading threshold rose from 24% in 2018 to 30.2% in December 2025 (target 35% end 2026) — the only disbursement condition classified “off track”.

Performance-based financing: 5,240 schools in 2025/2026 (56% in PEZs), 79.9% improved their score. But a randomised impact evaluation on 240 first-wave schools: grants do not improve learning outcomes and may degrade them — positive effects on cleanliness, staffing and girls’ retention.

PASEC 2024 was collected between March and June 2025 (21 countries, more than 28,000 respondents per country); results expected in the last quarter of 2026. Under PAPMEC, a workshop in Soa (25 May – 2 June 2026) produced a National Framework for Assessing Primary Learning Outcomes, validated by MINEDUB.

UNESCO modelled estimates 2025 (February 2026 release): of one hundred children entering school, about seventy-eight complete primary, fifty lower secondary, twenty-three upper secondary. Girls now complete more than boys at all levels — parity indices 1.08 / 1.06 / 1.06.

The deadliest step is transition: primary → lower-secondary transition rate of 60% in 2021/2022 (INS), against ~70% for Central Africa and SSA; the SSEF assessment retains 70% for 2020/2021 on another perimeter — the two are not comparable. The Global Partnership for Education notes that this rate is declining. Without a birth certificate, a pupil cannot sit exams: PAREC phase 1 (Jan.–June 2024) covered 57,244 CM2 pupils and enabled 48,232 transitions; phase 2 (July 2025) targets 1,048,170 pupils, 533,504 processed as of 30 Nov. 2025 (51%).

Dropout: 34% in primary (INS 2021/2022); 35% of primary spending lost (13% repetition + 22% dropouts). In lower secondary, 20% of resources wasted; 70 pupils per classroom in public secondary (norm 50).

ESG baccalaureate: the official rate reports admits over those present. 2024 triggered the abolition of deliberations for 2025 (+10.19 points), then −5.31 points in 2026. Registrations fall by 12,755 (−8.8%) — a coincidence to watch with the post-electoral crisis, not an established fact. Among the 55,108 admits in 2026: 30,750 girls / 24,358 boys. Mentions: 43,638 passable, 9,372 assez bien, 1,792 bien, 304 très bien, 2 excellent. BEPC: 59.10% (2024) → 65.58% (2025, 137,845 / 210,203); bilingual BEPC 75.90% → 85.57%.

Human capital — two incompatible scales. Old HCI (0-1, 2020, never updated): 0.40; 8.7 expected years of schooling, harmonised score 379, i.e. 5.3 effective years — 3.4 years out of 8.7 produce no learning; rich/poor gap 1.68. HCI+ (0-325, April 2026): 127 (SSA 126, lower-middle income 153, Kenya 171); education 58 against 61 regional — the only pillar below the region; women 117 / men 139. Closing the gaps would raise future income by 68%. Human capital represents 58% of national wealth (Changing Wealth of Nations).

This is the priority retained in the 2024 Partnership Compact: “improve learning quality through professionalisation of the teaching profession”. Data 2023/2024, primary: 121,453 teachers of whom 74,549 women (61.4%); pupil/teacher ratio 43.6; pupil/qualified-teacher ratio 63.5; 68.6% qualified; 72.3% trained (2022/2023); attrition 0.70%.

The 43.6 / 63.5 gap is the real indicator: one third of teachers lack the required qualification. The trained-teacher rate fell ten points in one year (82.7% in 2021/2022 → 72.3% in 2022/2023), after a decade of progress from 57.4% in 2010. Women teachers are far less often qualified: 60.4% against 81.7% — a 21-point gap.

“Parent-hired teachers” — teachers recruited and paid by parent associations, outside status — were meant to disappear by 2020. Their share among “chalk-in-hand” teachers in public primary schools nearly doubled, from 18% in 2012 to 33% in 2017. No updated figure after 2017. Documented mechanism: fees paid by parents fund substitute teachers. The “free” public primary is structurally financed by underfunding the teaching corps.

The OTS movement (“On a Trop Supporté” / “We Have Endured Too Much”) was born in February 2022. Timeline: draft status filed on 6 October 2023 then on 2 April 2025 — without follow-up; strike of the eleven public universities in January 2025 (academic debt since 2009); COREC notifies the Prime Minister on 19 March 2025; “Dead School” operation on 22 April 2025 (45% follow-through on day one); national petition on 13 July 2026, signed by 18 unions. As of 3 August 2026, the special status is not signed. National Education Forum not held. Private-education collective agreement at a standstill. Only concrete act: decree no. 2024/057 of 21 February 2024, 5% revaluation of all civil servants’ salaries.

Recruitments: PAREC enabled 18,000 teachers (target met); joint order of 6 January 2026 for 3,000 primary teachers (tests 14 February 2026); 12,242 recruitments planned in 2026; commitment of 3,000 more in 2027. Visible result: 98% of public primary schools with more than 100 pupils had at least three state-paid teachers in December 2025, against 43% in 2017. But of 16,260 teachers tracked, 12,116 (74.5%) are registered and paid. Of 965 compliant community preschool centres, 727 (75%) await arrears for three school years. Press (caution): 3,442 MINESEC teachers residing abroad would still be paid; ~5,000 would have deserted since 2023. World Bank: about 78% drop in absentees from post between 2024 and 2025 (2,200 → 480). Horizon: 9,612 retirements by 2030.

Initial training reformed: decree of 4 October 2023 — entry level raised to baccalaureate, duration of two years (previously BEPC for three years). New designation: “preschool and primary-cycle educators”. Measurable effect from the 2026–2027 cohorts.

Reading rule: a figure around 13% designates the total budget; a figure around 19% excludes debt. As % of GDP: 2.84% in 2023 (after 2.66% in 2022, below the 3.10% of 2020). INS measures domestic education spending of FCFA 926 billion in 2022, or 3.3% of GDP (households included). World Bank Public Finance Review (June 2024): cumulative education + health spending below 5% of GDP. SDG 4 benchmark: 4 to 6% of GDP and 15 to 20% of public expenditure. CEFAN claims 20 to 22% of the budget and 6% of GDP.

Finance law no. 2025/012 of 17 December 2025: state budget at FCFA 8,816.4 billion (+14%), of which FCFA 3,104.2 billion to be borrowed. Secondary weighs more than primary (MINESEC 595 bn / MINEDUB 334 — ratio 1.8; INS: 59% secondary vs 31% basic education). The education budget grows more slowly than the state budget (+2 to +7% vs +14%); CEFAN puts only +1.03% on the broadened perimeter. MINEFOP receives FCFA 33.4 billion — 3% of the envelope — while it carries the SND30 objective of raising technical and vocational education from 10% to 25% of secondary enrolment.

INS 2022: 79.8% of current education spending is salaries; capital expenditure represents only 9.3% of spending. Households fund 31% of spending at primary and 21% at secondary.

Public primary school is compulsory and free in law. Parents nonetheless pay APEE fees of FCFA 5,000 to 15,000 at primary (press 2024–2025), plus remediation, cleanliness and substitute-teacher support items. Legal lock: APEE fees are established by a 2001 presidential decree — only the President can suspend them. Confirmation of maintenance on 26 August 2024; lawsuit by the National Consumers’ Network on 4 September 2024. No abolition in 2025 or 2026. ECAM5: education spending = 4.4% of total household spending; net primary rate 70.4% among the poor against 89.4% among the non-poor; secondary 32.4% against 65.3%.

Textbook success: ratio moved from one textbook for 12 pupils (2016) to 1.5 textbooks per pupil (2023); more than four million children; unit cost cut by more than half; in December 2025, 100% of levels 1 and 2 and 54% of level 3 had the pack of three essential textbooks.

External financing: GPE — cumulative USD 220.3 M since 2006, five active grants for USD 102.1 M including PAPMEC USD 31.25 M (2026–2029) and Multiplier USD 14.87 M (IsDB). PAREC (P160926): USD 227.45 M, 155.18 M disbursed as of 22 Dec. 2025, closing 31 Dec. 2026. PADESCE (P170561): USD 125 M, disbursement 56.74% as of 12 Nov. 2025, ~408,162 pupils of whom 192,777 girls, more than 4,300 head teachers trained. Alert: both World Bank projects close on 31 December 2026; no new education project approved between 2023 and August 2026.

No factor better predicts a Cameroonian child’s school destiny than the region where they are born. A South-West candidate is twice as likely to obtain their baccalaureate as a Far North candidate. BEPC 2025: 83.77% in Littoral against 43.29% in the Far North — 40.48 points. PASEC 2019 from the start of primary: share below the language threshold from 10.0% in Littoral to 90.1% in the Far North; at end of primary Far North: 81.4% below the reading threshold, 88.6% in mathematics. ECAM5 poverty map: 69.2% Far North, 66.8% North-West, 61.1% North, against 10.8% in Yaoundé and 8.3% in Douala.

The gap was meant to shrink and it widened: coefficient of variation of regional gross rates rose from 0.215 to 0.249 (lower secondary) and from 0.156 to 0.227 (upper secondary) between 2012 and 2017. PEZs (Adamawa, East, Far North, North): 2,937 PAREC schools in PEZs (56% of 5,240); PASEC PEZ/non-PEZ gaps of 111.4 points in language and 84 in mathematics; PEZ equipment index 46%.

Social composition (INS 2021/2022): 77% of out-of-school children belong to the two poorest quintiles; these quintiles = 40% of 5–24 year-olds but 23.3% of lower secondary and 8.3% of upper secondary; the two richest quintiles = 53.5% and 75.5%. Access to Terminale: 27% urban against 5% rural. Non-literate household head: 66.6% probability of being poor, against 26.2% otherwise. Material conditions: 13 primary schools in 100 have a canteen; 2.5 latrines per 100 pupils in public primary, 0.92 per 100 in general secondary.

North-West / South-West: −37% enrolment in primary, −49% in general secondary, −50% technical (2015/2016–2017/2018). About 2,245 non-functional schools (68% NW, 39% SW — 2023 figure); 865,029 children aged 4 to 17 needing educational assistance in the two regions, out of more than 1.5 million nationally (UNICEF 2024/2025); 6 attacks on education recorded by OCHA as of September 2025. Caution: “855,000 children deprived of school in NW/SW” is a UNICEF figure from November 2019. Despite everything, the South-West ranks first at the 2026 bac (54.26%), the North-West fifth (38.58%).

Far North: 564,091 children needing educational assistance (UNICEF); another perimeter 1,126,007 pupils and 12,000 teachers; 262 schools flooded (2024); 2 schools attacked in Q1 2026; 308 people abducted in three months (OCHA, August 2026).

Post-electoral crisis Oct.–Nov. 2025: establishments closed in Douala; ghost towns; GECAM Jan. 2026 — 94% of businesses affected; MINESEC e-learning reinforcement (limits: electricity 60.2% ECAM5 2022). Unlinked signals: T3 term start postponed from 20 to 27 April 2026; bac registrations −8.8%. Partner association intervention areas: Yaoundé, Bertoua.

Most reference documents, including the UNESCO January 2024 brief, describe a system unfavourable to girls. That description is outdated on completion. Cameroonian girls now complete their schooling more often than boys, at all levels. The 2026 baccalaureate confirms it: 30,750 female admits for 24,358 male admits. Boys have a higher gross primary enrolment rate (119.2% against 109.5%) but complete less — they enter more, repeat more and exit more. Boys’ dropout is becoming a public-policy problem not yet identified as such.

What has not changed: out of school at upper-secondary age — 74.4% girls against 69.5% boys (2025). Adult literacy ECAM5 2022: 75.3% overall, 69.5% women; poor women 45.2% against 81.0% non-poor. DHS 2018: 70% women 15–49 against 83% men; 86% urban women against 50% rural women. Qualification of women teachers: 60.4% against 81.7%. HCI+ April 2026: 117 women / 139 men.

Action lever: the randomised evaluation of performance-based financing showed positive effects on girls’ retention, with no effect on learning. Placed alongside 0.92 latrine per 100 secondary pupils, this suggests that improving material conditions can act on girls’ retention, independently of pedagogical quality.

Official starting point: only 10% of children with disabilities are enrolled. A National Inclusive Education Plan 2024–2028 was validated in October 2024 (cost FCFA 100 billion, 65% funded by the state and CTDs): transform 1,289 establishments, train 8,075 teachers and supervisors, raise to at least 25% by 2027 the share of persons with specific needs enrolled in an inclusive setting. MINESEC workshop of 1 April 2026 on modalities — no execution indicator found. The INS school census identified 21,656 pupils with specific needs in 2021/2022.

INS 2021/2022: 334,913 vulnerable pupils (73% in primary), of whom 198,319 internally displaced, 85,034 refugees, 21,656 with specific needs — 29,904 in other situations. Cameroon hosts Central African refugees in the East — including the Bertoua intervention area — and Nigerians in the Far North, in addition to internally displaced from the Anglophone regions and the Far North. Updated 2025–2026 data not established.

School feeding: 13 primary schools in 100 have a canteen. In a country where 27.2% of children under five suffered from stunting in 2024, this is a missing link between health and learning. It is one reason the foundation funds and supports food aid, water access and school support together — implemented by the partner association.

SND30 sets two targets: raise technical and vocational provision from 10% to 25% of secondary enrolment, and from 18% to 35% in higher education. Frame: SNDCTP 2024–2030 (finalised Nov. 2023), law no. 2018/010. SSEF: vocational training “supports more than 300,000 young people each year”; 2025 mapping: 4,426 structures across 9 ministries, 545,789 learners. INS 2021/2022: 407,028 pupils in technical and vocational secondary out of 1,983,379 (20.5%); 59,557 learners in training centres (83.6% private). Note: SND30’s “10%” and INS’s “20.5%” do not measure the same thing — do not conclude the target is met.

Announced reform: replacement of SAR/SM by Skills Training Centres (decrees March 2026). PADESCE: 350 digital boards (Apr. 2025); more than 4,300 head teachers trained; training vouchers for 1,000 young people (3 to 6 months). Weak point: MINEFOP at FCFA 33.4 billion (3% of the envelope), headed by an interim minister in dual portfolio since 27 June 2025.

Higher education 2023/2024: 447,513 students (219,663 women); GER 16.7% (women 16.4%, men 17.0%); 40.4% in private; 7,670 teachers; 26.8% women among doctoral-level academic staff; gross graduation rate 8.32%. Eleven state universities since the decree of 5 January 2022 (Bertoua, Garoua, Ebolowa); ~96 to 98 affiliated establishments and grandes écoles. SSEF assessment: “The expansion of the university map has not been accompanied by improvement of technical platforms, equipment and infrastructure.” Reform since 12 May 2026: standard curricula and common core. Tensions: Jan. 2025 strike (debt since 2009); since July 2026, 100% of tuition fees to be paid before French student visa.

Cameroon has never been so well endowed with framing documents. The SSEF 2023–2030 (~350 pages) contains an explicit self-critical assessment of the previous strategy: failure on parent-hired teachers, worsening regional disparities, deadlock of community preschool, drift of the lower-to-upper secondary promotion rate to 92% instead of the 32.7% targeted. Vision: “promote an education system at the end of which every young graduate is sociologically integrated, bilingual, competent in a field capital for the country’s development”. Quantified 2013–2020 assessment (government): primary completion 70.8% → target 100%, achieved 75%; CM2→6e transition 69.3% → target 85%, achieved 70%.

The government charged with executing these strategies has been in place since 2019. Despite the 12 October 2025 re-election and the announcement of a new government on 31 December 2025, no reshuffle had occurred as of 3 August 2026. Four dossiers without arbitration — teacher status, APEE fees, National Education Forum, foundational education — do not ask for money, they ask for a signature.

Private-sector regulation: on 20 July 2026, three orders ending the activities of 105 private establishments in seven regions (of which 52 in Littoral) for 2026–2027 — divergent sources 105 / 205, we retain 105. The private sector hosts 25.3% of primary, 65.5% of pre-primary and 40.4% of higher education. Regulation comes after the fact.

Country briefs are abundantly copied, and their errors propagate. Below, the points of the UNESCO IICBA January 2024 brief to update, plus sourcing traps. Themes absent from the brief and central in 2026: teacher crisis and unsigned status, APEE fees, closure of both World Bank projects end 2026, National Inclusive Education Plan, upper-secondary out-of-school (71.9% out of school).

This document is an analysis, not an advocacy plan. Here are the five operational conclusions we retain for the work of the foundation and the partner association — each backed by a precise datum.

And a method conclusion, drawn from the randomised evaluation of performance-based financing: giving money to schools improves schools, not necessarily learning. Any intervention must be measured on children’s learning outcomes. Our projects are designed in that spirit.

We list here the data sought without finding them. Better a flagged gap than an estimate presented as fact. A deadline to watch: PAREC (USD 227.45 M) and PADESCE (USD 125 M) both close on 31 December 2026; relay announced via GPE (USD 31.25 M, 2026–2029) and IsDB (USD 14.87 M, 2025–2029). The 2027–2028 school year could be the first in a decade without a major World Bank operation in Cameroonian education.

Principles: every figure is dated (reference year distinct from publication year); modelled estimates distinguished from administrative data; contradictions exposed, not arbitrated; own calculations flagged (pupil/teacher ratio 43.6; repetition rate 11.6%); announcements distinguished from achievements.

Limits: no access to ministerial yearbooks 2023/2024 and 2024/2025, nor to the full ECAM5 report, nor to the full PASEC 2019 country reports. This study will be updated on publication of PASEC 2024 results (Q4 2026) and release of ministerial yearbooks. Study closed as of 3 August 2026.

To go further: Cameroon in numbers · Yaoundé · Bertoua · Zoétélé · Our projects · Business & philanthropy · guide Education in Cameroon.