Non-formal education reaches people the regular school system misses: children who are too old for their grade, nomadic and displaced children, and adults who never learned to read and write. In Somalia it ranges from alternative basic education classes to literacy courses, skills training and Qur'anic schooling.
A history of mass literacy
Somalia has a well-known precedent. After Somali was written in the Latin script in 1973, the government launched a mass literacy campaign in 1974 that sent students and civil servants to teach in rural and nomadic communities. According to research summarised by the Heritage Institute for Policy Studies, the literacy rate rose from about 5% to roughly 55%. Much of that progress was reversed by the economic crisis and conflicts of the 1980s and the collapse of the state in 1991.
Alternative Basic Education
Alternative Basic Education (ABE) programmes offer over-age and out-of-school children a shorter route through basic education, with the option of moving into formal schools. Education ministries include non-formal education in their structures: Puntland's Ministry of Education and Higher Education combines it with TVET in a single department, and Somaliland's Ministry of Education and Science has a dedicated non-formal education department.
Adult literacy and life skills
Puntland's ministry has defined non-formal education as including vocational skills, adult literacy, community health education and agricultural extension. Courses of this kind are often delivered by NGOs and community organisations with donor funding, and many combine reading and writing with practical skills.
Education in emergencies
Drought, floods and conflict regularly force families to move, and displaced children are among those most likely to lose their schooling. Humanitarian partners run temporary learning spaces and catch-up classes so that children can keep learning. Education Cannot Wait, the UN global fund for education in emergencies, has invested US$64.2 million in Somalia, including a US$17.1 million programme announced in May 2025 that aims to reach more than 43,000 children with basic literacy, numeracy and social-emotional learning. At that time the 2025 humanitarian appeal for education, US$68.6 million, was only 29% funded.
Digital learning
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, distance learning has received more attention. Puntland, for example, launched the Learning Passport, a digital learning platform developed by UNICEF with Microsoft and the University of Cambridge.
Qur'anic schools
Qur'anic schools remain the most stable and widespread form of non-formal education, with strong community support and a presence even in nomadic areas. Integrated Qur'anic schools, which add the secular curriculum, act as a bridge between this tradition and formal schooling.
Who provides it
- State education ministries, through their non-formal education departments.
- UN agencies and pooled funds, including UNICEF and Education Cannot Wait.
- International and Somali NGOs, such as Save the Children, the Norwegian Refugee Council and the private-school network FENPS, which are partners in recent emergency education programmes.