CONNECTING THE DISCONNECTED: FROM SCHOOL EXCLUSION TO EDUCATIONAL TRANSITION THROUGH ACCELERATED LEARNING PROGRAMS IN BALOCHISTAN, PAKISTAN

Abstract

Globally, an estimated 272 million children and youth remain out of school, obstructing progress toward Sustainable Development Goal 4 (UNESCO, 2025). Balochistan has the highest proportion of out-of-school children among all provinces in Pakistan. To address this challenge, Accelerated Learning Programs (ALPs) provide overage out-of-school children with an alternative pathway to complete primary education and transition into formal schools. Despite the growing implementation of these programs, limited evidence explains why children remain out of school before enrolling in ALPs or the barriers they encounter when transitioning from ALPs to mainstream education. This study examined both questions through a sequential explanatory mixed-methods design in the Quetta Division. Quantitative data were collected from 315 students (212 who had never attended school, 103 who had dropped out) and were analyzed using chi-square tests and McNemar's test, followed by semi-structured interviews with 16 key informants. Among children who had never enrolled, access and environmental barriers were most common (45.5%), followed by socioeconomic (31%) and sociocultural constraints (15.5%); among those who had dropped out, institutional and administrative failures dominated (42.7%), followed by learning and engagement problems (21.3%), access barriers (13.7%), and socioeconomic pressures (12.6%). These differences held across all six reason categories examined (χ² ranging from 9.47 to 103.60, p < .01), and the categories themselves were unevenly distributed overall (χ²(5, N = 543) = 125.94, p < .001). Reasons for exclusion (prior enrollment in ALP) and expected transition barriers diverged significantly across five of six categories, the exception being sociocultural constraint (p = .213), while key informants cited to Poverty & economic deprivation, Access, poor education quality and lack of facilities in schools, gendered norms, low parental awareness & educational prioritization, and governance neglect running consistently through both stages. Exclusion and transition thus demand separate policy responses: expanding access and strengthening educational quality alone are insufficient without a properly resourced government-led transition mechanism and sustained, gender- and culture-focused attention across the educational journey.