Understanding School Enrollment in the Free Education Era: Roadblocks to Meeting the Sustainability Development Goal

For decades, Pakistan's government has continuously provided its citizens with accessible, universal, basic education; however, these efforts have not yielded any gains for the citizens. Consequently, Pakistan has a lower literacy rate, one of the lowest in South Asia and the rest of the world. Although such a substantial issue is daunting and weakens the country's educational system, there needs to be more evidence that proposes potential implications or interventions in identifying the most important in-school factors of primary school enrollment in Pakistan. Therefore, the present study derived a literature review-driven hypothesis and administered a rigour analysis using the 2018 school census from the Punjab government education commission, showing detailed information on 24,305 public primary schools. The finding of this study asserts that the medium of instruction has shown a considerable impact on primary school enrollment and the availability of qualified teachers. Single-sex schools, WASH facilities, and the security of schools have significant and diverse effects in determining student enrollment, which leads to forwarding possible implications to scholars, educators, and policymakers.