Michelle Kaffenberger, Head of Evidence Translation for the What Works Hub for Global Education, writes in the News and Views section of Nature Human Behaviour on the learning gap. Despite huge global increases in school attendance since 1950, in many places learning achievement has remained very low. In low- and middle-income countries, at least 53% of 10-year-olds cannot read and understand a simple story, and in sub-Saharan Africa 87% cannot.