All countries have pledged to eliminate gender disparities in primary and secondary education by 2005. According to the new edition of the EFA Global Monitoring Report, 54 countries are at risk of not achieving this goal on present trends.More than 56 percent of the 104 million out of school children are girls and over two-thirds of the world’s 860 million illiterates are women.But reaching equality is not just a question of numbers. It implies the same chances of learning, of benefiting from equitable treatment within the school and the same opportunities in terms of employment, wages and civic participation.This new edition of the Report highlights innovative and best practice, suggests priorities for national strategies and examines how the international community is meeting its commitments towards EFA.