From MDGs to SDGs to what comes next for education systems and the people doing the work on the ground.
Abayomi Ogundipe
In 2010, I wrote an audacious plan about wanting to see the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) written on the walls of secondary schools in my city.
I didn’t have a big platform. I just had questions.
Why were these global goals invisible to the young people whose futures they were supposed to shape? Why did development conversations feel so far away from classrooms, teachers, and community organizers?
That curiosity changed the way I see the world and what it means to be a global citizen. Learning about the MDGs didn’t stay as abstract UN language for me; it became a lens for how I looked at my own community, my work, and my responsibilities. In that first post on my personal blog, I wrote an abstract about wanting to see the MDGs physically on school walls so that young people could grow up with those goals in front of them, not hidden in reports and conferences.
Over time, I kept reflecting on it and later through more reflective pieces on Scenic Memo. Those spaces became my lab: a place to connect what I was reading about development with what I was seeing in classrooms, youth centres, and community projects.
That curiosity pulled me into a decade of work around education, youth, and social impact. I carried the MDGs with me, then watched the world transition to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015, and especially SDG 4: Quality Education.
Now we’re approaching 2030, and I find myself asking a similar question:
What comes after the SDGs, and what does that mean for education and the people doing the hard work on the ground?
The MDGs were a focused list of eight goals. The SDGs expanded that into a broader, more ambitious agenda, 17 goals covering poverty, climate, peace, equality, and more.
For education, SDG 4 promised:
But we all know the story: progress has been uneven. Millions of children are still out of school. Many are in school but not learning. Digital divides, conflict, and climate shocks are widening gaps.
So what happens after 2030?
There is no final, agreed “post-2030 agenda” yet. But if you follow UNESCO, UNICEF, the Transforming Education Summit, the Summit of the Future, and the Pact for the Future, clear patterns emerge.
Three strands are especially important if you care about education and project design:
In short: education is moving from nice to have to central infrastructure for the future.
If you run a nonprofit, school, social enterprise, or program today, the post-2030 agenda isn’t an abstract UN debate. It shows up in your daily work:
In that context, the ability to design strong projects is no longer a nice bonus. It’s survival.
I still believe classrooms, youth centers, and community spaces should be full of the language of global goals, whatever they’re called after 2030.
But for that to matter, organizations need the capacity to design projects that:
If you want to be ready for what comes after 2030, start by strengthening the way you design your next project.