Every August 12, International Youth Day invites us to listen to youth and students. This year's theme, "Different Contexts, Common Aspirations," reminds us that while the daily reality of youth and students in a coastal village, a landlocked town, or a small island state can look nothing alike, their hopes converge: dignity, opportunity, meaningful participation, and a sustainable future. The 2026 commemoration places special attention on youth and students in Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries, and Small Island Developing States, who often navigate overlapping challenges of poverty, climate change, geographic isolation, and unequal access to technology, yet who continue to lead with resilience and innovation.

At UNESCO IESALC, we see this every day in the students, researchers, and young professionals we work with. Higher education is where "different contexts " and "common aspirations" meet. It is the space where a student from a coastal community and a student from a landlocked capital can both find the tools to shape their futures, different starting points, same conviction that learning changes what's possible.

The numbers tell part of the story. Global enrolment in higher education has more than doubled in the past two decades, reaching nearly 269 million students in 2024. But access remains deeply uneven: while enrolment rates approach 80% in some regions, they fall to roughly 9% in others. Refugees' access to higher education has grown nine-fold since 2019 yet still trails far behind the global average. These gaps are precisely why IESALC's mission, advancing inclusive, equitable, and quality higher education, is not an abstract goal. It is the difference between the aspiration of youth and students staying a dream or becoming a plan.

This Youth Day, we asked two young people what higher education means for their future. Matilde Ideias , from a coastal community in Portugal, reflects on how her studies helped her connect science and community knowledge to respond to challenges like climate change and biodiversity loss close to home. Ricardo Delgado Lander, from Venezuela, speaks to something more universal: what having access to higher education means for the future he wants to build, wherever he starts from. Two different contexts. One shared aspiration.

Their perspectives capture exactly what this year's theme is about. Higher education does not erase the different contexts youth and students come from: it equips them to respond to those contexts with knowledge, innovation, and agency. That is IESALC's commitment, higher education for the people: to keep expanding access as a genuine enabler of opportunity, wherever youth and students start from.

Watch the full video to hear Matilde and Ricardo say it in their own words, one minute that captures why higher education matters for youth and students everywhere, in every context.