STEM education is crucial for driving economic growth, fostering technological innovation, and addressing global challenges in the Asia-Pacific region. In 2023, Malaysia and India emerged as leading contributors to STEM education. Malaysia excels with approximately 43.5% of tertiary students earning STEM degrees, while India, with 34.0% of its students in STEM, tops the global charts in STEM graduates due to its massive population of about 1.4 billion. With nine of the top ten emerging jobs by 2025 projected to be in STEM fields, these nations are well-positioned to meet future workforce demands. Recognizing this, we examined key challenges in STEM education and calls for strategic investments to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. We leveraged the PRISMA-ScR framework and content analysis of literature from 2010 to 2024, identifying seven STEM education challenges across all levels of educational institutions: Teaching practices, learning approaches, gender disparities, location, career interest, student enrollment, and student soft skills. The most pressing challenges in STEM education are teaching practices, learning approaches, and gender disparities, with issues most pronounced at the secondary school level and continuing into higher education. The study‘s findings advance theoretical understanding of STEM education obstacles and provide a foundation for further research. Practically, this work offers crucial insights for educators, policymakers, and stakeholders, enabling the development of targeted interventions to improve teaching quality, enhance learning experiences, and foster gender inclusivity in STEM. Addressing these issues is vital to advancing Sustainable Development Goal 4, promoting a more accessible, equitable, and impactful STEM education across the Asia-Pacific region. This study thus enriches the literature on the challenges of STEM education by offering a comprehensive, unbiased review of past research, drawing broader conclusions, and outlining pathways for future exploration. © 2025 AIMS Press.
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