OPTIONAL SESSIONS
PROGRAM & LINKS

HIV/AIDS

Contact Person: Brad Strickland bstrickland@afr-sd.org

HIV/AIDS MODULE
Brad Strickland, Anthony Kinghorn & Megan Thomas

Monday & Tuesday, July 17 & 18, 1:30 - 3:30 (Option 1)

This module explored the radical consequences of HIV/AIDS for educational development and looked at the practical action that educational professionals can take in response. In the first session, participants and facilitators assessed the cost implications of HIV/AIDS on the teaching force and other programmatic areas of a Ministry of Education. Participants also became familiar with some of the tools available for Ministries of Education in making strategic planning and budget decisions. In the second session, participants and facilitators brainstormed ways to re-engineer education in Africa in light of the cost implications of HIV/AIDS.


IMPACT OF HIV/AIDS
Brad Strickland, Anthony Kinghorn, Megan Thomas

Wednesday, July 19, 8:15 - 10:00

This plenary session synthesized the input of the HIV/AIDS module working groups. Facilitators, working groups and participants explored the radical consequences of HIV/AIDS for educational development and looked at the practical action that educational professionals can take in response.


The following resources and links are relevant to HIV/AIDS

The economics of HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment:
http://www.worldbank.org/aids-econ/

Preliminary Discussion Draft of Vision Statement, Emphasis Areas, Goals and Interventions For Ghana Education Sector HIV/AIDS Strategic Plan (Click here to download as a WORD document)

USAID Africa Bureau Activity Summary (Partial): Mitigating the Impacts of HIV/AIDS on Education in Africa (Click here to download as a WORD document)

HIV/AIDS TOOLKIT: WHY HIV/AIDS IS A GOVERNMENT ISSUE (Click here to download as a WORD document)

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Teacher Development

Contact Persons: David R. Evans dre@educ.umass.edu and Michel Welmond mwelmond@rti.org

TEACHER DEVELOPMENT MODULE
David R. Evans & Michel Welmond

Monday & Tuesday, July 17 & 18, 1:30 - 3:30 (Option 2)

"Teacher training, development and management should be considered an integral part of the school system so that the contributions of teachers are more likely to improve classroom learning." In this module, participants explored two major themes: (1) the design of new approaches to teacher development; and (2) the importance of the policy and management framework needed to insure that investments in teachers produce the desired results. Facilitators and participants explored reasons for the ineffectiveness of current models of teacher education and utilized case studies to propose possible alternatives. Using a range of examples, facilitators and participants also considered the different dimensions of teacher management, including recruitment, deployment, qualifications, supervision and incentive structures, and looked at how these dimensions affect the outcome of teacher development decisions.

Resources for Teacher Development:

Commonwealth of Learning
http://www.col.org/teaed.htm

Center for the Study of Teaching and Policy
http://www.ctpweb.org

Youth/Workforce Development

Contact Person: Monika Aring maring@edc.org

YOUTH/WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT
Monika Aring

Thursday & Friday, July 20 & 21, 1:30 - 3:30 (Option 1)

From Crisis to Opportunity: a human-centered workforce development strategy for growing people and economies.

Utilizing case study, roleplay and discussion, this workshop provided participants with a highly interactive experience designed to produce the following results:

1) a new insight into what workforce development is (and is not);

2) an understanding of the issues confronted by countries who want to improve their human resource base;

3) an experience of a powerful, results-based planning process that grounds workforce development inside a vision for future growth that is owned by all stakeholders; and

4) a collaborative inquiry into how aid organizations can make the most effective investments for workforce development.

Related Resources:

Center for Workforce Development:
http://www.edc.org/CWD/

Youth Employment Summit:
http://www2.edc.org/YES2002/

Community Participation

Contact Persons: Joy Wolf jwolf@shentel.net and Janet Robb janet@caii-dc.com

COMMUNITY CHANGE: (A) DEFINING INVOLVEMENT (B) EXPLORING THE LESSONS
Joy Wolf, Janet Robb

Thursday & Friday, July 20 & 21, 1:30 - 3:30 (Option 2)

Session A -- Community Change: Defining Involvement -- introduced participants to a system for exploring differences and similarities among community programs. Facilitators and participants considered the range of approaches to community involvement as well as ways of matching the approach to the context. Working in groups (according to type of community involvement experience), participants looked at key issues, such as the meaning of "participation" in different kinds of community involvement.

Session B -- Community Change: Exploring the Lessons --utilized case studies (three social mobilization campaigns conducted in Malawi) to examine the lessons that have been learned from community involvement programs. Participants looked at lessons relating to program design, methodologies, participation and sustainability.

Resources and Links for Community Participation:

Community Schools Alliance
http://www.edc.org/CSA

Quality Learning

Contact Person: Jane Schubert jschubert@air.org

QUALITY LEARNING
Jane Schubert & Diane Prouty

Concurrent Afternoon Session (Option 1)
Monday & Tuesday, July 24 & 25 1:30 - 3:30

This session articulated the meaning of "quality teaching and learning" in relation to USAID Mission responsibilities, i.e., fulfilling SOs and R4s; monitoring progress and impact of programme implementation; developing and designing programmes; and facilitating policy dialogues.

In this session, participants had the opportunity to:

• Share individual definitions of "quality learning and teaching" and discuss definitions from the literature;
• View classroom tapes to pinpoint "quality" learning and teaching behaviors;
• Explore the quality issues that need to be addressed in order to successfully perform on the job;
• Share procedures for assessing teaching and learning and explore ways of using this information to fulfill diverse job requirements; and
• Consider ways of integrating activities which contribute to sustainability.

Facilitators provided a variety of materials including articles about recent research on quality, examples of assessment instruments, and articles on education standards, assessment and accountability as well as other items of interest.

Related Resources:

Improving Educational Quality
http://www.ieq.org

The following is a restricted version of the IEQ Research Tools and is currently under development. Comments and suggestions regarding the site are appreciated and can be sent to Jane Schubert at jschubert@air.org
http://198.69.134.149/ieq/

Africa Bureau Technical Sector Review: Education
(Click here to download as a WORD document)

Information Technologies & Education

Contact Person: Steve Dorsey sdorsey@aed.org

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGIES FOR EDUCATIONAL STRENGTHENING
Steve Dorsey & Stacy Cummings

Monday, July 24, 1:30 - 3:30 (Option 2)

This session focused on the traditional and emerging roles of information technologies (IT) in education. Participants shared and discussed the most critical issues currently facing their educational systems before exploring the potential supporting role of IT in addressing these issues and identifying implementation challenges. Participants also had the opportunity to gain hands-on experience with new IT tools in developing a short, low-end multimedia presentation/mini distance learning course that showed how IT can address specific educational issues.

Related Resources:

LearnLink
http://www.aed.org/learnlink/

TechKnowLogia (Online Journal)
http://www.techknowlogia.com/

AED's Millenium Education Project:
http://millennium.aed.org

Knowledge Exchange and Learning Partnerships:
http://www.kelp.org

Journal on Technology and Education:
http://www.TechKnowLogia.org/

Areas in Crisis/Transition

Contact Persons: John Hatch jhatch@usaid.gov and Talaat Moreau tmoreau@air.org

AREAS IN CRISIS/TRANSITION
Talaat Moreau & John Hatch

Concurrent Afternoon Session (Option 2/Session 2) Tuesday 25 July, 1:30 - 3:30

Facilitators and participants discussed the findings of research on basic education in countries in crisis undertaken by the Africa Bureau's education team (for which thirty international organizations and non-governmental organizations working in this field were interviewed). In this part of the session, participants were encouraged to help the facilitators identify oversights, explore alternative approaches and examine the role of USAID. Participants also were asked to share their own experiences and insights into what works and what doesn't work in crisis situations . The session also presented an opportunity to do some "hands-on" research on the Global Information Networks in Education (GINIE) website - a clearinghouse for information on crisis.

Resources:

Global Information Network in Education (GINIE): http://ginie.sched.pitt.edu/index.html

Assessing Learning

Contact Person: Steve Ferrara sferrara@air.org

The session on assessment began with some definitions and an explanation of the “principle of alignment.”

Definitions

Assessment is any systematic basis for making inferences about characteristics of people, usually based on various sources of evidence; it is also the global process of synthesizing information about individuals in order to understand and describe them better. This process stops just short of evaluation, or the making of value judgments.

Formative assessment is ongoing, diagnostic assessment providing information to guide instruction and improve student performance.

Summative assessment is culminating assessment for a unit, grade, or course of study that provides a status report on mastery or degree of proficiency according to identified standards.

A test is one type of instrument to make assessments or evaluations. It may be a set of questions, with a limited range of acceptable answers, designed to elicit responses that permit an inference about what a student knows or can do.

The principle of alignment

How curricula, instruction, and assessment are “aligned” is important. For example, it there have been instances where school systems would develop new curricula that teachers then ignored. In response, the school systems would revise the curricula yet again. In the late 1970s in the United States, assessments were developed that showed teachers were not “teaching students how to think, organize their thoughts, and present their ideas persuasively.” Instead they were teaching grammar, despite school leaders’ insistence that they teach these other things. The assessments helped begin changing this lack of alignment.

Participants pointed out other sources of misalignment. There may be no national curricula while there may be national tests; educational policy (and reform), curriculum frameworks, and assessment may not be clearly linked or the linkages may not have been articulated; the alignment could vary by region or by the resources available to the schools; and alignment can vary according to the degree of system centralization. The important point is that all these elements are related, and the stakes for the students are quite high.

Related Resources:

Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development
http://www.ascd.org/

National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST)
http://www.cse.ucla.edu/

Country Team Reports

Contact Person: Norm Rifkin normrifkin@aol.com

During the second week of the training, participants began moving toward the application of some of the ideas they had been discussing. On Monday, each country team chose an “assignment” to work on throughout the week—to design or revise the mission’s education sector strategy, results framework, or activities plan/management strategy. Participants continued to attend presentations and discussions in the morning, but in the afternoons divided into country teams and met informally with resource people to prepare their presentations. On Friday morning, Ron Bonner allowed each team to make a brief presentation of the results, and allowed followup questions from the participants. A brief summary of the presentation follows:

Benin

The problem: Benin’s education SO was too wordy and abstract and was too hard to measure, even though it did describe the kind of education system USAID wants to help the country build. IR1 suffered from wordiness. And the 21 indicators were too numberous and cumbersome.

The solution: The Benin team revised the strategic framework, rewording and simplifying the SO; redefining equity to include rural/urban; and combining IRs. The new SO has only four IRs and the number of indicators has been greatly reduced. In addition, the new framework makes clearer the cross-relationships between IRs. For example, the work on the curriculum and textbooks will reflect the focus on equity; and NGO and PTA strengthening will be related to work in sectoral finance.

The assumptions the Benin team made are that textbooks are replaced as appropriate, decentralization proceeds and becomes “effective,” and the ministry of education provides schools with adequate staff.

The team will present the new plan to the mission, revise the PMP, and begin to develop the consensus with the mission and stakeholders to move forward.

Comments from participants:

… The new framework could take into account what government, other players (including donors) are doing or need to do.
… The SO is a long-term objective, and the mission should be on the lookout for changes to occur first at the IR and subIR levels.
… Indicators should not drive the mission’s program, that is, you shouldn’t not do something because you cannot measure it.
… As there are no cost figures in the RF, there is no means of assessing whether, on a cost basis, the interventions are worthwhile.
… The RF does not take into account the effect of HIV/AIDS on demographics. Will the gross enrollment rate be an adequate indicator in such an environment?


Guinea

The Guinea team also revised and simplified its SO, but divided an IR into two to better describe the different activities the mission is supporting. The team also developed a set of indicators forthe IRs.

Comments from participants:

… " The IRs related to community participation need to make more clear the desired relationships among communities and the outside environment, e.g., local government and the ministry of education.
… " The quality index used to measure improved instruction should be more detailed. How will the mission measure instruction?
… " Sub-IRs can be activities phrased as results.
… " IR3 is a means to an end and touches all other IRs.
… " Does the framework recognize the difference between input and impact?
… " Could the framework benefit from use of process indicators?
… " The connection between inputs and impacts can be multiple. For example, a training activity can train so many teachers, who in turn may change their teaching practices, which in turn may lead to improvements in student achievement. On the other hand, these changes might not materialize. Does that mean that an activity was not worthwhile when the impact cannot be measured at the student level?


Mali

The Mali team’s objective was to develop an analytical framework to use in developing a plan to improve access to and the quality of community schools. The rationale for the plan was that community schools represent the most viable opportunity for Mali to attain universal primaryenrollment while promoting quality.

The development hypothesis of the team was that community participation in schooling leads to improved access and quality. Access will improve as communities create adequate school facilities, and quality will improve as more (and better) teachers and materials arrive in these classrooms. As the quality improves, more parents will enroll more children, demand will increase, and communities will contribute their share to accommodating the new demand by ensuring the creation of more facilities.

Comments from participants:

… The central question is political–no matter how strong all the other arguments are, politics can sweep away any reform effort.
… Community schools are a threat to the “entrenched” school system and the “colonial mentality.” We should look at how to engage the government and civil service in the process.


South Africa

The South Africa team continued some of the mission’s work in trying to define and measure quality in a convincing way, focusing on basic education. Team members tried to develop an indicator at the IR level that measures quality more convincingly than the exiting indicator, which the team “relegated” to the sub-IR level.

The new “composite indicator” for primary education is the percentage of DDSP schools in which three out of four quality criteria are met: the practice of continuous assessment; the systematic maintenance of records; the development of school governing body constitutions; and the utilization of library boxes. For each of these indicators, the team developed one to five sub-IRs.The team’s develoment hypothesis was that if quality criteria are implemented, greater student learning will result. The hypothesis will be tested by correlating test scores with schools that have and have not implemented the quality criteria.

Comments from participants:
… Some of the sub-IRs are “tenuous,” and it may be difficult to show that learning is really improving.
… It will be difficult to collect the data on the 20 or so indicators listed for the IR.
… Why is the focus on schools rather than classrooms or quality?
… Does the SO reflect that the mission works in only a few provinces? Will the sample be national or local?
… There is a need to articulate and link the impact of USAID’s work to the overall education system.


Zambia

The Zambia Team, having stated that the country Results Package for their SO had just been reviewed, presented an overview of the results framework, IRs, and performance monitoring indicators. The SO indicators call for increases in assessment scores as well as in enrollments and retention. This plan was unique among all the presentations in that it made an effort to take into account of the effect of the HIV/AIDS crisis on education.

The Zambia Team outlined HIV/AIDS school-based activities that could be fit into the existing IRs. Some of the activities outlined by the team to lead to the IRs included:

… NGO programs to provide daycare and school feeding – IR2.1
… Interactive radio instruction for out-of-school youth – IR2.1
… Bursary scheme/fund – IR2.1
… School feeding program – IR2.2
… Life skills education – IR2.2
… Peer and teacher counseling – IR2.2
… IEC campaigns – IR2.2
… Data collection and impact analysis related to teachers and orphans – IR2.3
… Intersectoral working groups on HIV/AIDS and orphans – IR2.3
… Dissemination workshops – IR2.3
… Research – IR2.3

Comments from participants:
… What is the impact of the country’s “context” statistics on the program?
… How will you replace teachers lost to AIDS?
… Is Zambia considering alternative school models? Incentives?
… How is the government reacting to the HIV/AIDS crisis?
… Does the government have the resources to address the problem? What can be done right now?
… How do health education, MIS, and girls’ participation link to the SO? (The answer was that a range of other activities are being undertaken by the ministry and other donors. USAID’s work complements the overall sectoral investment program.)