System strengthening

We have been working on at-scale education reform in Africa for over 30 years, and globally for a decade longer. This work includes both research on powerful international case studies of successful school reform, and as practical working in partnership with Ministries of Education to deliver school improvement at scale.

Our teams have expertise in supporting education at all levels of the education system – from designing solutions to bolster foundational literacy and numeracy skills, to interventions to support transitions from education into work. In addition to using evidence-informed benchmarks to monitor progress, we tailor interventions to local contexts to maximise gains in learning outcomes – especially for the most marginalised learners.  Based on our proven delivery models, we strengthen schools as hubs of professional learning, supporting practitioners to build professional networks to scale effective policies and practices, and we develop professionals at the middle tier of systems as change agents for effective delivery.

Our recent work in system strengthening in Africa includes:

• Our UK Aid-funded Building Learning Foundations (BLF) programme, which focuses on establishing solid foundations at lower primary level in all government and government-aided schools
• Our TARGET programme in Ethiopia, which supports the World Bank’s General Education Quality Improvement Programme for Equity (GEQUIP-E) by training government agencies, reforming school leadership training, improving school planning and activities, and strengthening monitoring and evaluation.
• Our Wasichana Wetu Wafaulu programme in Kenya, part of the UK Aid-funded Girls’ Education Challenge (GEC), which encourages and supports vulnerable girls to transition into secondary school and alternative pathways.
• Delivering the teacher professional development component of the TEACH (Teacher Effectiveness and Equitable Access for All Children programme) in Zimbabwe, bolstering the foundations of the education system and enhancing teacher effectiveness to improve the quality of education.