A Review of DANIDA ROI Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan
Identifying Good Practice and Replicability
14/12/2011
Cliff Lonsdale
A Review of DANIDA ROI Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan
Identifying Good Practice and Replicability
Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ...... 2 RECOMMENDATIONS ...... 4 ACRONYMS ...... 9 BACKGROUND ...... 10 INTRODUCTION ...... 15 STUDY METHODOLOGY ...... 16 DEFINITION OF BEST PRACTICE ...... 16 STUDY FINDINGS ...... 17 PROGRAMME INFORMATION ...... 25 ALTERNATIVE EDUCATION SYSTEM (AES) ...... 25 FUNCTIONAL ADULT LITERACY / BASIC FUNCTIONAL ADULT LITERACY ...... 28 EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT (ECD) ...... 30 CHILD PROTECTION MECHANISMS ...... 32 ACCESS TO SOFTWARE ...... 36 ACCESS TO HARDWARE ...... 36 GENDER SPECIFIC POLICIES ...... 38 VULNERABLE GROUPS ...... 41 CONFLICT AND FRAGILITY IN EDUCATION ...... 42 ATURAL AND ANMADE ONDITIONS
N M C ...... 42 | | GOSS MOE PRIORITIES ...... 43 BEST PRACTICE AND RECOMMENDATIONS ...... 45 ECD...... 46 ALP ...... 47 VCALP ...... 47 SAT/ GEM ...... 47 PTA ...... 48 SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION ...... 48 USE OF LOCAL NGO AS IMPLEMENTING PARTNERS ...... 48 ACCESS TO A SCHOOL FEEDING PROGRAMME ...... 49 ENGAGEMENT WITH THE LOCAL EDUCATION AUTHORITIES ...... 50 CONCLUSION ...... 50 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...... 50 REFERENCES ...... 51 APPENDIX A: TERMS OF REFERENCE ...... 52 APPENDIX B: LIST OF INFORMANTS ...... 54 APPENDIX C: METHODOLOGIES ...... 56 APPENDIX D: PRIMARY SCHOOLS SUPPORTED BY THE PROGRAMME ...... 57 APPENDIX E: BEST PRACTICE ...... 60
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1 Executive Summary The purpose of this report is to review the current DANIDA Regions of Origin (ROI) funded education programmes in South Sudan with an aim to identify best practice, taking into consideration transferability and replicability. Particular attention will be drawn to recommendations made with a view to improving the access to and quality of education in South Sudan1 See the Terms of Reference in APPENDIX A
The report was carried out following recommendations made in the DANIDA “Review of the Regions of Origin Initiative 2009-2011” 2
“To ensure systematic utilisation in overall strategic educational development of experience gained by the NGOs, steps would need to be taken to initiate the collection, analysis and assessment of these experiences with a view to their transferability and replication across the education system, and with particular attention to possibilities of improving the quality of education. It is recommended that SC with their firm position in and prioritisation of education be requested to be the key agency in this undertaking”.
The report was written after an extensive background review of supporting documents and a four-week visit to South Sudan, travelling to Central Equitoria (CES) Juba, Northern Bahr el Ghazal (NBeG) Aweil East and South and Jonglei, Bor Counties. These locations were selected as the organisations receiving this particular funding stream have programmes in these locations. It was anticipated that visiting those regions would meet the requirements of the study and enable the maximum number of programmes and organisations to be seen in the allocated time. Although not physically possible to visit the entire country, nor all the activities in the programme, it is expected that this sample of experience will provide sufficient diversity and range of information to validate the conclusions and recommendations. Logistical and linguistic
problems caused minor inconveniences to the collection of data, although this should not impact
on the ultimate findings and recommendations. |
A full range of methodologies were used to obtain information and these are highlighted in the report.
The initial findings, based on the experiences and information gained are that access to and the quality of education in South Sudan is affected by:
The diminishing amount of the national budget allocated to Education by the Government of South Sudan (GoSS)3 The low numbers of qualified, and or paid teachers in the Education system The quality of teaching in the classrooms The consideration of child protection and safe learning environments, including the prevention of use of corporal punishment in the classrooms The availability and quality of teaching and learning materials
1 Agencies included in the review: SC, NRC, DRC, DCA, C&D. See page 17 of the main report for more details on their programmes and input into this paper. 2 2 DANIDA “Review of the Regions of Origin Initiative 2009-2011 in support of the Implementation of the Comprehensive Peace DANIDA “Review of the Regions of Origin Initiative 2009-2011 in support of the Implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement Sudan 2010-2011 Final Report” January 2011 3 GoSS budgetary allocation to education has decreased: from 10% in 2006 to 6.2% in 2008/2009, to 6% in 2010. Well below the
EFA-FTI target of 20% There is therefore a huge budget gap between the MoE proposed budget and the actual allowance of around Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 40%. 2 The capacity of the Ministry of Education (MoE) and the County and State Local Education Authorities to address the needs and demands of the education system Economic barriers at household level impacting on the attendance, accessibility and dropout rate of children especially girls attending school, due to the need to supplement the family income Cultural barriers such as the use of the dowry system and traditionally imposed gender roles influencing the opportunities for girls to attend and sustain access to education. The involvement of the local community, including ownership of school buildings, and contribution to construction Shortage of and poor condition of classroom buildings and school infrastructure Influence on education through insecurity and natural and manmade conditions
The solution to these problems could be described as a jigsaw puzzle. Several iNGO’s are implementing different, although often very similarly, targeted programmes, with varied success, to address the numerous needs of the fragile education system and its beneficiaries. It is very difficult to categorically state which pieces of that puzzle are the most important, or whether pieces can be removed without negative consequences. The foundations of the solution clearly lie with a strong government, economy and civil society; the continuation of
peace, and the eradication of intertribal conflicts
| | and insecurity; the development of a strong gender equality policy that can work alongside cultural and traditional expectations and the continued support from the international donors and iNGO’s and the capacity building of all key players in the process.
There is no quick fix solution; only a well-documented, well-orchestrated and well-structured intervention can have any lasting impact as the country continues to progress from an emergency phase into one of sustainable and lasting development.
This report makes the following recommendations based on the information gathered. Qualitative information has been ascertained from a representative sample of all of the individuals and organisations most directly involved and affected by the Education system, from the Ministry of Education to homeless children in the streets. Quantitative information has also been collected to use in collaboration with the qualitative data.
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3 Recommendations
1. Continue to work in collaboration with the GoSS and increase efforts in advocating for an increase in the annual budgetary allocation to all education programmes. As highlighted in the SC rewrite the future impact evaluation.4 2. Continue to carry out capacity building activities at both MoE and County level to increase collaboration and connectivity whilst improving reporting and communication channels and accountabilities. 3. Continue to support and advocate to the Government in meeting the huge needs of the Education system for increased numbers of recruited teachers, including the employment of current volunteer teachers. 4. Continue to improve the quality of teaching through thorough training, assessment, monitoring, and support for County Education inspections. 5. Continued construction initiatives to increase the numbers of permanent / semi- permanent classrooms, and school facilities such as store rooms, kitchens, offices, boreholes and latrines. 6. Facilitate and enable the access to a school feeding program for all schools, through a system of evaluation, implementation and capacity building support. 7. Continued use of community groups such as Parent Teachers Associations (PTA’s) to maintain links between the community and school, utilizing their knowledge in increasing the demand and advocating for continued growth in the education sector, whilst promoting child protection both in school and in the community. 8. Continued use of Social Advocacy Teams (SAT’s) and Girls Education Movement (GEM) clubs to address the cultural and traditional barriers to education, especially for girls and vulnerable children whilst maintaining those initiatives to achieve longevity of the changes and improvements to education, and continuing to
incorporate the important message of child protection.
9. Address the economic barriers preventing access to education through developing |
integrated cross cutting linkages between different development programmes and ensuring that the needs of the most vulnerable children are met, socially, economically and educationally. 10. Develop long-lasting sustainable relationships between the implementing organisations and the communities, schools, local NGO’s and local education teams. 11. Continue to develop and provide child friendly, protective environments that consider the welfare of the children attending school, ensuring that they are introduced to important life skills such as health, hygiene and children’s rights. 12. Improve communications and collaborations between implementing partners, removing barriers, unnecessary repetitions and sharing best practice. Enabling programmes across all interventions to collectively contribute to the success of each.
One of the difficulties in delivering an education programme in the context of South Sudan is that there are very little structures already in place. Unlike other post conflict countries that may have previously had a fully functioning education system, infrastructure and relative ‘normality’ before the conflict, much of that is missing in a country that has seen many years of war and instability. This means that literally everything from infrastructure to systems and processes is being developed from scratch, with little time to evaluate and trial the initiatives. Education systems are generally developed over a very long period of time with changes and amendments facilitated to meet the individual needs of those involved. This is a luxury that the MoE doesn’t
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 4 Save the Children “Impact Evaluation of the Rewrite the Future (RtF) programme in Southern Sudan 2011 4 have. What often happens is that to address these huge inadequacies and in response to immediate needs programmes, through an emergency response, tend to address the surface problems without depth, attempting to cover all the needs in one go with little structure for lasting change, or sustainability; or on the other hand, concentrate specifically on key areas leaving other important aspects out of the equation. As discussed in the jigsaw analogy, any successful programme will need to address the key areas, where change can be most effective, whilst ensuring that this sustainable change will be firmly rooted. Arguably, all the elements pictorially represented in the jigsaw are equally important, however the below information highlights those areas that have been seen to be having the most impact, or could be considered best practice.
Points 1 and 2 (Increased Advocacy and Capacity building):
The use of (SC) Technical Advisors (TA) strategically seconded to the Ministry of Education in Juba is a very positive influence, and this approach has been used to great effect by SC since 2006. The Director Generals that were interviewed were very complementary of their contributions; although only one TA remains in the MoE it is still considered a very vital role. Training was carried out by the TA’s with State and Country education teams. Although not completely demonstrating best practice in its current state, it can be seen that the role of the TA could be extended and utilized effectively to improve the communication channels between the state, county and national level MoE, whilst assisting in the continuing advocacy for increased budgetary support and increased resources. The continued presence of a TA in the MoE should be used to improve the capacity of the MoE, and perhaps further roles could be included to provide individual TA’s to each state and county team (as the former Academy for Education Development, now FHI 360, technical assistance programme (TAP) provides) in a solely capacity building and network developing exercise for a set period of time, with clearly defined
goals and objectives that can be regularly monitored and evaluated to ensure continuity and
| | successful change. Evidence of the influence of the SC initiative in this area can be seen
through the results achieved so far in terms of the development of policy guidelines, syllabuses and curriculum materials in Alternative Education System (AES) and Early Childhood Development (ECD). The TA’s have also had an influential role in the development of the teacher’s payroll system, and thus making the MoE one of the few ministries with a working payroll system in place.
Point 3 and 4 (Increased numbers and quality of Teachers):
The Education system is massively understaffed and under skilled. According to the GoSS EMIS report of 2010, there are 26,658 teachers employed (only 12.3% female) however only 11,971 (44.9%) of them are classified as trained, although not necessarily ‘qualified’5. Although the GoSS is implementing recruitment of teachers, and training, the pupil to teacher ratio (currently at 52.6) is increasing year on year as the numbers attending schools is increasing at a rate faster than the teachers are being employed and trained. The government have recently moved from the teacher training system run mainly by NGO’s known as Phase Training, where teachers were trained during the school holidays over a period of three years or three phases, to a unified pre-service and in-service training. Although not an MoE policy yet, those teachers who had started yet not completed the phase training will more than likely have to start from the beginning of the 4- year In-Service training programme. There have however been discussions
5 A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A EMIS states that “Trained teachers are those that have completed pre-service teacher training, in-service teacher training, and have a higher education diploma
5 on this and as reflected in the minutes of the 2010 ERDF6 it is expected that those teachers that have graduated from the Phase 3 stage of the training will be allowed to commence the In- Service training at stage 2, as the content of the In-Service stage 1 follows closely the Phase training. Although this will mean that they probably get a more thorough training, it does delay their status as trained teachers by anything up to two years which may have a negative impact on their moral, their opportunity for earning salaries and also a delay in the process of reducing the pupil to teacher ratio and improving the quality of teaching. All of the implementing partners are carrying out some form of teacher training, generally this training is very brief and an ambitious attempt to change the habits of a lifetime, in a very short space of time. The (IBIS) Accelerated Learning Programme (ALP) teacher training is a very thorough and detailed programme that covers one whole year and also continues with regular support and refresher trainings.
Were the iNGO’s able to implement in assistance to the GoSS their own teacher trainings at local level ensuring that they maintained a high enough standard of training, this would assist in increasing the numbers of trained teachers and thus alleviating, in the short-term, some of the pressure on the GoSS enabling them to concentrate further on increasing recruitment numbers and employing the volunteer and recently qualified teachers. However this could not be considered a lasting solution, only a proper coordinated MoE teacher training programme can be the long term goal.
Points 5 and 6 (Increased number of Classrooms Access to School Feeding Programme):
As the vast majority of teaching spaces in South Sudan are actually outdoor classrooms under trees there is a huge need for the improvement and construction of permanent and semi- permanent classrooms. The classrooms (DRC) that are being constructed in Aweil South using the Hydraform bricks are an excellent example of innovation to save time and money. The
classrooms are spacious, well-built and add a massive injection of trust into the school from the | | community. The children and teachers alike feel more empowered and value education, the moral of the teachers increasing as the community validates their efforts. The PTA’s who have worked hard to collect the raw materials are hugely involved in the project and enable the communities to share the responsibilities and ownership of the school. The accessibility of raw materials being different in different States in the country may mean that this is not always the most cost effective option. Also the massive immediate need may be too much to address in the short life of a programme, however the (IBIS) semi-permanent structures being built from locally sourced materials and zinc roofs could be used in conjunction with the construction of permanent classrooms to quickly meet the demands for classrooms until such a time as to be eventually replaced with more permanent structures. Due to the economic barriers preventing children from attending school, the opportunity to access World Food Programme (WFP) School feeding programmes should be utilized to bring much needed relief to families and encourage healthy children to continue to attend school. The prerequisites of such programmes are simple to achieve and with fairly little investment and time. If a school has a permanently built store room, kitchen, latrines and a functional PTA then they can apply to be included. The ECD programme (SC) provides one meal a day to the pre-Primary classes, this vital nutrition ensures that the youngest children can continue to grow and develop their mental, physical and cognitive abilities whilst attending school.
Access to food is a very important area of concern for all the communities in South Sudan, and schools that have school feeding programmes are demonstrating better attendance and
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 6 European Regional Development Fund 6 increased enrolment. Although not possible to ascertain fully whether there is a noticeable improvement in learning outcomes, or an improved transition from Primary to Secondary school, it can be assumed that through increased attendance alone more learning is taking place, and therefore there will be an improvement of learning outcomes and higher numbers of children progressing further in the education system.
Points 7 and 8 (Utilizing community and student groups):
This simple act will make a massive difference to the children and their families in a very short space of time. The importance of the PTA’s as a tool for advocating for education, especially girls education with their local communities and potentially to the local education authorities should be encouraged and maintained. The responsibilities instilled in the PTA groups should be nurtured and their continued presence as an intermediary between the community/school and implementing partners cannot be undervalued. With adequate training, support and capacity building the PTA’s can hold a key, integral part of addressing the gaps in education or bringing those gaps to the attention of duty bearers to act upon. With special attention to the cultural barriers and traditionally imposed roles on girls, an active, aware PTA group can influence the parents of these girls and aim to sensitively and with understanding of both sides of the equation attempt to encourage the education of girls without adversely affecting the traditions and values held by that community. A key element of the PTA mandate, which is integral to their training, is the promotion of child rights and protection. The PTA groups that were trained by SC were vocal in their support, and proud of their achievements in their work towards increasing awareness attendance of girls at their schools, and of ensuring their continued safety. The Social Advocacy Teams (SAT) and Girls Education Movement (GEM) initiatives both play a vital role in the continued movement towards girls accessing education. The well trained and well informed teams can continue to hold a vital key to this difficult
problem. Through development and support they can continue to develop their local presence
| | and develop innovative new approaches to communicate the message. The SAT teams also
help promote child protection in schools by acting as role-models and providing support and mentorship to vulnerable children. The SAT interviewed at a SC supported school explained their many roles and how their influence had not only increased attendance at the school, but improved the school environment as well. The investment in these teams of children will also provide them with life skills that they can utilize as adults, with the confidence and knowledge that they can make a difference to their lives and the lives of their communities and become great advocates for change in the future.
Point 9 (Overcoming economic barriers, developing relationships):
An integrated approach (DCA) (ADRA) should always be considered if possible, tailoring the education program to work alongside other interventions such as Water and Sanitation (WATSAN),Food security, Nutrition, Health, Adult Learning, Vocational Training and Livelihoods. The above interventions all have an important role to play in the foundations of the educational ‘jigsaw’ and with only one piece missing the programme may fail. The use of cluster groups and channels of communications between the implementing partners can only strengthen the effectiveness of the programmes whilst minimising unnecessary duplications and sharing best practice. The most vulnerable children, either orphans, abandoned, returnee, disabled or from the most vulnerable families must be supported, to ensure that they have a fair and equal access to education and a healthy safe life. The provision of a school uniform can ensure that (at least in school) they are considered equal and able to mix freely with their peers
without prejudice, the availability of text books, exercise books, chairs and other learning A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
7 materials reduces the burden on a child’s parents empowering them to take the opportunities that an education will bring. By supporting the most vulnerable families a huge impact can be seen for the most vulnerable children (MVC) to access education. The (NRC) Vulnerable Children’s Accelerated Learning Programme (VCALP) is ideally planned as an intervention to support the most vulnerable children in accessing some form of education that will enable them to progress to more concrete forms of learning, whilst addressing their most direct needs in the form of food, clothing, social and psychosocial support. As potentially more and more children fall into the category of MVC, for numerous reasons, it is vital that the protection and support systems are well established and functioning.
Point 10 (Local community relationships):
As can be seen in Bor county, (C&D) if an implementing organisation can build sustainable, two- way open relationships with the local education authorities, communities and schools it ensures that the programme is given a far greater chance of success and sustainability. By investing in the capacity building of the community, by demonstrating a fair and open approach to development activities, and including the direct beneficiaries in the needs assessment (DRC) (SC) the end result is going to be more effective and better suited to the needs of the communities affected. The use of PTA’s, community Focus Group Discussions (FGD), special interest days (e.g. Girls Education Day) all contribute to this feeling of involvement and continued support. The close relationship between the PTA’s and the school can be utilized well by the implementing agency. Regular meetings between the County Education teams and then NGO/iNGO will ensure that full understanding of initiatives and programming and shared responsibilities are maintained. The continued use of the TA’s will also elaborate upon this relationship and link this to the MoE strategies and expectations.
The SAT and GEM clubs both hold a very vital link between the school, iNGO and local
community and this can be maximised through continued support for SAT and GEM activities. | |
Point 11 (Child Friendly and Protective Policies):
The Social Advocacy teams (SAT) (SC) and Girls Education Movement (GEM) (DCA) all aim to support and promote the concept of a Child Friendly School (CFS) (UNICEF) and child protection. Through the teacher training, Head teacher training and PTA trainings, the emphasis is to ensure that child friendly environments are maintained in the school, home and community that aim to protect the welfare of children, addressing their rights and ensuring that their voices are heard. Through collaboration and integration of all programmes this can be considered outside of the school environment as well as within. By utilizing the local capacities and school groups the inclusion of cultural and traditional practices can be utilized to positive effect. The abolishment of corporal punishment and the encouragement of positive forms of discipline throughout the education system at all levels through an active advocacy approach will assist in this aim.
Point 12 (Communications between Implementing Partners):
Most importantly this report aims to recommend that the implementing partners work closely together, ensuring that the specific areas of strength of each partner, as highlighted in the report, are utilized to the full and that unnecessary replication is avoided and removed. Best practice should be shared and regular meetings held, joint reports conducted and cross organisation site visits carried out. This can be extended to include organisations not linked by donors, yet working in the same areas with similar objectives. A consortium based approach Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
8 would ensure that each community worked with would receive an excellent intervention at all levels, delivered by all the implementing partners collaboratively.
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9 Acronyms
ADRA - Adventist Development and Relief Agency AED – Academy for Educational Development AES – Alternative Education System AIDS - Acquired immune deficiency syndrome ALP – Accelerated learning programme BAL – Basic Accelerated Learning BFAL - Basic Functional Adult Literacy C&D – Church in Development CES - Central Equatorial State CFS – Child Friendly School CGS - Community Girls School CIDA – Canadian International Development Agency CPA – Comprehensive Peace Agreement DANIDA – Danish International Development Agency DCA – Danish Church Aid DfID – Department for International Development DRC – Danish Refugee Council ECD – Early Childhood Development EFA (FTI) – Education for All (Fast Track Initiative) ERD – European Report on Development EU – European Union EMIS – Education Management Information System FAL – Functional Adult Literacy FGD – Focus Group Discussion FBO – Faith Based Organisation GEM – Girls Education Movement GoSS – Government of South Sudan HIV - Human immunodeficiency Virus ICLA – Information, Counselling and Legal Assistance IDP – Internally displaced person
IEC - Intensive English Course | | iNGO – International Non-Governmental Organisation JICA – Japan International Cooperation Agency MoE – Ministry of Education MVC - Most vulnerable children NBeG – Northern Bahr el Ghazal NGO – Non-Governmental Organization NRC – Norwegian Refugee Council PCR - Primary School Classrooms to Pupil Ratio PRA - Participatory Rapid Assessments PTA – Parents Teachers Association PTR – Pupil Teacher Ratio ROI - Regions of Origin Initiative SAT – Student Advocacy Teams SC – Save the Children SGBV – Sexual and Gender Based Violence SPLA - Sudan People's Liberation Movement SSIRI - Southern Sudan Interactive Radio Instruction SSLM/A - The South Sudan Liberation Movement/Army TA - Technical Advisors TSP – Teachers Support Pack USAID – United States Agency for International Development UNICEF – United Nations Children’s Fund VCALP – Vulnerable Children Accelerated Learning Programme WATSAN - Water and Sanitation WFP – World Food Programme WUSC – World University Service Canada
YEP – Youth Education Pack A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
10 Background After a relatively short period of ‘peace’ South Sudan became the newest country in the world and also immediately one of the least developed. After over 20 years of civil war, decades of marginalisation from the north and centuries of intertribal fighting South Sudan is in a very fragile state, with little or no infrastructure across the whole country, including the capital Juba. With large numbers of refugees returning from around East Africa, and several million returning from North Sudan, the already stretched resources are being put under great pressure.
A lack of infrastructure for so many years has left “Young girls in South Sudan face the education system unstable, of very poor quality extreme disadvantages in and of an extremely low capacity. South Sudan education. Girls are less likely to stands second-to-bottom in the world ranking for enter school, and more likely to net enrolment in Primary education — and bottom drop out.... Today, a young girl in of the world league table for enrolment in South Sudan is three times more secondary education7. likely to die in pregnancy or during childbirth than complete 8 years of However some inroads are being made in the area Primary education”3 of education, there is now a functioning MoE with an allocated budgetary allowance and an active network of local education teams. Even with massive donor and iNGO support there is a vast financial, infrastructural and cultural gap to fill. As more and more children are enabled to access education the lack of trained, qualified, educated and salaried teachers becomes more evident, as does the huge lack of capacity and infrastructure. This is not only impacting on the quality of education children receive, but also retention, although the high dropout rate is not entirely due to this, the lack of teachers and physical infrastructure are contributing factors. Economic and social problems in the households
and communities, as well as cultural and traditional views towards education, especially that of
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girls, also contributes to the massive drop in attendance throughout the 8 years of Primary school.
FIGURE 1: CHILDREN LEARNING UNDER A TREE IN NORTHERN BAHR EL GHAZAL
7 Building a better future: Education for an independent South Sudan. EFA, Global Monitoring report 2011 A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
11 Figure 2 demonstrates the huge disparity across the whole of South Sudan between the number of children enrolled into the first year of Primary school (P1), and those remaining enrolled in the final year, (P8). This discrepancy is magnified for girls, with only 4% making it all the way through the Primary School system. Girls make up an average of just over a third of the population of the Primary school throughout all the grades.
P1 262,309 164,040
P2 182,311 113,243
P3 153,349 90,866
P4 118,737 67,148
P5 75,914 41,504
P6 43,872 24,049
P7 28,022 14,135
P8 15,694 6,681
300,000 200,000 100,000 0 100,000 200,000 300,000
Male Female
8 FIGURE 2: PRIMARY SCHOOL PUPIL ENROLMENT BY GRADE AND GENDER, 2010 FOR THE WHOLE OF SOUTH SUDAN
Looking at the Primary school enrolment numbers for each year for Jonglei and NBeG states shows a very similar trend, although the information in Figure 3 is not broken down by Gender.
In Jonglei only 2% of the number of children enrolled in P1 are enrolled in P8. In NBeG it is
double that, but still only the national average of 4%. |
STATE TOTAL P1 P2 P3 P4 P5 P6 P7 P8 Jonglei 254,750 78,561 57,055 47,790 34,446 20,873 10,089 4,348 1,588 NBeG 142,696 52,923 29,115 22,578 16,935 9,443 5,876 3,620 2,206 7 FIGURE 3: PRIMARY SCHOOL PUPIL ENROLMENT BY GRADE FOR JONGLEI AND NBEG, 2010
Figure 4 shows enrolment figures for the entire country, and shows that over the last two years the numbers of children enrolled has increased by approximately 10%, however the boys to girls ratio has changed very little.
YEAR BOYS BOYS (%) GIRLS GIRLS (%) TOTAL ENROLMENT 2010 880,208 62.8% 521,666 37.2% 1,401,874 2009 871,804 63.1% 508,776 36.9% 1,380,580 2008 809,519 63.0% 474,733 37.0% 1,284,252 9 FIGURE 4: PRIMARY SCHOOL PUPIL ENROLMENT GENDER, 2010
8 Education Statistics Government of Southern Sudan (GoSS) Southern Sudan 2010 National Statistical Booklet, (2011)
9 Education Statistics Government of Southern Sudan (GoSS) Southern Sudan 2010 National Statistical Booklet, (2011) Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 12 Comparing figure 4 with figure 5 demonstrates the issues of teacher’s recruitment. With around one hundred and seventeen thousand extra pupils (even taking into consideration those that have dropped out) enrolled over the last 2 years, compared with only 746 newly recruited teachers over the same period, means that class sizes are growing, and in turn the quality of education received by children is decreasing.
STATE YEAR TOTAL MALE FEMALE MALE FEMALE PTR (%) (%) Total 2010 26,658 23,372 3,286 87.7% 12.3% 52.6 2009 26,575 23,144 3,431 87.1% 12.9% 52.0 2008 25,912 22,739 3,173 87.8% 12.2% 49.6 FIGURE 5: PRIMARY SCHOOL PUPIL TO TEACHER RATIO (PTR) (GENDER OF TEACHERS GIVEN) 2010
The numbers enrolling into Primary School is also increasing because of the large numbers of returnees, refugees and IDP’s. As the numbers of children enrolling in schools continues to increase, the lack of permanent classrooms becomes more and more important and evident. As the table below demonstrates, around 25% of all learning spaces are actually inside permanent classrooms, the large majority of teaching is being carried out under large Mango trees in the school grounds, or in temporary shelters and tents.
Year Total Perm. Semi- Open-air Other PCR perm. 2010 19,872 5,650 4,797 6,588 2,837 134.2 2009 19,604 4,942 5,721 6,532 2,409 129.5 2008 15,072 3,399 3,214 5,497 2,962 194.2 FIGURE 6: PRIMARY SCHOOL CLASSROOMS TO PUPIL RATIO (PCR) 2010
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The lack of teaching space can clearly be seen with the high pupil to classroom ratio. Classrooms made to comfortably accommodate 50 children can have as many as 160 crammed in, and trees in the school grounds shade the outdoor classes from the sun.
This lack of qualified, salaried teachers, of classrooms, and of resources, prevents children from accessing a quality education. Other serious challenges include access to potable water, latrines, teaching and learning materials, distances to travel to school, insecurity and instability and economic, social and cultural barriers to education.
FIGURE 7: CLASS UNDER A TREE IN NBEG
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13 A massive gender disparity not only exists in the children attending Primary Schools. Figure 8 demonstrates the difference between the numbers of male teachers and female teachers across the country. For example only 7.4% of teachers are female in Jonglei State, and across the country there is only just over 12% of teachers that are female.
MALE FEMALE STATE TOTAL COUNT % TOTAL COUNT % TOTAL CES 3,579 2,720 76.0% 859 24.0% EE 3,038 2,632 86.6% 406 13.4% WE 2,785 2,559 91.9% 226 8.1% Jonglei 2,285 2,116 92.6% 169 7.4% Unity 3,270 3,051 93.3% 219 6.7% Upper Nile 2,250 2,144 95.3% 106 4.7% Lakes 2,945 2,401 81.5% 544 18.5% Warrap 3,177 2,975 93.6% 202 6.4% WBG 1,289 1,024 79.4% 265 20.6% NBeG 2,040 1,750 85.8% 290 14.2% Total 26,658 23,372 87.7% 3,286 12.3% FIGURE 8: PRIMARY SCHOOL TEACHERS BY STATE AND GENDER, 2010
The number of female teachers employed in an education system, especially at Primary level can have a massive influence in the numbers of girls who attend, and stay in school. Likewise the qualifications and training of teachers has a huge impact on the quality of the education the pupils receive and the opportunities for them to continue their studies after Primary School. Figure 9 demonstrates that less than half of the 26,658 teachers employed by the MoE have been trained.
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TRAINED UNTRAINED UNKNOWN TOTAL % % % COUNT COUNT COUNT TOTAL TOTAL TOTAL 26,658 11,971 44.9% 7,339 27.5% 7,348 27.6% FIGURE 9: PRIMARY TEACHERS’ PROFESSIONAL QUALIFICATIONS BY STATE, 2010
The GoSS MoE has developed a blueprint education plan for the future10. These ambitious plans will only come to fruition with the right support, advice and drive from the iNGO and Donor sector. By 2013 they are aiming to recruit and train an additional 23,400 Primary School teachers, and provide In-Service and Pre-Service training to an additional 7000 Primary School teachers. They have set the target of providing every Primary School pupil with his or her own text books by 2015, which will require approximately 5.6 million extra books, and have set the targets for classroom construction at 4000 classrooms (i.e. 1000 blocks of 4) with latrines by the end of 2013. These ambitious plans are commendable, this report highlights a need, amongst other recommendations, for the international community to continue to advocate to the GoSS to meet these expectations, on time.
The time old traditional method of teaching by rote, and teacher centred learning in overcrowded classrooms or even under trees is not providing the children with the opportunity to learn to an adequate standard. The low levels of literacy or numeracy in Primary school children, is demonstrated by the large numbers re-sitting grades each year, resulting in another issue of over-age children, failing to reach secondary school from P8 or simply dropping out.
Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 10 http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/ED/pdf/gmr2011-policy-paper-south-sudan.pdf 14 The allocated education budget, is far below what is required to develop an already decimated education system faced with such problems, and has in fact been reduced each year over the last three years. The MoE is under resourced and instead of developing and growing as a new entity, it is continuing to become more and more reliant on the funds of international Donors and the iNGO’s that implement the programmes supported by those funds.
The GoSS Act, The Child Bill, was passed in 2008 and demonstrates the good intentions of the GoSS in implementing Child Protection policies. However, the rights of children to live in a safe environment and have access to a safe and protected environment at school without fear of assault or sexual attacks are often violated. Many parents keep their children away from school, especially girls, for fear of them being attacked sexually or otherwise, either en route to school or in school itself.
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A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
15 Introduction The International Non-Government Organisations (iNGO’s) that receive funding for education through the DANIDA Regions of Origin Initiative (ROI) programme in South Sudan are:
Save the Children (SC) Danish Church Aid (DCA) Danish Refugee Council (DRC)
These iNGO’s were visited and interviewed regarding their programmes and site visits were also undertaken to view and evaluate the work carried out.
SC is the only implementing organisation to have a specific direct focus on education. DRC contributes to the education system as part of a broad based approach to community development, and DCA provide some inputs to education but freely admit education is not their main target, rather a contributing and integrated factor to their on-going programmes. Other iNGO’s that receive funding from DANIDA, but not ROI funding, and that have education programmes were also included in this study (IBIS Danish Solidarity and Development Organisation; United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF); Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) and Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) these iNGO’s were visited and interviewed regarding their programmes. Although NRC does receive funding on the ROI programme this is not for education. Site visits were not conducted with these organisations.
Other key informants to contribute to the study that were met and interviewed include:
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Ministry of Education (MoE) in Juba County Education teams in Bor and Aweil East Counties County Education Inspectors in Bor County State Education team in Northern Bahr el Ghazal (NBeG) Parent Teachers Associations (PTA’s) Head Teachers Primary School Teachers Early Childhood Development (ECD) Teachers Accelerated Learning Programme (ALP) Teachers Functional Adult Literacy (FAL) school Head Teachers, Teachers, and learners Student Advocacy Team (SAT) members (Girls and Boys) Students (Girls and Boys) Vulnerable children (boys)
A list of the names and details of all informants can be found in APPENDIX B
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16 Study Methodology A mixed methodological approach (further details can be found in APPENDIX C) was used to collect the information that is contained within this report. A desk review of existing studies, programme documents and project evaluations on the various education programmes currently implemented in South Sudan by the three NGOs and various relevant GoSS MoE documents was carried out prior to a visit to South Sudan. Qualitative information was collected from several areas of South Sudan including, Aweil East, Aweil South and Bor Counties. Meetings were held with all the education programme implementing partners on the DANIDA funded ROI programme. Other key players in the field of Education were also met with, though their programmes were not necessarily visited. Activities used to gather information include the following: Structured interviews Lesson observations Focus Group Discussions (FGD) Semi-structured and informal interviews Observation checklists
Definition of Best Practice Throughout the study of the programme the identification of best practice was sought. Best Practice can be defined as:
“A working method, or set of working methods, which is officially accepted as being the best to use in a particular business or industry, usually described formally and in detail”11
In this context Best Practice was considered for each of the Education programme components from each of the implementing organisations, including those organisations not included in this
specific funding stream. Considerations made were: | |
The effectiveness, relevance and impact of the programme component on the contribution to:
Increased attendance of children at Primary school Reduced incidence of drop out from Primary school by children Improved teaching and learning environments, methodologies and resources Promotion of child protection measures Sustainability of the initiative, within relation to capacities of the Goss MoE Value for money Replicability of the initiative Flexibility and responsiveness to change
A more detailed framework covering the investigation of best practice for each programme can be found in APPENDIX E
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A 11 http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/best-practice
17 Study Findings Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) has been working in South Sudan since 2004. This year NRC has provided direct support to almost seventy thousand and indirect support to almost three-hundred thousand IDP’s and Returnees. Although NRC provides vital educational support to the MoE, including the training of teachers and support of ALP and AES they do not provide direct educational support through DANIDA funding on the ROI programme. Within the ROI framework NRC has established Information, Counselling and Legal Assistance (ICLA) centres across South Sudan. The centres provide three key activities: Provision of information and counselling Assistance on land and property issues Community based protection training The ICLA centre in Malualkon, Northern Bahr el Ghazal (NBeG) provides information and advice on how returnees can access vital services from other iNGO’s, UN Agencies and Government departments. Covering legal assistance, access to shelter and feeding programmes, the ICLA centre offers a drop-in service and also arranges community presentations to disseminate information; local community groups attend FIGURE 10: ICLA CENTRE - MALUALKON training sessions, with a module of the training
covering child protection and the rights of the child. Children do not attend the ICLA centres and
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no special provision is made to encourage children to access information. Vulnerable children from vulnerable families are referred to the other agencies such as Save the Children. NRC receives funding towards their Educational programmes from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), through the World University Service Canada (WUSC), The UK AID Department for International Development (DfID), Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (NMFA) and Sweden International Development Agency (SIDA). The Educational programmes follow closely the NRC tried and tested education work in many other countries, with four major initiatives: 1. Accelerated Learning Programme (ALP) Teacher training Teaching and Learning materials Construction or rehabilitation of ALP centres Monitoring of classes
2. Youth Education Packs (YEP)12 - youths Construction or rehabilitation of independent YEP centres Community teacher training
12 NRC Core Activity Education, Youth Education Pack (Yep) In Brief, Background, Concept, Evaluations and Development Plans Feb 2007/EKM Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 18 Teaching and Learning materials Uniform School feeding programme Literacy, numeracy, life skills and vocational training
3. Basic Accelerated Literacy (BAL) Programme - adults Community teacher training Teaching and Learning materials Construction or rehabilitation of ALP centres Literacy, numeracy and life skills
4. Vulnerable Children Accelerated Learning Program (VCALP) 1 full meal per day (lunch) and a breakfast (tea) School Uniform, sport clothes Teaching and Learning materials, Personal hygiene NRC are clearly a very well organised iNGO, with huge capacity and experience in the field of education. They have well written and tried and tested methodologies that have proved extremely successful in many other countries with similar challenges to South Sudan. The success of the ICLA centres and the information at ground level that they collect can be well used to continue to strengthen their work. They are the cluster lead in the Education forum in NBeG and work closely with other NGO’s through donors such as DfID and partners such as Save the Children.
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Danish Refugee Council (DRC) has been working in South Sudan since 2005, and currently has programmes in 2 states, Central Equitoria (CES) and NBeG. They have also been working with Southern Sudanese refugees in Uganda since 1999.13 DRC has a broad based approach to community development with three major components, all of which have some direct or indirect impact on the education of children:
Construction and rehabilitation of infrastructure, such as schools, spring wells and important public buildings (police and resource centres) Improved self-reliance through agricultural activities and livelihood assistance, including training on crop cultivation, distribution of seeds and tools, and small grants for groups. Protection, advocacy and institution building targeting duty bearers at both the local authority and the community level. These activities include among others, awareness raising, training sessions, radio broadcasts, material capacity building to promote and support gender equality, non-discrimination, prevention and response to Sexual and Gender Based Violence (SGBV) DRC carried out Participatory Rapid Assessments (PRA’s) in NBeG in the 6 Boma’s considered for programmes in Aweil South County. Over 300 people attended, (22% of female). Information
13 DRC Annual Report 2010 Support to Protection and Reintegration Of Refugees and IDPs in Central Equatoria and Northern Bahr el Ghazal, South Sudan A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
19 was given by the attendees on the local needs and priorities. In each community, community members ranked the most pressing needs:
In NBeG, three communities ranked Primary school construction as their greatest need – Majakgoi, Nyocanoon, and Riangaker. DRC conducted joint assessments with the MoE in all three communities, where currently there are no permanent school buildings and classes take place under trees. The use of Hydraform blocks in the construction has lowered the input cost, the time taken to build and the need for specific bricklaying skills resulting in a faster, better quality construction with the interlocking blocks. The method has generated much interest among NGOs and UN agencies and is contributing to raising overall construction capacity and know-how in NBEG.
The team of nine local builders (5 skilled and 4 unskilled) working at Riangaker explained the benefits of the Hydraform blocks. Once the community had collected and provided the sand, aggregate and water the builders were able to build the
FIGURE 11: HYDRAFORM BRICKS entire school in just over a month. With 20 days before hand to dig the foundations and a few days at the end for fixtures and fittings, the whole process can (although in the end didn’t due to weather problems) take less than 2-months. All three schools were either completed or will be completed, ready for a December handover ceremony to the MoE. The cost for each 4-classroom block is estimated (depending on location) at around $50,000 USD, which is an indication of the difficulties and expense of construction. The classrooms are built to a very high standard and will clearly last for many years, however this
high cost is particularly prohibitive, especially if the implementing program is short, and could | | often be used to achieve greater changes in more areas for the same money.
DRC also developed and delivered training to 30 teachers (only 2 females) on Child rights and Child Protection including the “Child Friendly Schools Approach” that has been taken from their experiences in Uganda. Work was carried out with the development and subsequent training of a PTA to ensure community involvement and ownership of the school.
DRC have also built nineteen Primary school blocks to the same specification in CES (see APPENDIX D for more details)
FIGURE 12: COMPLETE SCHOOL IN MAJAKGOI A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
20
Danish Church Aid (DCA) do not directly deliver any DANIDA funded education programmes, they sub-contract the programme management to a local NGO and then provide support, capacity building, funding and monitoring and evaluation throughout the life of the project. In Bor County, Jonglei state, their partner organisation is Church and Development (C&D), a Christian-based organization established in 1996.
C&D supports education in Bor County with a series of community based initiatives, supporting 6 Functional Adult Literacy (FAL) centres in Palabach, Baidit, Kolmarek, Kolnyang Anyidi, and Lieudiet in Bor town, and 6 Primary schools in Werkok, Baidit, Kolmarek, Kapaat, Malualbur and Pariak.
FIGURE 13: FAL CLASS AT LIEUDIET CENTRE
Activities that C&D are carrying out in the county include the construction of two blocks of four
classrooms each at two schools, (Pariak and | | Kapaat primary schools in Bor County), and latrines at three schools. The provision of teaching and learning materials, to these Primary Schools and the FAL Centres, and the provision of sports equipment and girl’s sanitary packs at these Primary schools. Training of PTA’s on community involvement in schools, the rights of the child and gender specific training to encourage girls to attend school. (See APPENDIX D)
Teachers and Headmasters in all locations have been trained. GEM clubs have been established at these Primary schools, with each school receiving 2 training sessions, and all necessary promotional materials. The County Education team, Inspectors and Supervisors have also received training. The salaries of the Head
FIGURE 14: COUNTY EDUCATION TEAM MEETING teachers at the 6 FAL centres are paid for by C&D.
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
21 C&D was established by Reverend Stephen Mathiang as a developmental wing of the ECS Diocese of Bor in which to provide support for the inhabitants of the county of Bor through the Church. Himself a refugee twice, having left Sudan to escape the fighting, has worked hard alongside community elders and PTA groups to create and nurture well established educational and community links over the last 15 years. Through the support of C&D many of the children attending classes in supported schools have now moved onto University in Juba, Nairobi and Kampala. Some have even returned to contribute to the good work in the county.
The Director of Education in Bor County and his School Supervisors and Inspectors have all received training and support with inspection materials, logistical support and problem solving activities. They have a very close working relationship with the C&D Education team. The close open working relationship is very evident in Bor, far more so that in Aweil East and South. The shared experiences between C&D and the education team really does demonstrate best practice and is something that can overcome many obstacles. The open channels of communication means that any problems can be quickly rectified or advice given. This is in both directions, and C&D can quickly and easily access data and information held by the education team. There is also a mutual respect for the work of each other from both sides, this facilitates honest and constructive discussion and sharing of ideas.
Save the Children (SC) have the largest specific approach to education of all the DANIDA funded iNGO’s. Their portfolio of work covers a huge area of the sector. The specific ROI funded work is limited to NBeG, though they have an extensive education programme in 9 states.
On the DANIDA ROI funded programme SC had two main objectives that were met through a
number of initiatives. 14 | |
Objective 1: To increase access to education in a safe learning environment for children and young people in targeted Payams of high return in Aweil East County, Northern Bahr el Ghazal State by the end of December 2011.
Objective 2: To strengthen Management capacity within the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology at National County, Payam and community level by the end of December 2011.
The results that have contributed towards these two objectives include:
Delivery of training for 150 volunteer and returnee teachers (19 female, 131 male) focusing on child-centered methodology, and subject content. Establishment and running of 10 ECD centers, with training for 20 ECD teachers (9 female, 11 male) by a MoE ECD specialist. Textbooks, Education Kits, Head-Teacher Kits and Sports kits distributed to all 50 SC supported schools ensuring that learners have appropriate scholastic and play items, and that teachers also have appropriate teaching materials. SAT’s established and active in all 50 schools, with training carried out. 30 schools were identified by SCiSS and the Ministry of Education for improvements. Boreholes have been completed at seven schools Bags, stationery and uniforms distributed to 5,000 vulnerable children.
Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 14 Save The Children DANIDA - Education in Emergency VI - Q2 2011 report - Final 22 Secondment of a technical M & E Adviser with the MoE at GoSS. Ongoing PTA trainings and exchange visits were carried out.
Under other funding from donors SC activities also include:
Pastoralists schools at Cattle camps in Jonglei State Women into teaching programme Intensive English courses Construction of classrooms, latrines and boreholes Education in emergencies- co lead of the education cluster
SC is currently implementing the DANIDA ROI programme in 50 schools (See APPENDIX D) and communities in NBeG state. Their work is well respected by the communities and education teams in the Counties and State. A thorough needs assessment was carried out at each of the schools prior to the commencement of the programme and the implementation of the activities. SC programme staff have worked closely with and built up relationships with all the schools, especially those ten with SC supported ECD classes. One area that SC Area Programme Manager in Malualkon suggested that they could improve their work and impact is
FIGURE 15: SAT IN NBEG to implement more advocacy and governance
| | work to directly address the problems in the state with regards to the implementation and funding of education programmes. A huge area of impact seen through this program has been the initiation, training and support of the SAT’s in all 50 schools. Comprehensive examples of the results of the SC implementations throughout NBeG are well documented throughout this report.
ADRA carries out 15 programmes in 7 out of the 10 states in South Sudan. Their programmes are varied, covering Livelihoods, WATSAN, Education and Health, some of which are integrated ensuring that each programme complements the other whilst maximising impact at a reduced implementation cost.
Activities they carry out in education include:
Construction of schools and teacher training centres Teacher training, training of Government employed teacher trainers, including intensive English classes. Head Teacher training, including school management systems and reporting and
management tool kits A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
23 Local Education Authority training, and support with materials and logistics (for example provision of motorcycles and/or vehicles for joint supervisory visits) AES including FAL linked with Livelihoods Promotion and advocacy for girls’ education, including campaigns and school clubs and community events Provision of teaching and learning materials and sports materials PTA training Establishment of community TSP (Teacher Support Packages) to support volunteer teachers Utilization of organizational experience in the education sector as a basis for social change initiatives (working with PTAs, youth clubs and community groups) Coordination for education in emergencies, particularly as NGO Cluster Lead for one State which includes joint needs assessments, provision of temporary learning spaces, teacher, student and recreational kits and other school supplies for prepositioning.
ADRA is also running an interesting and innovative scheme that provides support and training to female teachers with the intention of enabling them to become head teachers.
ADRA holds great value in the capacity building and advocacy work they carry out and this is an integral part in all the programmes they run. The Programmes Director believes that ADRA’s continued support of the Government’s Teacher Training programme will reap the most benefits of all their education sector activities.
UNICEF has been operating in South Sudan for over two
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decades, supporting the country through its multi-sector approach to assist women and children. UNICEF’s strength lies in its size and ability to support the MoE at many strategic levels. The Chief of Education pointed out that UNICEF has been instrumental in developing the Republic of South Sudan 5-Year Education Strategic Plan, and will support the development of the implementation and financing strategies. UNICEF coordinates the ERD forum and is deputy chair of the Education Donor Group that comprises, among others DfID, EU, USAID and JICA.
Activities that UNICEF carryout as an implementing entity include:
Promoting the Child Friendly School approach to education development; Providing school supplies to every state in South Sudan (around $10 million USD per year) Promoting hygiene through distribution of hygiene packs and information Promoting sports and social clubs in schools through distribution of materials The Alternative learning programme, focusing on teacher training and supplies of teaching and learning materials; Life Skills programme for children and youth in and out of school; Ensuring that Education is sustained during humanitarian situations; Capacity development: In-service teacher/head teacher training on interactive methods;
intensive English language; life skills; child friendly school methods A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
24 The Education Management Information System (EMIS), with annual publications of education statistical booklets, national and states School Construction (over 150 classrooms either built or rehabilitated) Girls Education, focusing on the barriers at community and school levels Promotion of Child rights in schools and communities
UNICEF has a pivotal role in encouraging the GoSS to increase its Education Budget. Through the Education Sector Strategic Plan, which has been developed in an inclusive and participatory way involving government and stakeholders at national and state level, proposals for a five year plan have been outlined. The Chief of Education pointed out that UNICEF will continue to operate at upstream and operational level, and its approach will be cross-sectoral, with the pre- school and school as the point of convergence for Health, Water and Sanitation and Child Protection programmes.
IBIS have been implementing a $3.9 million USD Accelerated Learning Programme in Central Equatoria since December 2007. The programme is due to be handed over to the government in August 2012, and is comprised of the following four components: 15
1. Training and Quality of Teaching Component The identified teacher trainers and AES supervisors have been employed and trained by the programme. After the training, the teacher trainers and supervisors are responsible for running the initial basic courses for Accelerated Learning Programme (ALP) teachers as well as further
in-service training workshops in collaboration with county and district educational officers. The
| | supervisors are equally responsible for on-going supervisory support to the teachers in the field. Finally, the trainers are responsible for working on curriculum improvements and additions such as life skills as well as the creation of training workshops for teachers to integrate these changes and improvements.
2. Youth and Classroom Learning Component The ALP classes in communities of the target area are in existing physical school structures. Minor repairs to existing structures have, where necessary, been carried out. Children and youth belonging to the target group are identified and enrolled, 35 per class to ensure a safe healthy learning environment and teaching quality. Classrooms are equipped and pupils and teachers provided with the necessary learning and teaching materials. In order to ensure teacher commitment and performance, ALP teacher incentives have been made available by the programme once they are enrolled and teaching at the schools.
3. Empowerment of Communities Component The communities are empowered to network with each other in order to identify, analyse and influence common priority issues in relation to the local government policies and administration practices to support the community ownership process as a means of widening coverage.
4. Curriculum development and capacity building of State and county education officers
15 IBIS – Background Information – Republic of South Sudan A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
25 In close cooperation with education authorities contribute to the improvement and development of the ALP education curriculum; enhancing cultural diversity, dialogue and with special focus on life skills. Capacity building of education staff from the State, County and District capacitating them to participate in the supervision and monitoring of ALP as part of the bi-weekly in-situ mentoring and supervision of IBIS ALP teachers.
IBIS have a very pragmatic approach to their work; they have specified and targeted areas that hold strength and experience. Their programme has a clear end and exit strategy and they have already adapted some of their training and capacity building packages to other projects. The depth with which they undertake their work demonstrates a commitment to lasting change and their strategic capacity building approach will without doubt have a lasting effect on the areas they have approached.
Programme Information The following pages highlight the areas where each of the implementing partners, both funded on the ROI programme and funded by other sources, concentrate their efforts in education. For reasons of completion, Adult Literacy programmes are included where they may be seen to contribute to the overall success of the reviewed initiatives, namely Primary Education, likewise Vocational-Technical Education is included, although it is recommended that this sample of information be taken as an example rather than a thorough evaluation of these important and well implemented programmes.
Alternative Education System (AES) AES which until recently was contained under the umbrella of General Education is now a Directorate in its own right. As the Acting Director General explained the promotion demonstrates the significance and importance of this area in the future of the education system
of South Sudan.
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The Acting Director General said that the number or children not in regular Primary Education across South Sudan is around 1 million, and of the 1.5 million remaining in school, almost 50% of them will drop out of school before they can complete their schooling, and only 10% of children will complete their last year of Primary school, P8. Within the department of AES there are several schemes to address the continued difficulties keeping children out of the education system, however many of these have yet to be implemented at county and district level. One area that has been successfully implemented and is greatly admired is the ALP which iNGO’s such as NRC, IBIS and SC have been major implementers of, partnered with the MoE. The Director General of General Education suggested that in an ideal world there would be no need for such a department, and that as the General Education Department grew in strength, and access to education in South Sudan improved, the pressure would be removed on the AES, however as this is something that will take a long time, AES is something that should be taken seriously. For example the large numbers of children living away from fixed schools, such as the children of pastoralists, and children recently returned to the country are not being addressed by the general Education System. The numerous initiatives under this relatively new department include:
Accelerated Learning Programme (ALP) Agro-Forestry Basic Functional Adult Literacy (BFAL) Community Girls School (CGS)
Intensive English Course (IEC) Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
26 Southern Sudan Interactive Radio Instruction (SSIRI) Pastoralist Schools
For the purpose of this report only the ALP programmes were evaluated. The majority of the ALP’s are implemented and funded in the majority by iNGO’s in collaboration with the MoE. The classes are usually held at MoE Primary Schools. The MoE ALP curriculum has not yet been finalised and as such the ALP’s follow an MoE developed curriculum for Primary education, though the non-standardized ALP curriculum is different from school to school. A standardised ALP teacher training programme has however been developed and this is being implemented by all the involved parties. Many of the teachers working in ALP’s are still not on the Government payroll and are acting as volunteers.
The ALP covers the 8-year cycle of Primary Education (P1-P8) but is condensed into 4 years. In theory a student having completed the full four years of an ALP would be at a level to be able to attend secondary school. And likewise, a student who had completed the first 2 years of and ALP would be at a level to transition from the programme into Primary 5 with the correct level of education. The target audience for the ALP is children and youths between the approximate ages of 12 and 18 years old, that have missed either their entire Primary Education, or have suffered a major disruption to their schooling through displacement, or other contributing factors.
The target audience is considered by the MoE particularly important due to their immediate vulnerabilities, i.e. lack of access to education, instability, lack of social skills and knowledge. Youths and children at this age could easily be tempted to take alternative routes to survive, such as joining conflict, taking part in cattle raiding and petty crime. By addressing the needs of these in-between ages’ groups, great improvements can be seen in the local communities.
Unlike some other ALP’s in developing countries such as Malawi, Colombia and the
16 | |
Philippines where methods are aimed to improve knowledge retention, and designed around principles and practices linked to brain-based research, the ALP’s in South Sudan are classified as ‘catch up’ programmes. They are designed around alternative strategies to cover the curriculum in a short time period. These involve reducing the curriculum to be covered whilst incorporating more effective teaching strategies. It has been decided by the MoE, in collaboration with their partners, that this method of ALP is the most relevant, suitable and easiest to implement option to meet the needs and address the disadvantages of this particular out-of-school population. The classes are carried out during normal school term times, with 5 days teaching per week and approximately 3 to 4 hours teaching per day. The majority of the classes are held in the afternoons and therefore can utilize the school classrooms that are not used after classes have finished in the afternoon. There is a focus on life skills and socially important topics such as Human/Child rights, Water and Sanitation (WATSAN), Health and Hygiene, and HIV/AIDS, etc.
The problems faced by the program are due to its halved teaching time, any time that the students miss from the classes literally doubles the amount of information they do not receive, which in turn will have double the impact on their learning. The target audience of the programme generally have quite difficult backgrounds and are often more likely to miss school. Likewise, the fact that many of the 739 country wide ALP teachers are un-paid volunteers
16 Nicholson, (2007), ‘Accelerated Learning in Post Conflict Settings- A discussion paper’ SCUS. A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
27 means that they are more likely to miss lessons, which has a big impact on the teaching received by the students.
One of the other pressures faced by many ALP’s has been the number of adults taking advantage of the programme to address their lack of education. This has been alleviated to a certain degree in some areas with FAL programmes implemented at the same schools to encourage adults to attend these rather than take up places in ALP classrooms. DRC run FAL programmes in NBeG for this specific reason although there is still a large number of adults attending ALP classes due to their desire to receive a recognised qualification.
SC initiated ALP in South Sudan in 2001, and through the support of a seconded TA to the GoSS MoE the EAS department was upgraded to a full Directorate. SC currently support 15 schools with ALP classes in NBeG, their support includes training 80 teachers in the ALP curriculum and learner centred teaching and provision of teaching and learning materials.
IBIS run a large and very successful ALP in CES that incorporates all elements from teacher training and provision of teaching and learning resources to classroom construction and rehabilitation, and supervision and evaluation of teachers. Government pays AES incentives to those ALP teachers on the payroll and IBIS supports those teachers not on the payroll. The four-year programme established by IBIS and carried out in three counties costs almost $1 million USD per year. The same level of service will not be sustainable given the limited budget for education, however it is expected that costs will reduce significantly as the government fully deploy their own staff already trained by IBIS. The IBIS ALP is due to end in August 2012, and IBIS are working hard to try and sustainably increase the capacities of county and state education teams and teachers.
IBIS have trained around 150 teachers to become ALP teachers, the training they receive is a 1
month residential (rather the usual 2 weeks) and on completion of training the teachers are | | evaluated every 6-months and receive refresher training every year. This training is yet to be officially recognised or certified by the GoSS, though it is considered to be more thorough than the GoSS approved training. County education supervisors are also being trained to be able to carry out these assessments, evaluations and trainings independently of IBIS. IBIS currently run ALP’s in 45 learning spaces with 45 teachers (only 2 female) covering (depending on attendance) 2000 to 5000 students at any one time (their target is an average of 3500 students); approximately 45% of attendees are girls. For the year 2010, 408 children graduated from the level 4 ALP. Out of those only 68 (16%) continued onto secondary school, the main reason being the lack of secondary schools in the districts that the ALP centres were. IBIS constructs classrooms where there are no available options; the constructions are semi-permanent though of very high quality made with mud walls around a teak frame with tin roofs. Each 3-class building costs around $6,000 USD, with a life expectancy of several years. IBIS works closely with the local PTA groups to ensure that the importance of ALP is maintained in the community, although they do not specifically carry out PTA training per-se.
UNICEF supports ALP through conducting teacher training and provides teaching and learning materials to schools across the whole of South Sudan whilst NRC supports ALP through the training of teachers and the provision of teaching and learning materials; they also rehabilitate and construct schools. NRC also runs the VCALP which is aimed specifically at the vulnerable children that need extra support before moving on to a more traditional ALP.
An ALP teacher at Denyic Upper Primary School in Aweil South, NBeG said one of the biggest problems that he faces in being able to carry out his role is the lack of salary for his work. He is Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
28 rewarded intermittently by the PTA and SC, but this is not enough to live on and he struggles to feed himself and his family on his meagre earnings. He was very happy to explain that girls make up around 50% of his class, and the parents that he speaks to are happier that their daughters are attending the ALP classes rather than the regular Primary route as it is shorter and allows them to leave school in less time. He explained that very few of the children that complete the ALP go onto secondary school, though he couldn’t specifically explain the reasons why, it is possibly due to the economic and cultural barriers they face in their community that have caused them to attend ALP classes in the first place.
Surprisingly, during interviews and meetings with several county and state education members, no mention was made of ALP at all, although almost all the head masters referred to it in discussion or after prompting. It seems very much that due to its unique nature, i.e. AES, and the fact that it is currently funded in the main by the iNGO’s it is not considered a concern for MoE or Education employees. This will become a huge problem if the funding from the NGO’s begins to decrease on the ALP programmes. There are currently 168 ALP’s running in NBeG, from a total of 739 throughout the whole of South Sudan. It could be therefore estimated that at any one time there are approximately around 40,000 children regularly attending ALP centres. Accepting that the actual cost of running an established ALP programme after set up is not as much as the $1 million quoted by IBIS, it is still a very expensive program and due to its ‘perceived’ low importance, may well be the first to fall by the wayside as GoSS starts to prioritise its spending on Education.
Currently there is a massive need for this kind of education initiative; in time the need will become less however that is many years away. The ALP needs to be continued and expanded upon. A concerted effort should be made to encourage the MoE to take increased responsibilities of the running and funding of the programme. This essential piece of the jigsaw
is providing a vitally important service to some of the more vulnerable children in the
| | communities and also alleviating some pressures in the Primary Schools often caused through
overcrowding and classes with over-age children. The over-age children in the Primary schools visited during this assessment were made up of both returnee and host community children, it wasn’t possible to accurately calculate the percentages of either, however according to the GoSS UMIS report for 2010 over 90% of all Primary school children were classified as overage with respect the classes they were registered in. A similar figure can be found throughout the whole of South Sudan. This highlights the need for this specific initiative to be continued to enable the average ages of each class to be brought down to the expected level.
Functional Adult Literacy / Basic Functional Adult Literacy Although not part of the terms of reference for this evaluation, a short investigation was carried out on FAL and BFAL to establish a direct connection between these programmes and the access and quality of Primary Education. At the Leudiet Centre, Bor, Bor County, Jonglei several teachers and students attending FAL classes were interviewed. There are 220 adult learners at the centre, (50% female) ranging between the ages of 20 to 60. The majority attending the classes have never had any form of organised
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A learning and where almost entirely
29 FIGURE 16: ADULT LEARNERS AT LEUDIET CENTRE “We see our children coming home from school knowing more than us, that makes me want to go to school and learn” – FAL Learner illiterate on the commencement of their studies. However the majority are also small business owners and market traders who wish to develop their numeracy, literacy and English language skills to help them improve their lives and businesses. The teachers are paid a small stipend by the GoSS, although they claim it is not enough to live on. The Head teacher is paid a salary by C&D the supporting NGO for this project. All teachers have received some form of training that was conducted by the MoE covering the differences in teaching adults as opposed to children. Unfortunately due to the low earnings of the teachers, absenteeism is very common and out of the 12 teachers (1 female) there is almost 100% turnover of staff from one year to the next. The teaching is held in temporary and permanent buildings in a poor state of repair owned by a local Church. There are no restrictions on the number of attendees and the centre takes advantage of the position of the Church to organise recruitments and encourage participation. Occasionally children attend the classes but the teachers try to support them in attending a more suitable ALP classes at the local Primary school.
When asked about the importance of Adult Literacy – the students were very vocal, the generally consensus was that they had been left behind, or felt left out by their lack of education and the literacy classes enabled them to be in a position to understand the learning of their children, and also gain an insight into the immediate positive effects of learning such as numeracy and literacy in their daily work.
Many of those interviewed considered the time that they took each day away from their work a worthwhile investment due to the ultimate value of the education they would receive from being able to read and write. It was interesting to note also that the education they were receiving was convincing them of the importance of their children’s’ education. A participant said:
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“Now that I know about school, I make sure my children go every day...their education is important”- FAL Learner
It is without doubt that by enabling adult learners to access education the positive social and parental results can be seen in the attendance rates of Primary children. In one class when asked to signal if their children went to school, everyone indicated in the affirmative. The head teacher of Leudiet Centre explained that, not only are more and more adults attending the FAL classes, they are becoming more vocal in their community and encouraging others to attend and send their children to school. The C&D Education coordinator agreed with this theory, Primary School attendance rates are going up in the districts where they are supporting FAL centres.
Although not an element that is being funded by DANIDA on the ROI programme the benefits to the other key elements of the education programme that are being funded are very evident. Likewise the Vocational Training Centres, for example the SC Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET) centre funded on the DANIDA ROI programme in Malualkon, also has a trickle down positive impact on the attendance of children, especially girls, whose mothers are getting an education for the first time. It could be recommended that in the future
some element of funding is allocated for FAL classes as a contributing and complementary A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
30 service, utilizing perhaps the resources already in place at Primary Schools. Certainly it is an area that needs further study and evaluation.
As highlighted earlier in the report, one area of difficulty with the FAL and BFAL programmes are that they are currently not certificated by the MoE. Those attending and completing the programme do not receive a qualification, unlike those graduating on the ALP. Many adult learners wishing to be certified are continuing to attend ALP classes, and although not aimed at adults, the schools are loathe to turn the adults away. This increased pressure on the classroom size of the ALP has a detrimental effect on the learning of the children, and therefore efforts must be made to legitimize through official MoE certification the FAL and BFAL programmes.
Early Childhood Development (ECD) SC are the only organisation running ECD classes in South Sudan funded on the DANIDA ROI programme, and the only supporter of pre-Primary schools in the whole of NBeG state. They currently support 10 schools with 2 classes of 50 in each school (a total of 1000 children 50% girls) in NBeG state. Each school has one teacher per class (50% female). The salaries and training of the teachers is funded entirely by SC, as are all teaching and learning materials, one meal per day per child and classrooms.
FIGURE 17: HAND WASHING BEFORE EATING
According to the GoSS 2010 EMIS report NBeG and Jonglei states fall far behind the others in
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providing schooling opportunities to pre-school children. There were 333 pre-Primary schools (a total of around 800 classrooms) throughout the country and only 128 of these are financed by GoSS, the remainder are either community, private or NGO (iNGO) established and run. 17
Research carried out by Save the Children in India, Nepal and Bangladesh can attest to the theory that children who attend ECD classes are generally healthier, perform better in school, and have a lower dropout rate and a longer future in the schooling system.18
The Head teacher of Pariak School NBeG talked about his experiences of having an ECD programme at his school. He explained that they had two Primary 1 classes, (split due to the large number of children) but it was very clear that the P1a class with children who last year had been the first cohort on the ECD programme were performing much better than P1b, the other primary class without former ECD students. He is very pleased with the results from the ECD classes and considered it a vital element to the introduction of learning methodology at an early age. A female ECD teacher at the same school stated that the children are really learning quickly, and are way ahead in terms of knowledge, reading and language skills than other children their age who are joining P-1 at the same time. She also went on to say that the parents of the children were extremely happy that their children were attending school at such an early age. He elaborated that by reducing the need for mothers to look after their children during the day, it enabled them to take a more active role in earning money and have a greater
17 Education Statistics For Southern Sudan 2010 National Statistical Booklet (GoSS)
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A 18 Stansbery & Borisova, 2010, SCUS, “Early Childhood Care and Development, Helping young children reach their developmental potential”
31 access to food for the family. This positive influence was improving the lives of not just the children attending the ECD classes, but the lives of the parents and the extended family.
Children have to overcome massive obstacles in South Sudan to survive, let alone attend school. Statistics show infant mortality rates of 150 per 1000 live births and under-five mortality rates of 250 per 1000; also 45% of children under 5 years old are malnourished19 demonstrating the need to address many problems as well as education. The ECD programme provides children with one meal per day and encourages the children to consider their health and hygiene, lessons that they take home to their parents and elder siblings.
Although not possible to statistically prove, it would seem evident to the teachers and Head teachers that were interviewed that enrolment in a Pre-Primary class not only benefitted those attending, but also enables the children (girls) who had been tasked with the care of their younger siblings to also attend school. Primary School enrolment is increasing year on year, especially for girls and this is only one of the contributing factors, girls still only make up 37% of Primary School enrolments, this dropping to 27% for Secondary School. Although the ECD does not specifically target girls above boys (the attendance is 50%) it can be seen that girls receive the most benefits from the programme. By introducing girls at a younger age to the education system there is a greater chance that they will complete more years (or even all 8 years) in Primary School. This early introduction also assists in ensuring that girls are the correct age starting school and are therefore more likely to complete the primary cycle as it is in the higher grades when older girls often drop out of school. Starting earlier also cements the importance of education for girls with their parents. As the ECD programme has been running only two-years it is not possible to furnish this with tangible data. However through in depth interviews with Primary teachers, parents, PTA’s head teachers and children the qualitative information indicates that this will be very easily demonstrated in the future.
SC is a massive advocator of ECD programmes, having established them in over 60 countries | | worldwide. According to SC20, children who participate in ECD programs are more likely to enrol in school, complete school on time, plan their families, have higher household incomes, become productive adults, and educate their own children, compared to children without exposure to ECD programs. Additionally, children in ECD programs are less likely to repeat a grade or drop out of school, engage in youth high-risk behaviours, such as smoking, risky sexual behaviour, substance abuse and addiction, and criminal and violent activity.
The Director General of Planning and Budgeting stated that little is now being done in the MoE pre-Primary schooling programmes, and was very pleased with the SC ECD programme in NBeG. After a promising start, he explained the Government run programme seems to have stagnated due to lack of funding.
The Director General also has personal first-hand experience with his own children who have
“This is a vital element that can contribute greatly to the success of the South Sudan education system” –DG Planning and Budgeting
19 http://ssnbs.org/storage/key-indicators-for-southern-sudan/Key%20Indicators_A5_final.pdf 20 Save the Children, 2010, Early Childhood Care and Development Helping Young Children Reach Their Developmental Potential Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 32 attended pre-Primary programmes being clearly, better prepared educationally than his children who didn’t. He stated that ECD needs to be pushed as a priority within the MoE and SC could support this by advocating on their behalf, or assisting the Director General, General Education in advocating for this to become a more recognised area.
The TA who was seconded to the department from SC left the programme in 2009, and has not been replaced, although a lengthly recruitment process has yet to result in a replacement being found; this was noted as a negating factor in the financial downsizing of this important area.
One further area of concern brought up and agreed upon by the Director Generals was the only employee working on the Education program in Juba is the Education Technical Adviser, they feel that she needs support in her role recognizing that SCiSS has one of the largest education programmes and the demand on one person is huge, they recommended employing a South Sudanese national staff in a supporting position.
Child Protection Mechanisms All the investigated iNGO’s had in their programmes highlighted the need to consider Child Protection and ensure that their initiatives were at all times, child focussed, and sensitive to the needs of the children. All teacher, head teacher and PTA training sessions included modules dedicated to child-friendly schools, child centred learning, and the inclusive and safe teaching environment. Currently the MoE teacher training mentions positive discipline and the importance of ensuring that punishments are fair, and SC is implementing some training regarding positive discipline; however this is still an area that needs more iNGO and MoE involvement.
During the extensive PTA trainings and subsequent follow-up refresher trainings held by DRC, C&D and SC using the GoSS MoE PTA Training materials21 a significant amount of time is
dedicated to discussing and investigating the child protection mechanisms in the school and
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community. One of the objectives of the training is listed as:
“Ensure that the interests and welfare of children are prioritized at all times“
This is elaborated upon further through the training on the “Six Characteristics of a Child Friendly School (CFS)” this includes the following two characteristics amongst others:
Rights-based School: A rights-based school respects and realizes the rights of every child. It cooperates with other partners to promote and monitor the well-being and rights of all children. It defends and protects all children from abuse and harm, both inside and outside the school. It does this by:
enforcing rules and regulations; adopting non-discriminatory practices in all aspects; not allowing cultural practices to adversely affect psychological maturity and children; providing parentage and protection; and respect the community values
A Protective Environment: A protective school ensures the safety and security of all children, and protects them from abuse or harm inside and outside the school. To create protective schools, the Ministry of Education supports and trains PTAs, teachers, parents and children in
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A 21 Trainers Guide for Parent Teacher Associations & School Management Committees For Primary & Secondary Schools in Southern Sudan (GoSS)
33 peace education and child rights. This includes areas like:
rehabilitation; legislation; government commitment; capacity of community and family; monitoring and reporting; and environmental cleanliness, with children actively involved in cleaning their school environment
On the subject of discipline the PTA are encouraged to be active in ensuring that “beating and other forms of punishment that cause harm to the child should be stopped”
Guidelines for effective PTA management - Reinforcement of discipline in school through: monitoring the enforcement of school rules and regulations; suspension of pupils with unruly behaviour; guidance and counselling; advice to head teachers, teachers and pupils; and Protecting children and children's interest.
During discussions with head teachers and PTA members, discipline and the use of punishment was mentioned as a very important area to continue to work on. Historically corporal
“We used to use corporal punishment...it has always been
that way, now we know that is the old way...” – PTA member
| | punishment has been widely used in all classrooms across South Sudan. The PTA’s have been tasked with the challenge of addressing this area and are actively working at changing the mindset of teachers in the classrooms.
Similar ideas on corporal punishment and discipline are included in the ALP and Primary Teacher training and head teacher training. Teachers and head teachers are encouraged to utilize more positive, less harmful methods of dealing with problems in the classroom. It is important to note that alternative forms of discipline and punishment are not currently highlighted in the Teachers Code of Conduct Handbook22
The Child Act passed in 200823 by the GoSS, highlights their intentions to protect the rights of the children of South Sudan. Stating its purpose as:
“...to extend, promote and protect the rights of children in Southern Sudan, in accordance with the provisions Article 21 of the Interim Constitution of Southern Sudan, and as defined in the 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and other international instruments, protocols, standards and rules on the protection and welfare of children to which Sudan is a signatory”
22 This is due to be introduced and address by the Education Cluster and SC in December 2011 through workshops with the intention of putting this issue on the agenda with other iNGOs and MOE 23
Laws Of Southern Sudan, The Child Bill, 2006, GoSS Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
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Article 21 states that:
Every child has the right:
to life, survival and development to be free from corporal punishment and cruel and inhuman treatment by any person including parents, school administrations and other institutions;
Section 36 of Child Act talks about the responsibility of the government to:-
Ensure that corporal punishment in schools and institutions is prohibited;
Although clearly defined in the bill, corporal punishment is still carried out in the majority of schools. The Head teacher of Malual Bai Primary School in Aweil East, NBeG told me that they no longer beat the children with sticks to punish them. However a group of boys in a FGD at another Primary School reported that they had been beaten by the teacher on occasion.
Clearly the old habits of the “old-way of teaching” are hard to shake. In all schools it could be seen that some children were being taught in the time old manner of rote, even by teachers that had attended teacher training workshops. It was observed that teachers in some schools still carried canes, although it was claimed they were merely to point out items on the board. Change of course takes time, and the iNGO’s will need to be careful not to assume that two- weeks intensive teacher training can change the habits and cultural norms instilled over several generations. By advocating for more training, and increased, more regular competent inspection by the county education inspector’s effective change will continue to occur and be reinforced.
Initially there may be a dichotomy initially between ‘quality of teaching’ and ‘quantity of trained
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teachers’ however this can be overcome through long term planning and reacting to the needs of the training through review and careful monitoring and evaluation.
SC defines Child Protection as24:
“... measures and structures to prevent and respond to violence, abuse, exploitation and neglect affecting children. The goal of child protection is to promote, protect and fulfil children’s rights to protection from violence, abuse, exploitation and neglect as expressed in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and other human rights, humanitarian and refugee treaties and conventions, as well as national laws.”
Some of the Head Teachers, teachers and children that were interviewed were able to explain the characteristics of a Child-Friendly school and some elements of child protection. Almost all Head teachers highlighted the need for a security fence around the school grounds to ensure the safety of their pupils (as well as to keep the children at school, and prevent them from leaving the grounds unnoticed.)
All the teachers interviewed could explain some elements of their training and some were able to give examples of elements of the training that covered child protection, however it was evident that that needed a greater focus and perhaps more emphasis in subsequent trainings.
24 A ‘Rough Guide’ To Child Protection Systems, Save the Children A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
35 One female ECD teacher interviewed in NBeG explained that she had thoroughly enjoyed her teacher training programme and that it had provided her with skills to care for young children and ensure they had a safe environment in which to attend school.
“The children can benefit from the goodness of the school community; they are safe and eat food and are not afraid” – ECD Teacher
All the teachers interviewed claimed that the training had improved their teaching ability, given them more confidence in dealing with difficult situations and enabled them to provide discipline in a fair manner. Only one of the teachers reported that he had been able to prepare lesson plans and schemes of work. The difficulty faced by many of the teachers is that the Phase training has been stopped and a new system of in-service training established by GoSS. Any teacher who was part way through the three phases has had to start again at the very beginning, and all the teachers interviewed that were in this position were demoralized by this. However, this training will put them in a good position over the next few years to develop their skills and establish a child friendly, child protective environment at their schools. During this transitional phase the immediate need for teachers should really be prioritised, and although quality of teaching is essential, the quantity of teachers is hugely important. If teachers were allowed to use their existing knowledge obtained during the Phase training to be used as partial credits, or be allowed to miss some elements of the new training that they have already covered then this would speed up the process of recruitment. With a well-defined and useable continuous assessment system, coupled with regular inspections and monitoring and evaluation, those teachers could be continually supported, whilst addressing the gap in teacher numbers.
| | One very successful example of Child Protection systems in place is through the training and implementation of the SC SAT and DCA GEM clubs. The members of these clubs not only work in the community to provide advocacy for education and access for girls to education, they also have a very active role in their schools. These groups of responsible children provide much needed peer support to other members of their school; are active in seeking solutions to disagreements and preventing bullying and conflict in the school and community between their peers. By encouraging this child-to child support and mentorship they assist in building relationships between the different children at the school regardless of sex, age, background or status. The SAT and GEM teams have contributed considerably to the welfare and safety of the school attending children.
Without doubt, a well-trained group of teachers and head teachers, PTA’s and SAT and GEM clubs can have a massive impact on the health, safety and security of the children attending school; however it is also the case that there are many issues and factors to be considered in the community, society and traditions of South Sudan that can negatively impact on the lives of these children.
For example, the situation in Jonglei is a very different to the one witnessed in NBeG. One of the major contributors to non-attendance at school is the very real threat of child abduction. Every day in Jonglei, children are abducted from the streets. The Murle tribesmen are the main
instigators of intertribal child abduction, and although not always, it is sometimes connected to A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
36 violent cattle raids.25. Bor County in particular is at risk, the Murle, who suffer from very low fertility rates abduct both boys and girls to become a part of their families, to be brought up as Murle children. Understandably the streets of Bor do not have the usual gaggle of children playing and the long paths to the rural village schools are considered dangerous places to be. Children are seen behind fences in compounds, away from the potential danger. The PTA at Pariak School considered this to be one of the major reasons why children were not attending school. They are working hard to develop an adult supervised escort service to help children attend, and are also encouraging children to travel in large groups and with adults. This unfortunate situation is perhaps larger and more difficult for any education program to have any real lasting impact on, however it should not be ignored and efforts should be made to include this serious security and child protection issue in any initiative. This issue should be included in any advocacy and governance elements of the programme.
Access to Software UNICEF spends approximately $10 million USD per year on school exercise books, bags and other learning materials in South Sudan alone. All the other iNGO’s have provided some materials to the schools they were working with. Teachers were provided with teaching packs, boxes of teaching resources, and children with text books, although during classroom observations they were not evident. Many of these resources it seemed where kept under lock and key, and brought out for specific purposes. Not one single text book was seen in any of the classrooms visited during this evaluation. There is an on-going issue with text books in South Sudan as the GoSS has prevented the production of any new History and Geography text books until they can be updated to include the new information regarding the country. All current text books still refer to Sudan and Khartoum for example. This could be one explanation for the lack of text books in the schools. All the iNGO’s expressed concern that they had budgetary allocations for the purchase of text books that were not being spent. Resources are provided to
the GEM clubs and SAT’s, Girls Sanitary packs and sports equipment are also being issued.
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Access to Hardware SC have carried out, in conjunction with local communities through a participatory process, repairs and construction to around 30 school buildings, to ensure the continued improvement in school safety, this includes classrooms, offices and storerooms. Boreholes were also dug in 7 schools. DRC have built 3 (4-class) classroom blocks in Aweil South, NBeG to the approved government plans, these blocks include a Head teachers office and storeroom, and 19 of the same in CES. DCA (through D&C) have built 2 four-classroom blocks. NRC has built 5 learning centres. IBIS have built semi-permanent structures at 45 ALP centres.
It is still the case that across the whole of South Sudan over 50% of all learning spaces are under trees, with some classes in temporary structures or tents and only 25% in permanent classrooms. It is interesting to note that of the many new classrooms visited that were in use it was always that these were for the older Primary classes, usually P4 – P8 and that the lower classes were still being taught under trees. It may be due to the fact that as the classes are significantly smaller in the later years of Primary schooling it makes more sense. It was disappointing to note that often one of the classrooms had been converted into a teachers/head teachers office (although always ‘temporarily’). In one school, one classroom contained a class of 147 children; the space could probably comfortably accommodate 50. The children were so crammed in that the teacher was covering the smallest children sat on the floor at the front with
25 Child Abduction in Southern Sudan, The Need for Birth Registration, Child Protection International, June 2009 A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
37 chalk dust from the chalk board. This environment was not conducive to teaching and learning, and probably less so than an open classroom under a tree. Many of the classrooms had little or no furniture; therefore there was a mix of children sat on plastic chairs, bricks and on the floor. The chairs are brought into the school from home by the children every day.
It cannot be understated how important a permanently constructed school classroom is to the education of the children. The PTA’s Head teachers, teachers and children were all immensely proud of their classrooms and it evidently provided some legitimacy to the learning environment. The PTA groups who participated in FGD’s had all had active involvement in the procurement of building materials and the preparation of the land. This involvement encouraged community ownership of the schools and their classes and ensured that the resources were being well maintained and regularly used. The schools built by DRC in very rural areas of Aweil South NBeG, clearly dominated the small villages they were set in and could be seen from a long distance away, standing out against a backdrop of mud and thatch tukuls. The fact that out of the 6 Participatory Rapid Assessments (PRA’s) carried out in the area, 3 classified the need for permanent classrooms above all other needs, highlight the desires of the community to see education, firmly and permanently established.
There was little evidence of multipurpose classrooms, and the majority sat empty and un-used after the Primary classes had ended around 1 p.m. each day. A suggestion could be for multi/double (shift) classes planned to be carried out in both the morning and afternoon, with for example P1-P4 in the mornings and P5-P8 in the afternoons. This would alleviate some of the pressure on the limited resources and crowded schools. Another alternative could be to introduce more FAL, ALP classes to take place in the afternoons. Clearly this is an area that should be discussed with the MoE.
The Senior Programme Manager from IBIS explained that their ALP program builds semi-
permanent structures of mud with teak frames and zinc roofs, and he explained the reason they | | didn’t use locally sourced thatch, but rather zinc sheets for the roofs was that the communities do not take the building seriously if it has a thatch roof, the use of a modern stronger material is vital to demonstrate a professional approach, regardless of the cost saving implications. The DRC classrooms, although very well built, to high specifications, following the GoSS approved plan are still very expensive, at around $50,000 USD per block of 4-classes with a head teachers office and storeroom.
Many of those interviewed expressed the building of classrooms as a priority in any education programme. A member of the Majakon PTA explained that children that are taught under trees are far more likely to be distracted by their surroundings than children inside classes, they can also ‘escape’ the learning environment easier, and as there are more and more children attending school, the need for more and more classrooms is important.
The three director generals interviewed had some enthusiasm for classroom construction; however the immediate needs for rebuilding education they suggested didn’t revolve around hard ware alone.
The Chief of Education at UNICEF also had a similar feeling. “Without increasing numbers of well trained teachers it doesn’t matter how many classrooms you build, the standard and quality of education will not improve.” On consideration a judgment should be made as to whether teaching a large class of children under a tree with interactive, learner centered teaching methods is better than teaching an overcrowded class of hot children by a teacher who doesn’t have the skills to control the learning environment nor make it interesting and learner centered. Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
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A community member in the market of Malualkon suggested that classrooms were vitally important, however when the temperature rose to its peak during the dry season (although schools are on vacation for a large part of this) often the classrooms were abandoned as the teachers and students sought shade and a cooler environment under the trees. Likewise when it rains the classes under trees and in temporary constructions are cancelled and the school abandoned. Consideration of appropriate school design to climate should be made. In Liberia, for example, climate controlled air bricks were used to try to cool the classrooms down, this was done to great effect, a special brick mould was used to create bricks that although structurally strong, had ventilation slats throughout, angled to prevent rain entering the building, but open enough to allow a breeze and air to circulate through26. There are several other design considerations that could be researched from other countries.
The building of latrines was highlighted as a major contributor to the attendance of children, especially girls. All the schools visited had had latrines built by an iNGO over the last few years, but some of the latrines are already showing signs of wear and tear, and sinkage. The huge impact of latrines at the schools cannot be under-stated, and the fact that there is still a need, there are still schools without access to, or without sufficient numbers of latrines means that this is still a very relevant and vital input into the school. At Pariak school in Jonglei, the latrines where built by Peace Wind Japan and were the only ones visited that had an inbuilt rainwater harvesting system, this seemed to be a very good idea, because although there isn’t rain at all times of the year, to be able to collect rain that was then used for hand washing was a useful and fairly cheap addition.
Gender Specific Policies All the programmes
investigated had firm roots
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with regards to Gender Equality. All training sessions carried out with all the beneficiaries included modules on the importance of Girls education. Most notably was the hard work being carried out by the three PTA groups met with in NBeG and Bor. All the groups included women in the twelve members,
FIGURE 18: GIRLS EDUCATION MOVEMENT TEAM although only two or three in each. Both groups told how much effort they were putting into communicating the message and importance of girls education in the community, and with some degree of success as the numbers of girls attending Primary 1 had increased by 50% over the two years of the program. The PTA’s clearly are working, the message they are sending out is important, and is deemed relevant and received well by the communities. The use of the PTA’s add value to the message, and is demonstrating far more success than if it were presented by outsiders to the
26 “C” Certificate Teacher Education Program Training of Trainers Information and Guidelines, AED, 2010
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
39 communities. This strong link between the PTA’s and the community and the schools should be encouraged and developed, but also a strong link between the implementing agency and the PTA should be developed, increased and sustained.
The GEM clubs that C&D had set up in the schools they were working with in Jonglei state had been visiting the local communities and carrying out drama, dance and song to not only share the importance of Girls Education to the girl children, but also to “The parents send their girls away their parents. Likewise the SAT’s from school to the cattle camps...to established by SC in the NBeG prevent them being spoiled” explained that they felt a real responsibility towards the -Girl SAT member promotion of girl’s education. The SAT’s are made up of 6 boys and 6 girls, and they all spoke equally about their goals. When asked why there was a number of girls who didn’t attend school in the area it was explained that many parents keep their daughters from the school. According to the Save the Children RtF global evaluation the evidence shows that SAT clubs have a huge impact on the increased attendance of girls in schools. Although the SAT and GEM clubs have been well trained, there was a definite feeling that greater support could be provided on an on-going basis. Perhaps a regular meeting, that includes training and sharing of experiences could be established to ensure that the SAT and GEM teams are still continuing to be effective. These clubs also have a lot of responsibilities in the schools and are often looked up to for support and guidance from the other students. They get involved in activities such as sports at the schools and also can even be involved in supervising the children during break times.
In the tribes and communities of South Sudan there is well documented tradition of paying a
bride price when you marry. A healthy, tall, Dinka girl who has not been ‘spoiled’ i.e. still a | | Virgin, can command a price of as many as 200 head of cattle, often with a cash sum of up to as much as 75,000 SDG. This can drop depending on the (perceived qualities of the) girl, and community to as low as 20 head of cattle. In real terms this equates to anywhere between $1,000 USD and $120,000 USD. The education of a girl currently has little if any bearing on this value. Subsequently it is in the best interests of the family, financially to ensure that their daughters are well cared for and safe. This often means that girls are sent away from the family home to live at the cattle camps, (where the cattle are taken to have access to water). Here the girls can be protected by the armed cattle herders and have a limitless supply of fresh cow milk, a luxury that contributes greatly to their diet and one that is often not readily available in their homes. Those parents that don’t send their daughters away are concerned that the close environment of a mixed school will ultimately be the cause of problems for their daughters.
For many of the girls and boys the distance to travel to school is a massive factor in attendance, where as parents may be happy to send their boys to a school an hour or mores’ walk away, they are reticent to send their girls due to the risk of rape and abduction. Many of the parents spoken to explained that they would definitely send their daughters to a single sex boarding school, and are unhappy about the current school options. There are actually quite a few single sex boarding schools being Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
40 FIGURE 19: CATTLE CAMP IN CES developed across the country for this very reason. C&D in Bor County have built and furnished one such Secondary school. Any initiative that will increase the attendance of girls at school, improve their security and protection and meet the needs and cultural expectations of the community are incredibly viable and important. Single-sex boarding Primary schools would not be as easy to sustain due to the increased responsibilities of care with younger children. However the availability of this option for single-sex secondary boarding schools to assist in continued girl’s education could really work in favour of encouraging girls to continue to attend Primary school in order to be in a situation where they can attend the Secondary boarding school. SC is implementing a ‘moving’ cattle camp school programme in Jonglei, this is a magnificent opportunity to maintain traditions, ensuring education is maintained, whilst ensuring child protection.
ADRA provide support to the annual celebrations of National Girls Education day. A program of events is organised and with the support of the SAT and GEM clubs, PTA and community groups the importance of girls education is showcased in the local communities.
During the celebration this year a poem was presented by the girls of Kimatong Primary School
“BORN AS A GIRL
Ooh! What a hell on earth!!! Life, precious life We drag our being
Denied our rights coz we’re girls
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Women for bride – price they call Scrooge fathers, lazy parents Who sell young girls for prestige To enrich themselves
Human rights why silent Like the end of the world Yet we are at the centre core of fire No place to run and hide
We are not an accident Because life has meaning Let us join hands for solidarity
And we shall overcome. A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
41 Vulnerable Groups Some street children in NBeG shared their stories, (after some encouragement and the use of a willing translator). The group of 6 children, who were not all entirely sure of their ages were approximately between 5 and 11. They slept in the market, ate what they could forage and made a small living shining shoes and selling peanuts on the streets and in the restaurants of the town.
One of the older boys explained that he had never attended school; he spends his days walking the streets of Aweil selling small bags of peanuts for 1 SDG per bag. He buys the nuts in the shell and then FIGURE 20: VULNERABLE CHILDREN IN MALUALKON removes the shells, decants the nuts into smaller bags and sells them from a tray. He explained why he didn’t go to school.
“...I have no family, no one to pay for my school fees. I don’t even know how to go to school...I sleep in the market, but sometimes the police come and beat us
and make us leave” – Street Boy, Aweil
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One of the younger boys explained that he had tried to go to school, but with no family to support him he had not been able to access school books after his first one had finished. He also had no uniform, chair or pen. This child spent his days polishing shoes on the streets of Aweil, charging 1 SGD.
It was evident that these children had slipped through the net, and had no access to information to help them escape their dire situation. The NRC VCALP doesn’t run in Aweil, nor was there any evidence of any other programmes to meet the needs of these vulnerable boys. The boys were either orphans, or boys who had been sent from their home due to the expense of keeping them and the greater value of girls (in dowry) and the potential cost of boys in having to pay out a dowry. There is a definite gap in the system with regards to these boys and an extension or replication of the VCALP programmes by NRC is desperately needed.
The NRC VCALP programme is currently only being run in one centre in NBeG. The beneficiaries are made up entirely of boys, as a general rule it is boys that are sent away from their family homes to live rough rather than girls, who hold some value to a family. The numbers of attendees is increasing rapidly as more returnees settle in NBeG state. The programme provides the boys with basic literacy and numeracy skills with a view to them enrolling on ALP in
a Primary School. The VCALP centres are however not sited near a school so as to provide a A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
42 safe disturbance free environment. The majority of the attendees will however not be in a position to attend Primary school at the end of the one-year programme and will more than likely commence straight onto YEP. Currently around 40 boys are enrolled on the programme but attendance fluctuates wildly. UNICEF has previously tried a re-unification programme that brings together homeless boys and their families, most of the boys on this programme are surprisingly not orphans. The attempt failed to a large degree, and boys that were welcomed back into the family, found themselves back out on the street a short time after, and in an actually worse situation mentally and physically than they were before being briefly re-united with their parents. It is not the intention of the programme to reunite these children with their families, but to prepare them better to live on their own, and provide for themselves. The programme is not advertised, due to the strong incentive it would provide families to throw their children out of the home; the beneficiaries are carefully selected by the local community and Church. Conflict and Fragility in Education South Sudan is still in a very fragile state, in the last month there have been outbreaks of fighting in Unity State on the border with Sudan. The Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLA) forces have been fighting against The South Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SSLM/A) and the Sudanese Army from the North. In Jonglei State the SPLA, the South Sudan Liberation Army / South Sudan Defence Force (SSLA/SSDF) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement – North (SPLM-N have all been involved in fighting. This coupled with the very prevalent and very violent cattle raids periodically carried out across the whole country, and most especially in Jonglei leaves South Sudan in a constant state of instability. A grenade attack in Aweil mid-October that left one dead and nine injured, and is believed to be an isolated incident and the result of personal grievance or a crime of passion.
It is very difficult to establish continuity and consistency in
Education through the turbulence of violence. During October | | and November two of the three SC offices were closed in Jonglei “People are State due to the continued insecurity there. This meant a stall in the implementation of the programme and much time wasted in already an already short window of opportunity due to rains preventing moving from access to the affected areas. In these circumstances the rural contingencies must be planned and through the capacity building of local community groups, SAT teams and County areas, when education authorities, some form of continuous presence can be the people maintained. Unfortunately during times of conflict and instability education is often cast aside in favour of survival, this also start moving it means that any programme successes or changes can easily be is the sign that compromised and when the crisis has abated the community, schools and children are often in a poorer state then when the crops have before the education programme commenced, leading to a failed and they necessary duplication of work and resources. are coming to Natural and Manmade Conditions the towns to The rainy season has ended, and poor rains across the majority find food and of the state of NBeG have led to drought and increasing food insecurity. Much of the rice harvest has failed, and there is poor earn money” – sorghum yield, with some Bomas reporting total crop failure and Community Member,
families forced to rely on foraging wild fruit and selling assets to Aweil East A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
43 eat. The highland areas of NBeG are particularly badly hit, and water scarcity will be a real concern in the upcoming months. There are reports of increasing numbers of people moving to towns in search of labour and food, as there is not enough food available in the villages - something that has not been seen since the 1988 famine.27
One of the biggest problems faced by the inhabitants of NBeG is the access to basics, food and fuel. Before the CPA almost all the raw materials, food and fuel came to NBeG across the border from the north. NBeG is situated at the far north of South Sudan, bordering Sudan. Now with the border closed all essential items have to come from the south, from Juba via Wau, or from Khartoum via Wau. With the poor state of the roads during the dry season and the almost impassable state of the roads during the rains, the access to these essentials has become very difficult and when items are available, they are prohibitively expensive. This is contributing heavily to a huge increase in inflation. According to the SC twice monthly market price monitoring data, average inflation compared to Jan 11 is 106% though on individual food items many prices are much, much higher as much as 200%. For example the market price of Sour Gum (a stable in the diet) has increased from 72 SDG in 2009 to 192 SDG in 2011. It can be seen in previous food security crisis that as the family begins to struggle to provide food for the children, the attendance at school drops dramatically. Children are expected to contribute to the income of the family, either through manual labour, petty trading or through caring for siblings and collecting water to free up the mother to concentrate on finding food. Those children that continue to go to school do not perform as well as they had previously, they are tired and malnourished and cannot concentrate. There is also a reduction in the number of volunteer teachers during these periods, this was explained in Bor FAL centre, though applies throughout all the schools. Volunteer teachers rely greatly on the support of the PTA and community, as food insecurity becomes more immanent that support dries up. In studies carried out in Liberia, it was found that during times of food insecurity low-paid teachers are also more likely to miss classes to earn money elsewhere, or begin to insist on financial support from the children for 28
example “Cash for Grades”, even at Primary Level. | |
The WFP school feeding programme is providing vital food to some of the schools (one-meal- per-child- per-school day) and in this context this is an important aspect of maintaining, and even increasing the numbers of children attending school. Two IOM trains transporting returnees from Khartoum arrived in Aweil 12 November 2011, with a total of 2028 passengers. It is anticipated that the majority of these returnees will be housed with their relatives in the areas surrounding Aweil; however these returnees and further trains will continue to stretch the available resources, although provision is being made to improve the access to water in schools, for example SC has constructed 7 boreholes in schools in this area, however this will not address all the problems of the influx of returnees, especially during the coming food- insecurity.
GoSS MoE Priorities From meeting with the three Director Generals at the GoSS MoE it became evident that their priorities in education differed slightly from those of the State and County education teams, and likewise those differed slightly from those of the head teachers, teachers, PTA’s and children. There is a very clear disjoint in communication, aims and expectations in this chain of command, mainly caused through lack of resources, and poor communication channels. Any changes in direction by the MoE are rarely communicated effectively between all the key actors.
27 SCiSS GBeG Bi-weekly Situation Report 13/11/2011 A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 28 “C” Certificate Teacher Education Program Training of Trainers Information and Guidelines, AED, 2010 44 Many of the county education team members met with, believed that their opinions and ideas mattered little and that their voices, and those of their communities, were rarely heard. Likewise the MoE in Juba felt that their contributions and messages were being diluted at county level. All three of the Director Generals agreed that the secondment of SC Technical Advisors at the ministry had been very beneficial, and the fact that only one of the original three remained was detrimental to the improvement of the education system. They all expressed disappointment that the main area of work of the technical advisors was directed towards capacity building the county and state education teams, and would like to see a more concerted effort towards the development of their own departments.
Areas of concern highlighted by the three Director Generals not directly linked to the DANIDA programme were the continued lack of infrastructure at the Ministry. With little or no budget to cover such expenses the Director Generals cannot visit the regions to assess the programmes and meet the MoE staff. Vehicles or the lack thereof was a major concern to the Director Generals. One area that they highlighted where they would like to some improvement is in advocacy, they hoped that SC would commence a more thorough advocacy campaign towards the GoSS in the area of budgetary support to education. The actual spend per-anum on Education has been decreasing, this they claim is an area of major concern and they would be very interested to see the iNGO’s working together to try and address this.
At the State and regional education offices visited in NBeG and Jonglei the concerns were also regarding logistical support and capacity. The County Education Director in Bor County shared his strategic plan for the next 3 years. Many of their goals, such as the building of 600 new classrooms, 400 new latrines and the training of 335 teachers where all allocated the joint responsibility of the iNGO’s and Ministry. One area that the Director considered of vital importance was the shortage of trained teachers, he claimed that there was over 300 teachers
missing from the system in their county alone, and very little new teachers being employed
| | trained and allocated each year.
The County Education Director of Aweil East and his deputy shared their thoughts on the problems faced in their county. The most vulnerable children and families they explained were their biggest area of concern. Many of the returnees and IDP’s in the county (many returning from the north on IOM arranged trains) have little opportunity to access schools due to the remote locations of the returnee camps. The extreme poverty of these people also means that they have little access to money to buy school uniforms, books, pens or even food. They were very complementary of the WFP school feeding program and other iNGO’s that provided uniforms and books. They saw the role of the PTA’s as a vital link between the iNGO’s, the schools and the most vulnerable families, and would like to see a continued support and presence from the iNGO’s in this area. When asked to prioritise the needs of Aweil East with regards to education they listed the following:
1. Teacher recruitment and Teacher training 2. Classroom construction 3. Latrine construction 4. Low level of capacity in the county education teams 5. Lack of resources in the county education inspection teams
One area of concern that both County Education teams shared was that their School inspectors were very much lacking in capacity to carry out their jobs effectively. With no transport, and very
little budget it was becoming increasingly difficult to access all the schools in their respective A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
45 counties, and without thorough inspection the schools and the teachers cannot be assumed to be carrying out an effective education programme. The inspectors had received training, from C&D in Bor and SC in Aweil East, but they still lacked the capacity to carry out their duties to the highest standard. There was also some confusion over the use of the reports that were written, and little evidence to suggest that any affirmative action was taken on the basis of those reports. The State Education Coordinator for NBeG highlighted that often the communication channels between the state and GoSS MoE in Juba are difficult to maintain due to the lack of resources allocated to the regional offices. There are few computers available to record information gathered through inspections, and no avenues to effectively share that information with MoE in Juba. Even where there are computers, the lack of electricity and computer literate staff make this useful technology almost redundant.
Best Practice and Recommendations It is evident that between all the implementing partners a huge gap in the education system is being filled and the need to continue with these programmes and continue to develop and grow them is required for many years to come. However, time should be taken to step back from the implementation and consider the areas that are having the largest impact and are the most suited to be carried forward and if possible replicated in other states of South Sudan. With the current instability in certain states, and logistical difficulties caused by poor roads and infrastructure some initiatives may be better suited than others.
Those programme aspects that require little infrastructure, such as the SAT’s, GEM’s PTA,s and advocating for education, girls education and child protection can easily be replicated, and have been shown to have a massive impact so could easily be expanded upon to be more influential with little extra effort or money.Those that require a greater investment of money and capacity
such as school construction and ECD and ALP classes although with great success and impact | | in some areas, may be more difficult and more expensive to implement in all areas, for example in Bor county there is not the same access to the locally sourced raw materials such as sand and ballast as there is in NBeG and therefore this adds extra expense as these have to be brought into the construction site from further afield. Perhaps some alternative sources of construction could be considered in these areas to take into account the raw materials that are available. A one-size-fits all approach in this instance would produce similar results but at vastly different costs. Teacher training and recruitment is without doubt essential, at both local implementation level and national advocacy and governance level. Without sufficient teachers, trained to a sufficient level of quality the impact on the quality of teaching of all the other initiatives is watered down or made irrelevant. A well trained, high quality teacher will have a bigger impact on the quality of the education received by their class under a tree than poor quality teaching in a over-crowded newly built classroom.
Furthermore, collaboration, open communication and sharing of best practice between all educational organisations must be continued and improved upon to ensure that the best initiatives are being implemented and not duplicated in the areas where they are required the most. It could be recommended that in future DANIDA ROI programmes, the specialist areas of the individual iNGO’s be capitalised upon. For example, a school could be built by DRC, using their institutional capacity and knowledge, using the Hydraform bricks. The ECD classes and SAT’s would be established and run by SC. IBIS would develop and maintain the ALP program and DCA could capacity build the local NGO and PTA’s to work closely with the local education
authorities and continue with the GEM clubs. This consortium based approach would ensure A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA
46 that each community worked with would receive an excellent intervention at all levels, delivered by all the implementing partners collaboratively.
From evaluating the various programmes from the different iNGO’s this report has identified several areas of Best Practice.
ECD This initiative was highly favoured by the GoSS MoE in Juba. The County Education Director of Aweil East stated categorically that this is a vital area to be continued. Members of the local community and the PTA’s all spoke very highly of the methodology and concept of children
attending school before the age of Primary 1.
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The SC initiative into ECD has been a huge success. With 20 ECD classes in 10 schools, 100 children in two classes at each school, resulting in 1000 children between the ages of 3 and 6 attending school. As the above diagram shows, not only are children entering Primary 1 better prepared and at a higher level of understanding and knowledge than their peers who did not attend ECD, they are doing so healthier, in a better educational frame of mind, and potentially from better supported households. The other very positive accompaniments to this program is the increased attendance (although difficult to pinpoint through data, there is anecdotal supporting evidence) of the girls that would normally be expected to care for these children.
A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A Parents that were interviewed on their thoughts on the program demonstrated that they were
47 now more aware of the importance and need for education and where actively seeking out FAL classes that they could take to ‘keep up’ with their children.
Although a relatively expensive component of the SC programme with approximately $100,000 USD spent on learning spaces, feeding programmes, teachers’ salaries and resources since May 201029 this innovative programme is a great example of best practice, with the multi faceted benefits reaching many beneficiaries other than just the children attending classes.
ALP The IBIS ALP model that is being implemented in CES shows exemplary planning, delivery and continued support. Although relatively expensive, the programme demonstrates that a ‘quick-fix’ approach may tick boxes, but is rarely the answer to a long time development plan. The ALP teachers are trained over a long period of time, and continually supported, tested, supervised and re-trained. The teachers have opportunities to ask for support, and share ideas with their peers. They are well rewarded for their work and subsequently standards, attendance and moral are all maintained. The innovative use of local materials to build the semi-permanent classrooms has reduced the costs of a usually very expensive component which in turn allows money to be spent across the whole programme.
Although this programme is relatively expensive to establish, once functional the running costs can be reduced and the benefits to the other programmes and trickle down effects can be seen as a valuable inclusion in the review of best practice.
VCALP NRC’s patented approach to supporting vulnerable children is also to be mentioned as best practice. This ‘grey’ area is very poorly addressed in all the other programmes. There is a huge
need for this service, across the whole of South Sudan, the programme is delivered in an
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understanding and very supporting way, and has the support of the local communities and Church members. Although not necessarily directed at the root cause of the problem, it addresses the realistic needs of the children and considers very sensitively their futures. With increasing numbers of returnees and increased food insecurity this programme could potentially have massively positive results.
SAT/ GEM The impact of the SC initiated SAT’s and DCA GEM’s is evident in all the communities where they have a presence. The role of the children in becoming ambassadors for education is very much a validatory one. The members interviewed took their work incredibly seriously and were also very passionate about taking on the responsibility and spreading their message to their peers, and communities. Interestingly the parents in the community were equally inspired by the messages of the SAT’s through their dance, singing and drama and took their words to heart, not only encouraging their own children to attend school, but by seeking out their own options to gain education, literacy and numeracy through the FAL and BFAL programmes. One member of a SAT even recommended that all the SAT’s across the country could work together to try to have an impact on the GoSS, advocating for increased public spending and increased commitment and good governance from the Government. The huge potential impact of this programme cannot be understated and with sufficient funding and careful nurturing, these young activists and advocators could have a very big influence over the entire education system.
Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 29 7204_SCDK_Education_BVA_Budget_Forescast 48
PTA All the implementing partners were very much in favour of continuing to support the PTA’s, with training and capacity building activities. The PTA groups met with were very vocal in their agreement of the initiative in place to increase and encourage the attendance at school, especially with regards girls’ education. Their efforts to improve this situation are commendable. The inclusion of the PTA’s in the rehabilitation and construction of the schools enabled them to take some ownership of the school and this in turn validated a lot of the work that was being done by the iNGO’s with the communities. All the PTA’s explored had a pivotal role in collecting and supplying vital raw materials to ensure the timely reconstruction and repairs of the school. Many of the PTA members assisted and escorted children to school to ensure their safe passage and also were a constant presence in the schools to maintain safe boundaries and access to water. Often it seemed due to a lack of reward of incentivisation the PTA’s were not a stable presence and their membership changed. This didn’t necessarily weaken the integrity or overall goals of the PTA’s it does however mean that training sessions will need to be repeated more often to ensure that the standards and objectives are maintained. Continued funding and training, coaching and support will ensure that the PTA’s maintain their strong presence as advocates for change to the education system.
School Construction The DRC constructed schools demonstrated innovation in their use of Hydraform interlocking bricks, enabling schools to be constructed quicker and with a reduced need for skilled labour. The schools actually took longer to be completed than they should, but with improved preparation and planning this can be overcome. Once the raw materials were sourced, and the
foundations dug, the 4-classroom block, with head teachers office and storeroom can be
| | erected in little over 1 month. The Schools were strong and very impressive and provided a much needed positive image for education. In communities with literally no permanent structures, the school stands out as a very important place. The communities themselves see this construction as a positive impact and addition to their areas, the PTA’s who were heavily involved in the collection and deliver of some of the vital raw materials are very proud of their new school. The head teacher and teachers all demonstrated that they felt the schools not only added to the quality of education the children were receiving but also added to their pride in their job, the permanent buildings cementing their roles in the community and reminding them that education is a permanent state.
The IBIS semi-permanent school constructions, (mud and teak framed walls with zinc roofs), although not providing the useful imagery of permanent education were also a simple way of quickly and very cheaply providing a shelter, and a room for learning. As a way of impacting on the massive shortage of classrooms, but whilst still providing some quality, this has to be commended. Interestingly though, the communities where unhappy with the idea of roofing these buildings with locally sourced thatch, and the addition of zinc roof’s provided a sufficient permanency to be accepted by the community.
Use of local NGO as implementing Partners The use of the local NGO Church and Development in Bor County to implement the DCA education program is a great success. Although the strength of capacity and experience of the local NGO’s may mean that this is not a practical recommendation in all situations, it does mean A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A that this capacity building, sharing of ideas and utilizing local knowledge could be developed as
49 an integral part of any future programmes, with a funding allocation to enable the use, support and ultimately build capabilities of similar organisations. C&D are well known and well respected in the community; they have a very strong local image and very intuitive local knowledge. Their relationship with the county education team clearly demonstrated the mutual respect of two local organisations, staffed and managed by people local to the area and with similar skills sets, knowledge and experience. It was admirable that C&D was founded by the Church, the Executive Director is a man who has lived in the region his entire life, apart from two spells as a refugee. Their policy of capacity building their local team with expertise from outside of the area, showed their visions and aspirations to grow as an entity. Although primarily a Christian Faith Based organisation (FBO), they did not only seek to support Christians, this was specifically stipulated by the Executive Director. DCA provide much needed support and capacity building and regularly meet to evaluate, monitor and support the programme. C&D may be an anomaly in South Sudan, during the research for this report, no other local organisations operating at such a high level were encountered. It would be recommended though that this avenue could be investigated, and other local organisations, either FBO or indigenous NGO be sourced and the necessary capacity building and support be carried out to attempt to have a similar impact in different areas as C&D are having in Bor County.
Access to a School Feeding Programme Both the ECD programme and the VCALP programmes evaluated contained a school feeding element to their implementation. It was also noted that some Primary Schools in both NBeG and Bor counties were benefitting from the WFP school feeding programme What was also evident was the schools not benefitting from this programme. Children that had no guaranteed meals were clearly not performing as well in schools than children that were regularly provided with food. Some boys that were interviewed had not eaten for two days, and had no guarantee when their next meal would be. The WFP has set strict guidelines on the schools that could apply to be recipients of their programme. The WFP aims to feed more than 375,000 school
30
children with school meals across the county . For a school to be eligible to benefit from the | school feeding programme they must have a permanent kitchen, storeroom, latrines and a functioning PTA. If these requirements are met then the school can apply for the assistance. Many of the schools are receiving assistance in this way but with food sufficient to feed only half of the children, often because of the large increase in children attending school since the original contract was signed. Regardless, this food is vital to the health and education of the children who benefit from it. A fairly quick, cheap and simple way to impact massively on the health and access to education for children is to provide them with food. This also removes some of the burden being placed on the families of the children to provide meals, and removes some of the burden placed on the children who may be expected to not attend school to carry out income generating activities.
The WFP states31:
“School feeding is an effective safety net. It helps to protect vulnerable children during times of crises. It safeguards nutrition, education and gender equality and provides a range of socio- economic benefits. School feeding can also contribute to a much-needed sense of normality for children living in insecure environments. When putting food on the family table today takes priority over a child’s potential for tomorrow, a daily school meal serves as a strong incentive to send children to school and ensure they attend regularly. When local production contributes to school feeding programmes, there are win-win spinoffs for local economies. School feeding is
30 http://www.wfp.org/countries/South-Sudan/Operations Sudan inEducationProgrammes South Review A ofFunded DANIDA 31 http://one.wfp.org/eb/docs/2009/wfp208224~1.pdf 50 sustainable. To date, WFP has handed over school feeding programmes to 31 national governments, which continue to provide school feeding today”
Although an externally controlled element this “quick-fix” and fairly cheap to implement initiative could utilize the access to the WFP school feeding programme as a complementary benefit to the schools being targeted.
Engagement with the Local education Authorities After meetings with the GoSS MoE in Juba and then subsequent meetings with the Local education authorities it became evident that there is a certain amount of disconnect. The problems raised at GoSS level did not always directly correlate with the immediate issues raised closer to the schools. Capacity building of the communications channels is very much required. Allocation of resources, technology and training will facilitate a smoother more coordinated approach from the County Education teams that can mirror and influence the priorities of the MoE in Juba. By developing good relationships with the Local Education teams, as seen in Bor by C&D a close well-orchestrated approach to problem solving and planning can be developed.
Conclusion All the implementing partners and other NGO’s visited are working hard on their respective programmes, however an increase in collaboration, open communication and sharing of best practice between them must be encouraged and improved upon to ensure that the best initiatives are being implemented and not duplicated in the areas where they are required the most. It is recommended that in future DANIDA ROI programmes, the specialist areas of the
individual iNGO’s be capitalised upon and a consortium based approach would ensure that
| | each community worked with would receive an excellent intervention at all levels, delivered by all the implementing partners collaboratively.
Acknowledgements
Thanks are offered to the following individuals for their assistance and support in the production of this report: Martha Hewison, Oscar Onam, Berhanu Haile, Dorothy Odwel, Emily Lugano, Okello Richard Cox McOrik, Jakob Eilsøe Mikkelsen, Kasper Ejslkov, Daniella Ritzau-Reid, Jess Shaver, Patrick Kibuku, John Adede, Maria Vargas, Gabriel Dut, Helle Mortensen, Susan Watkins, Gianmaria Pinto, Jamila El Abdellaoui, Peter Mc Canny, Becky* de Graaff, Simon Mphisa, Julius Taban, John Bullen, Reverend Stephen Mathiang.
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51 References
NRC Core Activity Education, Youth Education Pack (Yep) In Brief, Background, Concept, Evaluations and Development Plans Feb 2007/EKM NRC Alternative Education Systems in Southern Sudan SSD-11/E/39754 DRC Annual Report 2010 Support to Protection and Reintegration Of Refugees and IDPs in Central Equatoria and Northern Bahr el Ghazal, South Sudan Nicholson, (2007), ‘Accelerated Learning in Post Conflict Settings- A discussion paper’ SCUS. Education Statistics State Statistical Booklet for Northern Bahr-el-Ghazal Published 11 March 2011 Accelerated Learning Program, Teacher Training Manual ALP Teachers, Ministry Of Education, Science, And Technology, Southern Sudan Stansbery & Borisova, 2010, SCUS, “Early Childhood Care and Development, Helping young children reach their developmental potential” Laws of Southern Sudan, The Child Bill, 2006, GoSS A ‘Rough Guide’ To Child Protection Systems, Save the Children Child Abduction in Southern Sudan, The Need for Birth Registration, Child Protection International, June 2009 Child Protection and Education for Conflict Affected Children in Southern Sudan: October 2006 to March 2008 SC GBeG Bi-weekly Situation Report 13/11/2011 http://www.wfp.org/countries/South-Sudan/Operations http://one.wfp.org/eb/docs/2009/wfp208224~1.pdf http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/best-practice http://ssnbs.org/storage/key-indicators-for-southern-sudan/Key%20Indicators_A5_final.pdf
http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/ED/pdf/gmr2011-policy-paper-south-sudan.pdf
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Education Statistics Government of Southern Sudan (GoSS) Southern Sudan 2010 National Statistical Booklet, (2011) A Report Of The Study on Socio-Economic And Cultural Barriers To Schooling In Southern Sudan, UNICEF 2008 Building a better future: Education for an independent South Sudan. EFA, Global Monitoring report 2011 Save the Children “Impact Evaluation of the Rewrite the Future (RtF) programme in Southern Sudan 2011 DANIDA “Review of the Regions of Origin Initiative 2009-2011 in support of the Implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement Sudan 2010-2011 Final Report” January 2011 Save the Children, 2010, Early Childhood Care and Development Helping Young Children Reach Their Developmental Potential Trainers Guide for Parent Teacher Associations & School Management Committees For Primary & Secondary Schools in Southern Sudan (GoSS) Save The Children DANIDA - Education in Emergency VI - Q2 2011 report – Final “C” Certificate Teacher Education Program Training of Trainers Information and Guidelines, AED, 2010 7204_SCDK_Education_BVA_Budget_Forescast
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52 APPENDIX A: Terms of Reference The Consultant will initiate the collection, analysis and assessment of DANIDA funded education programmes. Best practice will be identified with a view to their transferability to, and replication in, other states and communities. Recommendations should then be made based on this review and identification of best practice that can contribute to the development of the MoE overall education strategy for South Sudan. The Consultant will consult with the DANIDA Programme Coordinator for South Sudan; Save the Children (SCiSS, Save the Children Denmark (SCD) and the Save the Children UK (SCUK) regional office); NRC, DRC, DCA; Ministry of Education at all levels; other donors and education development partners; teachers and students. The main point of contact for the consultant is Martha Hewison: SCUK Multi Country Education Adviser: [email protected]. The consultant will: 1. review relevant background documents and statistics (e.g. partner documents, programme documents, evaluation reports) regarding the design, implementation, objectives and outputs, activities, delivery and experiences (positive and negative) of four NGO’s32; 2. with a particular focus on targeting returnees and IDP’s at primary level, including non- formal programs (e.g. accelerated learning programmes (ALP) and the link between formal and technical and vocational training (TVET)) and how they enhance reintegration of the target groups within the host communities; 3. and promotion of child protection mechanisms in education at all levels of programme design and implementation. 4. assess the adequacy of both software and hardware provided by the various delivery modalities;
5. consider gender policies and implementation and consideration of access and delivery of
| | education to other vulnerable groups; 6. consider how the design and delivery of these programmes addresses issues of conflict and fragility in education 7. consider value for money in projects; 8. consider the flexibility and responsiveness of the activities to the context and room for adjustment due to unforeseen circumstances; 9. consider the effectiveness of monitoring and evaluation systems in the projects; 10. assess natural and manmade current conditions that affect the delivery of education (positively and negatively) e.g. physical infrastructure, access, quality of teachers, security, geography, climate and culture and how the programme design and delivery have mitigated or built upon these; 11. review relevant GoSS MoE documents, taking into consideration priorities, needs and gaps and how the NGO programmes reviewed contribute to this; 12. review policies, legislation and administrative structures at the GoSS and state levels that support or impede education delivery and how the programme design, delivery and activities support the delivery of education within this; 13. assess public service reform, (e.g. delayed introduction of education policies at the state level, etc) and how the programme design, delivery and activities support the delivery of education within this context;
32 Save the Children in South Sudan (SCiSS); Norwegian refugee Council (NRC); Danish Refugee Council (DRC) and A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A DanChurch Aid (DCA)- all implementing RoI programmes through Danida funding.
53 14. identify best practice based on all the above; with a view to their transferability to, and replication in, other states and communities; 15. consider how this best practice might support the effective delivery of education in this context and contribute to the priorities of the MoE; 16. consider the coordination mechanisms between education partners and the MoE at all levels; 17. Develop a list of recommendations that can be shared with the MoE that might support the effective delivery of education in this context and contribute to their priorities.
RESPONSIBILITIES AND TIMING The Consultant will be in-country no later than 12th October 2011. The consultant will collaborate closely with the MoE, GoSS; Save the Children and DANIDA. S/he will be responsible for organizing the work, and ensuring quality control and delivery of the required report as agreed by both parties. The consultancy should not exceed more than 45 days. Save the Children will provide the majority of background documents for review though it is expected that the consultant will also endeavour to gather some. METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH AND TENTATIVE TIME LINE Save the Children seeks a mixed methodological approach for this study. An initial desk review of existing studies, programme documents and project evaluations on the various education programmes currently implemented in South Sudan by the four NGOs and various relevant GoSS MoE documents should be reviewed. This will be followed by the formal evaluation, which should include formal and informal interviews with key stakeholders within the MoE, NGO’s, UN agencies, FBO’s, donor community, teachers and students. Site visits to selected states will also be undertaken.
| | DELIVERABLES Deliverables will include: Study Outline and Work Plan, an Out-briefing presentation and the final report. A draft report will be due by the agreed deadline after acceptance of the Study Outline and Work Plan. An out-brief presentation of the findings, conclusions, and recommendations will be required in Juba. It may be that a second draft is also required but the final report will be due 4 days after receipt of comments on the final draft from the consultant in line with the agreed work plan. The final study document, in MS Word, will not exceed 40 pages (excluding executive summary and annexes). Single line spacing and 11 point font are acceptable. The report should include: I. Executive Summary (not to exceed 8 pages, which can be used as an independent briefing paper) II. Introduction III. Study Methodology IV. Study Findings V. Recommendations VI. Conclusion VII. Annexes. This section may include an annex of data sources utilized, key informants interviewed and conceptual and background documentation used in analyzing and formulating the study document.
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54 APPENDIX B: List of Informants
KEY INFORMANTS LOCATION Save the Children Staff: Emily Lugano Juba Jess Shaver Juba Okello Richard Cox McOrik Juba Dorothy Odwel Malualkon Oscar Onam Malualkon Berhanu Haile Malualkon Ministry of Education Government of South Sudan Mr. Benjamin Ajongo - Director General, General Education Juba Mr. Shadrack Chol Stephen – DG, Planning and Budgeting Juba Mr. Kuol Atem Bol – Acting DG, Alternative Education System Juba County Education Teams Dominic Ajiith – County Education Director Aweil East Dominic Akol – Deputy County Education Director Aweil East Jamesco Deng – State Education Coordinator NBeG Aryul Arou Ajak – County Director of Education Bor John Baan – County Education Team Bor John Kelei Chol – County Education Team Bor Peter Ayaik Gauls – County Education Team Bor Chor Mike de Mauyang – County Education Team Bor
Garang Beek Daniel – County Education Team Bor
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Patrick Kibuku–DCA Juba Susan Watkins – DRC Juba Maria Vargas - DRC Aweil Gianmaria Pinto – NRC Aweil Jamila El Abdellaoui – NRC Aweil Peter Mc Canny – IBIS Juba Becky* de Graaff - ADRA Juba Simon Mphisa – UNICEF Juba Reverend Stephen Mathiang – C&D Bor Julius Taban – C&D Bor Andrew Manyok – C&D Bor Head Teachers Angelo Garang Geng Aweil East Peter Lual Aweil East Joseph Garang Tong Aweil East John Gai Mel Aweil East Joseph Mou Jacob Aweil South Rev. John Akoy Maluk Bor Primary Teachers NBeg – 4 male teachers Aweil East Jonglei – 2 male teachers Bor
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55 Garang Ajou Aleu Aweil East James Chuor Aweil East ECD Teachers Rebecca Atong Ngor, Aweil East John Yak Aweil East Elizabeth Abeny Aweil East Children Malualkon School (10 boys) Aweil East Majak – Akoon (10 girls) Aweil East SAT Members Madhol School (6 girls and 6 boys) Aweil East PTA Members Majak - Akoon School (12 members) Aweil East Panapuoth School (12 members) Aweil East Pariak Mixed Primary School (4 members) Bor FAL Center Peter Maluk (Headteacher) Bor Teachers (7 male) Bor Adult Learners (4 female) Bor Vulnerable Children 6 boys Aweil
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56 APPENDIX C: Methodologies
Qualitative and Quantitative data and Information was collected to formulate the recommendations of the report. Background research covered over 400 documents relating to the education sector, and South Sudan. A list of all documents and web resources directly used and referred to in the report can be found at the end of the main report under the title References. Quantitative data was mainly collected through interaction with key informants and beneficiaries. Structured Interviews The intention was to keep the structured interview questions simple, and yet ascertain as much information on quality and best practice as possible. The majority of interviews took around 30 minutes and during the course of all the interviews it was necessary to add or remove questions depending on the direction the interview is going, and how effective the translations were. Focus Group Discussions The intention was to keep the FGD questions open and to allow the participants the time to discuss their answers, encouraging all the opportunity to contribute and perhaps come to some form of consensus or agreement. Depending on the audience, the time and the opportunity and with efforts to obtain as much useful information on quality and best practice as possible, questions or activities where added or removed depending on the direction the discussion went and the abilities of the translation. The FGD’s lasted approximately 60 minutes.
Semi-Structured interviews The majority of the ad-hoc meetings that took place can be classified as semi-structured.
Meetings in the street or in the classrooms that didn’t fit the time requirements or understanding
| | of content for structured interviews were carried out in that manner. They lasted anything from 2
minutes to an hour.
Observation Checklists A simple checklist that was used to assess the standard and quality of the teaching in the classroom and also the quality of learning resources and buildings. This was not a scientific assessment, more a use of common sense and experience.
A total in excess of 200 people were consulted, interviewed or took part in FDG’s to provide the information recorded in this report. All names have been removed from the main body of the report to provide anonymity., however a list of the Key Informants can be seen in APPENDIX B.
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57 APPENDIX D: Primary schools Supported by the Programme
DRC
NO. NAME OF THE SCHOOL COUNTY STATE Visited 1. Loggo P/S Yei CES × 2. Peremasuk P/S Yei CES × 3. Kejiko P/S Yei CES × 4. Kupera P/S Lainya CES × 5. Bereka P/S Lainya CES × 6. Loka Round P/S Lainya CES × 7. Nyapea P/S Morobo CES × 8. Pabanga P/S Morobo CES × 9. Aworo P/S Morobo CES × 10. Logili Kajo-keji CES × 11. Lukura Kajo-keji CES × 12. Mereguga Kajo-keji CES × 13. Lubule Kajo-keji CES × 14. Ajira Kajo-keji CES × 15. Limi Kajo-keji CES × 16. Serejale Kajo-keji CES × 17. Longira Kajo-keji CES × 18. Kendiri Kajo-keji CES × 19. Rodo Kajo-keji CES × 20. Majakgoi Aweil South NBeG 21. Nyocanoon Aweil South NBeG
22. Riangaker Aweil South NBeG
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DCA / C&D
NO. NAME OF THE SCHOOL COUNTY STATE Visited 1. Werkok Bor Jonglei × 2. Baidit Bor Jonglei × 3. Kolmarek Bor Jonglei × 4. Kapaat Bor Jonglei × 5. Malualbur Bor Jonglei × 6. Pariak Bor Jonglei
SC
NO. NAME OF THE SCHOOL COUNTY STATE Visited 1. Makuac Girls Aweil East NBeg × 2. Malualkon Aweil East NBeg 3. Baac Aweil East NBeg × 4. Majak - Akoon Aweil East NBeg 5. Pariak Aweil East NBeg
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58 7. Riangawai Aweil East NBeg × 8. Waragany Aweil East NBeg × 9. Malekbol Aweil East NBeg × 10. Rumdier Aweil East NBeg × 11. Warawar Aweil East NBeg × 12. Rumarial Aweil East NBeg × 13. Malual baai Aweil East NBeg 14. Mabil Pr - school Aweil East NBeg × 15. Denyic upper primary Aweil East NBeg 16. Majak - Paluiel Aweil East NBeg × 17. Ameth Aweil East NBeg × 18. Rumwel Aweil East NBeg × 19. Lieth Aweil East NBeg × 20. Arieu Aweil East NBeg × 21. Pioryoom Aweil East NBeg × 22. Wunkuel Aweil East NBeg ×
23. Peth Aweil East NBeg ×
| | 24. Atuet Aweil East NBeg × 25. Wun - Cum Aweil East NBeg × 26. Pagai Aweil East NBeg × 27. Rumrol Aweil East NBeg × 28. Madhol Aweil East NBeg 29. Mabok Tong Aweil East NBeg × 30. Kuel Aweil East NBeg × 31. Man - Awan Aweil East NBeg × 32. Ajiep Aweil East NBeg × 33. Malualdit Aweil East NBeg × 34. Majok Dut Dep Jok Aweil East NBeg × 35. Titchok Aweil East NBeg × 36. Athiang Girls Aweil East NBeg ×
37. Mangar Tong Aweil East NBeg × A Review of DANIDA Funded Education Programmes in South Sudan in South Programmes Education Funded ofDANIDA Review A
59 38. Tarweng Aweil East NBeg × 39. Marol Ajoung Aweil East NBeg 40. Mabok Geng Aweil East NBeg × 41. Majak Girls Aweil East NBeg × 42. Majak Ajoung Aweil East NBeg × 43. Wunlang Aweil East NBeg × 44. Makuei Agep Aweil East NBeg × 45. Manyiel Aweil East NBeg × 46. Rulnyin Aweil East NBeg × 47. Maperpingdong Aweil East NBeg × 48. Riang Akeeth Aweil East NBeg × 49. Rumwut Aweil East NBeg × 50. Panapuoth Aweil East NBeg
APPENDIX E: Best Practice
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