PASEC2014 EDUCATION SYSTEM PERFORMANCE IN FRANCOPHONE SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA COMPETENCIES AND LEARNING FACTORS IN PRIMARY EDUCATION Conférence des ministres de l'Éducation des États et gouvernements de la Francophonie © PASEC, 2015 All rights reserved. Published in 2015 by the Programme d’Analyse des Systèmes Educatifs de la CONFEMEN, BP 3220, Dakar (Senegal) ISBN: 92-91-33-161-9 Graphic Design: Jenny Gatien Review: Barnaby Rooke Translation: LIDEX Communication: Performances Group Cover photo: © Global Partnership for Education This document is also available in digital format and in French at www.pasec.confemen.org PASEC2014 EDUCATION SYSTEM PERFORMANCE IN FRANCOPHONE SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA COMPETENCIES AND LEARNING FACTORS IN PRIMARY EDUCATION Acronyms and Abbreviations CAP Collective action plans to improve school performance CONFEMEN Conference of Ministers of Education of French-Speaking Countries EFA Education for All GER Gross enrollment rate GNP Gross national product GPI Gender parity index HDI Human Development Index IAP Individual action plans to improve school performance INSERM Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale MCQ Multiple-choice questions MRY Most recent year NGO Non governmental organization NIHCD National Institute of Child Health and Human Development OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development PASEC CONFEMEN Programme for the Analysis of Education Systems PIRLS Progress in International Reading Literacy Study PISA Programme for International Student Assessment SACMEQ Southern and Eastern Africa Consortium for Monitoring Educational Quality TIMSS Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study UIS UNESCO Institute for Statistics UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation IV CONFEMEN - PASEC Writers • Jacques MALPEL, PASEC Coordinator • Dr Oswald KOUSSIHOUEDE, Technical Advisor/Head of the Data Management and Statistical Analysis Division, PASEC • Vanessa Aye SY, Technical Advisor/Head of the Survey Tools and Procedures Division, PASEC • Dr Labass Lamine DIALLO, Technical Advisor, PASEC • Priscilla GOMES, Technical Advisor, PASEC • Moussa HAMANI OUNTENI, Technical Advisor, PASEC • Hilaire HOUNKPODOTE, Technical Advisor, PASEC • Antoine MARIVIN, Technical Advisor, PASEC • Bassile Zavier TANKEU, Technical Advisor, PASEC Members of the PASEC Scientific Committee • Pr François NDEBANI, École Normale Supérieure - Marien Ngouabi University, Brazzaville, Congo; President of the Scientific Committee • Jean Claude EMIN, former Assistant-Director of the Prospective and Performance Evaluation Directorate, Ministry of Education, France • Pr Christian MONSEUR, Education and Training Department – School of Psychology, Logopaedics and Education Science - Liège University, Belgium • Pr Agnès FLORIN, Education Research Center – School of Psychology - Nantes University, France • Pr Boubacar NIANE, School of Education and Training Science and Technology - Cheikh Anta Diop University, Dakar, Senegal • Dr Alain Patrick NKENGNE NKENGNE, Education Policy Analyst - UNESCO-IIPE Pôle de Dakar, Senegal • Dr François SAWADOGO, Director of the Arts and Humanities Training and Research Unit - Koudougou University, Burkina Faso Consultants who Contributed to the PASEC2014 Assessment Work Nantes University Experts (Validation of tools) • Dr Isabelle NOCUS, Senior Lecturer in Psychology of Development • Pr Philippe GUIMARD, Professor of Psychology of Development and Education, member of the Education Research Center, Nantes Liège University Experts (Validation of tools and development of the competency scales) • Michèle LEJONG, Research Associate • Françoise CRÉPIN, Research Associate • Pr Patricia SCHILLINGS • Pr Annick FAGNANT, Education Science Researcher Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) (Psychometric analysis of the tests) • Alla BEREZNER, Principal Research Fellow • Dr Wolfram SCHULZ, Research Director of International Surveys • Greg MACASKILL, Senior Research Fellow • Dr Alexander DARAGANOV, Senior Research Fellow/Data Manager This report was produced under the supervision and administrative monitoring of Boureima Jacques KI, CONFEMEN Secretary General, with support from the CONFEMEN Permanent Technical Secretariat. The PASEC2014 assessment benefitted from the political support of the ministers and the effective and efficient involvement of the national teams of the ten countries assessed. PASEC2014 ASSESSMENT V Acknowledgments This PASEC2014 survey report has been the fruit of work carried out in synergy and collaboration by the CONFEMEN Programme for the Analysis of Education Systems based in Dakar and the national teams of the participating countries, namely: Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Niger, Senegal and Togo. PASEC also wishes to thank the members of its steering committee for their support and strategic guidance throughout the process, as well as the various financial and technical partners, namely: the Agence Française de Développement, the World Bank and the Swiss Cooperation. Without their support, this project could not have been carried out. PASEC’s Scientific Committee made a valuable contribution to the implementation of this assessment, through its validation of the assessment exercises as well as of the report itself. PASEC extends its sincere gratitude to its members. Finally, the staff of CONFEMEN’s Permanent Technical Secretariat is thanked for their technical and administrative support. CONFEMEN also extends its deepest thanks and shares its warmest congratulations with all the persons whose cooperation in the production of this first international report has been instrumental. VI CONFEMEN - PASEC Foreword The international community renewed its commitment towards inclusive and quality education for the post-2015 era, through the Education 2030 Framework of Action, adopted during the World Education Forum held in Incheon in South Korea in May 2015. This commitment requires the sustained mobilization of all players to build education systems that are solidly integrated into nations’ sustainable development processes. CONFEMEN, in its capacity as a Francophone Ministerial Conference for Education, having adopted the Incheon Declaration in 2015, has reasserted its wish to assist countries towards these goals by promoting a forum of francophone expertise and solidarity, through its Programme for the Analysis of Education Systems (PASEC). This programme has produced data and analysis on the performance of education systems and the factors that contribute to education quality, through large-scale surveys of primary-level pupils’ learning outcomes. In two decades, PASEC has carried out close to forty national assessments in twenty-odd countries of Sub-Saharan Africa, the Indian Ocean, the Middle East and South-East Asia. Since 2012, PASEC’s missions have evolved to better respond to the expectations of countries and the international community, who want more measurement of learning outcomes. The added value of the new approach adopted is to focus on the comparability of results across national assessments. The measurement of different countries’ pupil competencies on a common scale, at the beginning (Grade 2) and end of primary (Grade 6), now enables better analysis and understanding of the effectiveness and equity of education systems, in line with other international programmes such as PISA, PIRLS, TIMSS or SACMEQ. The assessment of the last year of primary responds to the need to measure pupils’ key competencies at the end of primary education and before their access to secondary. Adequate mastery of basic competencies in the selected subject areas will impact academic trajectories and schooling, working life and social integration. The option to assess primary Grade 2, in addition to Grade 6, will provide decision-makers with relevant indicators and information on performance in reading and mathematics from the very beginning of schooling, to be able to provide the remediation required to improve the quality of teaching and learning, at the earliest possible opportunity. PASEC launched its first international assessment in 2014 in ten countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Niger, Senegal and Togo). The sample includes close to 40,000 pupils overall, surveyed in over 1,800 schools. Named PASEC2014, this assessment will be followed by a series of regular international assessments. The comparison of performance will be enriched over the years by a broader participation of CONFEMEN countries, and through the monitoring of trends thanks to successive assessments. Furthermore, linking the background information collected during the PASEC surveys with pupils’ success at the PASEC tests will provide some points of reference that may contribute to the public debate on the factors that have an impact on the quality of learning outcomes, and guide action in education. Despite the progress achieved and countries’ commitments, education quality remains a tremendous challenge for most Francophone countries in the South. The results of the first PASEC2014 international assessment underline and analyze the findings in terms of the weaknesses of Francophone education systems in the South, describing a situation that is of concern overall and alarming for some countries. PASEC2014 ASSESSMENT VII This stage of communication of the PASEC2014 international assessment results will be complemented by other publications in the course