Reading for Ethiopia's Achievement Developed (READ) II Activity

Overview

<p>Five year activity whose overall objective is to contribute to USAID/Ethiopia's goal of improving the reading proficiency of 15 million children. READ II also intends to achieve two cross-cutting and complementary objectives: demonstrate interventions that can meaningfully and measurably prepare a range of vulnerable students for learning and contribute to the implementation of a structured gender approach to increase boys' and girls' grade retention and grade progression at key grades in key regions or zones. READ II is intended to support grade 1-4 students, teachers, and communities as primary beneficiaries of this activity, while grade 5-8 students, teachers, and youth are secondary priorities. The Ministry of Education (MOE) will play a key guiding role, with the majority of capacity building activities and leadership training under IR 3 focused on staff from zones and woredas, as well as regional education bureaus (REBs). While the majority of READ II’s interventions support reading and writing improvement in the early grades, USAID/Ethiopia will not neglect working in a responsive and systematic manner with the MOE to improve services for the millions of students who are chronically or unexpectedly confronted by the effects dire poverty, conflict or emergency-related events. USAID/Ethiopia’s development hypothesis is: IF vulnerable students and communities are prepared to succeed, and IF classroom reading and writing instruction improves, and IF community and parental engagement is strengthened, and IF leadership, management and delivery ability at each implementation level improves, THEN students’ reading proficiency will improve. Global Partnership for Education (GPE) Ethiopia joined GPE in 2004 and has received several GPE grants to date totaling $268 million to support the implementation of its education sector plans. The World Bank is GPE’s grant agent in Ethiopia, supervising grant iplementation. UNICEF is the GPE coordinating agency in country. GPE funds are integrated in GEQIP. Generally speaking, this support intends to contribute to the following results: student-to-textbook ratio of 1:1; inspection of 60 percent of schools; and, an increase of the percent of qualified teachers to 60 percent. Minimum Expected Outputs: 1. Local-level monitoring practices in use and informing schools, communities and decision-making in five regions. (Year 1)<br>2. Evaluation of the G1-4 fidelity of implementation (uptake of new teaching methods) by teachers. (Year 1) 3. Textbook Distribution Track-and-Trace Pilot. (Year 2) 4. Regional-level revision and activation of benchmarks for the seven languages and developing new writing benchmarks. (Year 1) 5. Prevalence study of students with hearing and visual disabilities in the school setting, building on studies and data that already exist. (Year 2) 6. Additional research on technical issues aligned with USAID’s learning agenda to complement the evolving needs of the MOE.</p>