Pedagogical Improvement Project (2010-2014) Mid-term external Evaluation 2010-2011, Bolivia

Background:
From 2001-2010, ICEL implemented “School project, Cochabamba” in District 5, Tiquipaya, Bolivia with the support from Norad/NLM. This project involved the construction of an educational complex and also the development of socio-pedagogical actions aimed at providing opportunities and optimal conditions in terms of infrastructure and equipment to students from low-income and poor families in the community and district. It also aimed at substantially reducing the high rates of school dropout and failure rates and to improve the quality of education in the population. These objectives were roughly met in the set time, though, as a result of it, there were still several challenges, especially when you consider that the school population increased significantly and the legal, political and socio-educational context of the country changed substantially.

In order to take on the major challenges discovered by this former project, ICEL is implementing in 2010 - 2014, the Pedagogical Improvement Project that will cover virtually all the educational Sub-District "Toribio Claure", located in District 5 in Tiquipaya. The actions of the project are aimed towards a strictly pedagogical and institutional component of regular and special alternative education.

Purpose/objective:
The evaluation intended to assess the thematic and geographic coverage of the project and its results and socio educational difficulties so far. It also intended to look at perceptions of the various actors of the educational community and the challenges, which after two years of implementation, still remain to be met. To receive recommendations for the remaining project period was therefore a main purpose of the evaluation.

Methodology:
All relevant project documents were reviewed and questionnaires were used to collect specific quantitative information from the management and technical and administrative staff of the project. In-depth semi-structured interviews were used in conversations with principals and teachers from six educational units, students and parents in the schools where the project carries out its actions, municipal authorities and members of the Department of Human Development Department of Tiquipaya and the Tiquipaya District Administration of Education. During field visits, both observation and informal conversations were used to assess the activities developed by the project and to listen to some beneficiaries of the project.

Key findings:
The project had so far been implemented in eight of the ten planned schools, and the partial results that have been reached until December 2011 are positive and encouraging. This is because the project has been able to establish the bases for the management with more certainty and security in the next years. It has a legal fundament that gives the necessary support and legitimacy from the main stakeholders in the education community, both at the level of the Sub-District “Toribio Claure” as well as with the municipal education instances.  Among some of the partial achievements reached by the project, one may point out the coordinated work that is carried out with the stakeholders in the education community (teachers, families and students), the support to cultural activities so they may be a part of the institutional identity of some of the schools (the theatre in “Toribio Claure” and native music in Los Molinos), the approach to key topics in educational development (self-esteem, disability), the encouragement towards the participation of the students, the establishment of a culture for continuous training of the teachers and the strengthening of the confidence and security in their educational performance as teachers.

The most notable weaknesses that one may demonstrate in the project, and that might have a negative influence if they are not corrected immediately, are the following: an insufficient technical and interdisciplinary team, the lack of a culture of systematization and investigation, insufficient approach to new education rules, the lack of an office that permits a proper institutional identity and the lack of policies for editing and publishing education materials.

Recommendations:
It is recommended that the project should expand to include the entire educational district and that it should hire more technical expertise on a permanent basis instead of using freelance consultants. It is also recommended to incorporate the new Education Act to a higher extent and to work on a monitoring system.

Comments from the organisation, if any:
Some of the recommendations (particularly regarding project expansion and increasing the project team) do not take the budget frame and capacity into account and are therefore not realistic.