Evaluation of the Community Centred Education Project

Background:
The Community Centred Education (CCE) project is meant to mobilize communities towards active and effective
participation in the education processes and programmes. This project was conceived in 2006 out of the People’s
Constitution Campaign (PCC) of the Citizens Forum (CF). The CF had embarked on promoting the social and
economic rights being incorporated in the Bill of Rights of the Constitution of Zambia.

The CF is a social movement, which seeks to bring together concerned citizens from diverse backgrounds, devoted
to using their intellectual and moral conviction in finding and articulating appropriate solutions to the many
development challenges that Zambia faces. The movement commits itself to addressing national issues that
will move the country forward, and education is one of the key national issues.

Purpose/ Objective:
The CF requested the Consultant to:
• Carry out a desk review of the CCE project from 2006 to 2008;
• Follow up on the policy recommendations made by CF to government in December 2006;
• Review the national budget for education from 2005-2007;
• Identify some weaknesses/challenges in the CCE and recommend further CF strategies on the CCE project.

Methodology:
During the implementation of the PCC the CF reached out to twenty five (25) rural districts, and held a total of 27
community rallies and 9 public meetings. In this process the PCC reached out over twenty thousand (20,000) people,
all of them in rural communities. 649 people in rural areas and 177 in urban areas participated in the CCE project debates.

In both the PCC and the CCE a total of 23 traditional leaders have been actively involved. These have been in the Northern,
Central, Southern, Eastern, and Copperbelt Provinces.

Key Findings:

2005 allocation was less than 10% of the national budget, in 2006 it was 16% of national budget and then it dropped to
15% in 2007. The 2007 percentage was the same as 2008. It was concluded that with such minimal allocations to
education sector the shortage of teachers, few schools in rural areas and almost non existence of teachers’
accommodation would continue.  The short term strategy of upgrading primary schools to basic schools still leaves
a deficit in infrastructure.

Recommendations:
The review was done to use the information for advocacy for increased allocation to the education sector.

We wish to recommend that the Ministry of Education revisits the provision of automatic progression up to Grade 9.
The quality of education should not be compromised for the sake of attainment of the goal of universal basic education
for all children.
 
Government should send trained teachers to teach in community schools and these should be remunerated accordingly.
 Volunteer teachers who eventually undergo teacher training, and are put on government payroll, should be sent back
to their schools.

Government grants should be sent directly to the schools, and communities should set up committees that will receive
and account for whatever is sent to the schools. School grants should thus be controlled by schools, PTA and Area
Development Committees.

Comments from Norwegian Church Aid (if any):
NCA has shared this study with the other faith based partners in order for them to scale up advocacy.