Cameroon and Swaziland Exposure visit to Citizen Led Assessments

Introduction

Towards the end of June 2017, delegations from Cameroon and Swaziland visited Uwezo Uganda to learn more about the Citizen-Led Assessment (CLA) approach. The visit was hosted in Mukono District in the central part of Uganda. Cameroon is among the new members of the PAL Network, a network of 14 countries working across three continents to assess children’s basic competencies in reading and numeracy. Swaziland, on the other hand, seeks to use the CLA approach to assess learning outcomes in their country.

The Cameroon team was represented by three participants from the Cameroon Ministry of Basic Education, and three from Amom Charity, the organization that will be hosting the CLA initiative named Djangirde (meaning ‘school’ in Fulfulde). One participant from SWANCEFA represented the Swaziland team.

The Induction

The team was inducted to all process involved in the CLA approach, beginning with a theory session and finishing with practical sessions to apply and better understand what had been learnt.

The team was privileged to meet the Uwezo Uganda Advisory Committee Chair, Prof. James Albert, who provided useful insights on the history of the education system in the country, touching on her neighbors Kenya and Tanzania as well as the role of government in CLAs and the importance of CLAs to the government.

A representative from the Uganda National Bureau of Statistics, Ms. Yoyeta Magoola Jane, also graced the induction and took the team through the sampling methodology as well as data cleaning and analysis processes.

Visit to Uwezo partner organization

The exposure experience offered the opportunity for a visit to the Uwezo partner organization of Mukono district, Ekubo Ministries. Here, the team learnt about the activities of the Uwezo partner organization and how they are involved in the assessment cycle. Highlights were also shared on the challenges faced by the partners and volunteers during the assessment.

Visit evaluation

The meeting ended with a reflection of what had been done over the one-week period. The participants felt that the exposure visit was useful in that they finally had better understanding of the activities and processes involved in planning and conducting CLAs and they felt confident that they could move to the next steps of planning for a similar assessment in their countries.

Click here for more pictorial highlights from the exposure visit