Innovative Finance
August 1, 2024
Context
Ethiopia faces significant development challenges, including reducing poverty and meeting Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Despite progress—such as cutting poverty from 38.7% in 2005 to 29.6% in 2010, lowering child mortality, and improving gender parity in education—serious needs remain. Adult literacy rate (52%) and primary education coverage (85%) still fall short of MDGs. Limited access to formal schooling in earlier years has left many adults without basic literacy and numeracy skills, creating a strong need for adult education programs. Expanding adult education is essential to equip citizens with foundational skills, support poverty alleviation efforts, improve standards of living, and enable broader participation in Ethiopia’s plan to become a middle-income economy.
Solution
The Integrated Functional Adult Education Program (IFAEP) is a non-formal education initiative in Ethiopia, designed to provide educational opportunities outside the traditional formal school system, specifically for individuals who missed the chance for formal schooling or seek to update their knowledge and skills. It is a two-year initiative for adults and youth aged 15 and older, including women, people with disabilities, and minority groups to improve literacy and numeracy skills along with fundamental skills and knowledge. The programme emphasises linking literacy with practical skills to improve living standards, promote empowerment, improve participants' health and encourage problem-solving.
The program is designed to be less expensive and more flexible in terms of time and place than formal education. It delivers two eight-month courses using active, participatory teaching that connects literacy to everyday topics like health, agriculture, civic education, and gender issues. Classes run two to three hours, two to three times a week, in schools, alternative education centers, and Kebele facilities. Content is tailored to local needs through face-to-face learner interviews, while core curriculum requirements ensure nationwide consistency. Local facilitators (paid teachers, volunteers, and university students familiar with community culture and language) deliver lessons after receiving training in adult education methods. Monitoring is carried out by Woreda education officers who regularly track progress. The program’s outreach includes partnerships with organizations like Addis Development Vision and Action Aid Azerenet-Berebera to raise awareness, recruit facilitators, and support community engagement.
Impact
Since its launch in 2010, the IFAE program has graduated approximately 8.65 million adults from the full two-year program (4.7 million in 2010-2015 and 3.95 million in 2015-2020). In 2018/19, the share of female graduates rose to 47.1%, up from 40.7% in 2015/16, though still below the 70% target. The program has delivered clear benefits at individual and household levels. Adult learners have gained foundational literacy and numeracy and improved problem-solving, health practices, agricultural productivity, and income management skills. Socially, the program fosters inclusion, gender awareness, and reduced harmful traditions and improves understanding of rights and responsibilities. Longer-term, adult education supports poverty reduction, human capital development, and intergenerational benefits such as keeping children in school longer. Better-educated parents offer stronger learning support at home, with participating communities seeing school drop-out rates fall from 7.9% in 2012 to 1.5% in 2014.
However, despite these achievements, the program’s broader impact on national development has been limited by challenges like weak sector and partner coordination, insufficient resources, facilitator skill gaps, and curriculum alignment issues, underscoring the need for stronger implementation. Although there are multiple studies examining specific aspects of planning, implementation, and effectiveness (often focused on particular zones or regions), there is no comprehensive national database or evaluation that tracks total participation or assesses the program’s overall impact since inception, highlighting the need for such a thorough assessment. Such an assessment is needed to provide a clearer picture of reach and to better identify impacts that can be directly attributed to the program.