This brief discusses the results from the EGRA Baseline conducted in in February and March, 2013 in Uganda as part of the USAID-funded School Health and Reading Program (SHRP). Data were collected from 300 randomly selected government primary schools in 14 districts in Uganda. 7,463 P1 and 2,163 P31 learners were assessed in one of four local languages (Ateso, Leblango, Luganda and Runyankore/Rukiga) and English.

The first component of this EdData II research report (RTI Task 30) was a desk study of literacy instruction in primary schools in Honduras. The researchers reviewed curriculum materials and investigated the instructional practices and use of materials by teachers in primary schools. The second component was an October 2014 field study that involved collecting quantitative and qualitative data from 43 schools in grades 2, 3, 5, and 6, on effective teacher practices, school environment, and infrastructure related to early grade reading instruction.

EGRA Plus in Liberia Liberia began an early grade reading intervention, called EGRA Plus: Liberia, in 2008. By the end of the project in 2010, students' reading performance had nearly tripled. This video shows that large improvements in reading are possible on a relatively fast schedule. At the same time, there are many children in Liberia who still can't read. Now that there is proof that reading can be improved in short periods of time, this video calls for urgent attention to this issue and provides a few tips to parents as to what they can do to assist teachers in improving their children's reading performance.

This video was created by a grant from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation in order to disseminate results of the early grade reading assessment (EGRA), raise awareness of the importance of reading, and mobilize communities.

This video was created under a grant from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation by a local Senegalese production company in order to raise awareness of the importance of reading and mobilize communities to take action.

This report summarizes the results from a three-month pilot research activity in Kaolack, Senegal designed to test whether communications techniques can bring about changes in family members’ knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors related to their children learning to read. At the end of three months, family members in Kaolack demonstrated strong recall of the main messages of the campaign and were much more likely than control families to espouse beliefs supportive of their children learning to read.

This document was designed as a practical response to requests from USAID’s Africa Missions, which have increasingly indicated their need for more guidance on the role of language of instruction (LOI) in their efforts to achieve Goal 1 of the 2011 USAID education strategy: Improved reading skills for 100 million children in primary grades (USAID, 2011). This need reflects a call by USAID in the Technical Notes of its 2011 USAID Education Strategy (the Bureau of Economic Growth Agriculture and Trade, Office of Education [EGAT/ED]), which identified LOI among the seven areas in which Missions were likely to need technical assistance or additional resources for designing or implementing early grade reading programs.

The 2010 Nigeria Education Data Survey (NEDS) was a nationally representative sample survey implemented primarily by the National Population Commission (NPC) in collaboration with the Federal Ministry Of Education (FMOE) and the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC). The 2010 NEDS has the following specific objectives: Provide data on the schooling status of Nigerian children of basic education age, including factors influencing whether children ever enroll in school and why students drop out of school Quantify household expenditures on children’s schooling by examining different patterns of expenditure by various background characteristics Measure parents’ attitudes to schooling, including the quality of schooling and provide an understanding of attitudes that shape their willingness to send their children to school Measure the frequency of student absenteeism and reasons for missing school in order to suggest possible approaches to maximizing attendance Provide data that allows for trend analysis and State comparisons A very high overall response rate of 98% was achieved with interviews completed in 26,934 households.

The 2010 Nigeria Education Data Survey (NEDS) was a nationally representative sample survey implemented primarily by the National Population Commission (NPC) in collaboration with the Federal Ministry Of Education (FMOE) and the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC). The 2010 NEDS has the following specific objectives: Provide data on the schooling status of Nigerian children of basic education age, including factors influencing whether children ever enroll in school and why students drop out of school Quantify household expenditures on children’s schooling by examining different patterns of expenditure by various background characteristics Measure parents’ attitudes to schooling, including the quality of schooling and provide an understanding of attitudes that shape their willingness to send their children to school Measure the frequency of student absenteeism and reasons for missing school in order to suggest possible approaches to maximizing attendance Provide data that allows for trend analysis and State comparisons A very high overall response rate of 98% was achieved with interviews completed in 26,934 households.

This report discusses two overarching themes for the behavior change communication (BCC) activity under Education Data for Decision Making (EdData II), Task Order 20. We begin by presenting a summary of pertinent health behavior theories and studies, which aim to inform the BCC activity and suggest possible techniques and strategies that can be applied to the education sector. We then move to describing a proposed applied research study, which will use the results of the health behavior studies to develop a possible model to be used for implementing a literacy intervention in a developing country.