Policy linking is a standard-setting methodology, long used in many countries, to set benchmarks (or cut scores) on learning assessments that allow those countries to determine what percentage of students in their country are meeting minimum proficiency requirements for key skills such as reading and math. While it is an old standard-setting methodology, its use has been extended to help countries set benchmarks that will allow reporting against global standards. Policy linking allows countries to use their existing national and/or regional assessments to report against Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4.1.1: “Proportion of children and young people in Grade 2 or 3 (4.1.1a), at the end of primary education (4.1.1b), and at the end of lower secondary education (4.1.1c) who achieve at least a minimum proficiency level in reading and mathematics.” It works by linking assessments to the Global Proficiency Framework (GPF), a framework developed by global reading and math content experts based on current national content and assessment frameworks across more than 25 countries. The GPF provides performance expectations/ standards for learners in Grades 1-9 in reading and mathematics. By linking existing national and regional assessments to the GPF, countries and donors are able to compare learning outcomes across language groups in countries as well as across countries and over time, assuming all new assessments are subsequently linked to the GPF. In this roundtable, we will share learning from policy linking work that has taken place this past year. Following a brief introduction to Policy Linking for Measuring Global Learning Outcomes by Dr. Saima Malik, from USAID in Washington DC, Dr. Asumpta Matei from the Kenya National Examinations Council and Dr. Enos Radeny of USAID Kenya will present the model of a Policy Linking workshop that was designed and implemented in order to build ministry capacity as well as set benchmarks for grades 2 and 3 in English and Kiswahili in Kenya, Dr. Abdullah Ferdous and Dr. Jeff Davis of AIR (co-developers of the policy linking approach) will discuss the importance of feedback in establishing defensible global benchmarks during the policy linking process and Dr. Jodie Fonseca from RTI will share practical example from Nepal where policy linking was used to align the national assessment to the Global Proficiency Framework and proved to be a more cost-effective way to measure early grade reading outcomes than an EGRA. Melissa Chiappetta of Sage Perspectives will serve as discussant of the panel.

In the past two years, the COVID 19 pandemic and the ensuing and repeated school closures has caused an unprecedented upheaval to the education of children world-wide. With the onset of the pandemic, actors in education systems responded in myriads of ways to ensure children continued to learn while at home and when schools reopened. The purpose of this case study is to explore how educational stakeholders in the federal and provincial governments in Pakistan – Balochistan, Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT), Kyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), and Sindh, responded to school closures and re-openings during the COVID 19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021. As such, the research questions for the study are 1. How did actors in education respond to the COVID 19 pandemic in Pakistan? 2. What types of resilience capacities did actors in education exhibit? To answer these questions, the case study delves into how the education actors - communities, parents, teachers, federal and provincial government education officials, private schools, non-governmental organizations, and international development partners responded and collaborated to support children’s learning, psycho-social support and well-being. The case study draws on resilience, and social ecological frameworks to explore the response of Pakistani education system to the pandemic. A social ecological lens enables the examination of the interaction and relationships of the individual, the community, the learning environment and educational systems and policies (Bronfenbrenner, (1986). Resilience frameworks explore the practices of education actors which promote resilience during and after disasters. (Reyes, 2013; Shah, Paulson, Couch, 2020; Shah, 2019). A qualitative case study method was best suited for this research study as it allows for an in-depth, descriptive and analytical study of how these education stakeholders responded to the challenges of the pandemic (Merriam, 1998). Data collection comprised semi structured interviews with purposive sampling of 34 individuals and 11 focus groups with public and private school teachers and parents. Emerging themes include the digital divide, strength in community, parent engagement and a lack of focus on marginalized populations. The emerging themes give examples of resilience capacities of stakeholder responses and illustrate positive, and promising practices as well as areas which need considerable reflection, and change in and implementation of federal and provincial policies. References Bronfenbrenner, U. (1986) Ecology of the family as a context for human development. American Psychologist.32:513–531. Merriam, S. B. (1998). Qualitative Research and Case Study Applications in Education. Revised and Expanded from" Case Study Research in Education." Jossey-Bass Publishers, 350 Sansome St, San Francisco, CA 94104. Reyes, J. (2013). What matters the most for education resilience. A framework paper. World Bank Shah, R. (2019). Transforming systems in times of adversity. White Paper, USAID Education and Conflict Network.

ACR–Philippines falls under All Children Reading–Asia, a broader program implemented by RTI International across multiple countries in the Asia Region. The activities directly contribute to USAID’s education goal to improve early grade reading (EGR) skills for 100 million children worldwide. There are two main areas of activity in support of the overall goals and objectives: EGR instruction and assessment in support of mother-tongue based multilingual education (MTB-MLE), and the use of educational technologies to support improved instruction in early grade reading, especially during school closures. Key achievements and activities through July 2021 are summarized in these briefs--one broad and one specific to the COVID-19 response.

This playlist was part of a knowledge sharing activity organized by the All Children Reading (ACR) Philippines project regarding countries' experiences re-opening schools on the occasion of the 4th education forum of the Department of Education. This forum is a platform to share updates of major on-going reform initiatives of the Department with development partners including USAID and a venue to inform, deliberate on and coordinate efforts and actions towards quality basic education. Staff of ACR-Philippines interviewed education stakeholders in the Kingdom of Cambodia, the Dominican Republic, Romania, the United Arab Emirates and United States about what happened when they reopened classrooms. Representatives spoke with us about their experiences, including the preparations they have made—what worked and what did not work. They also describe the challenges that they have encountered and how they managed these issues.

This presentation highlights some of the results and implications of a 2019 study on fidelity of implementation of the language of instruction policy in the Philippines. In 2009 the Philippines Department of Education issued Order No. 74 calling for the use of the learners’ mother tongue (MT) as the main medium of teaching and learning (MoTL) in kindergarten through grade 3. The policy introduces Filipino and English as additional languages of instruction, gradually increasing their usage until they take over as the primary MoTL in grade 4. Successfully navigating students through three languages in the early grades is a daunting task. Building on previous studies of MTB-MLE policy implementation in the Philippines, this study examined how teacher assignment, class sectioning (grouping learners by MT), materials provisioning and usage, and teachers’ language usage in the classroom conforms to or diverges from the policy, especially across locations with different contextual factors. It also looked at the factors associated with higher implementation.

This brief describes the use of qualitative analysis in international education research.

The presentation summarizes a paper by Tim Slade and Luis Crouch on the measurement of learning inequality before and after a successful reading project. The paper concludes that at least for the case studied, the project improved not only the averages but also reduced the inequality. The paper was prepared under the auspices of a conference on "Learning at the Bottom of the Pyramid" organized by IIEP and Dan Wagner of U Penn. This is the presentation that was delivered at vCIES 2020.

This topic brief was prepared by Liezl F. Dunuan, under a subcontract issued to the Foundation for Information Technology in Education (FIT-ED), Philippines. It is based on document review and interviews with officials and staff of the DepEd’s regional and division offices in the Cordillera Administrative Region and Baguio City, DICT, DOST-Science Education Institute, the United Nations Development Programme Philippines office, two private telecommunications companies (Globe and Smart), two private EdTech service providers, and two non-profit organizations working in EdTech. Relevant policy documents were also reviewed. Carmen Strigel (RTI International) contributed to the international policy analysis section.

This topic brief is based on information from interviews with officials and staff of the DepEd Information and Communications Technology Service, BLD, NEAP, and DOST-SEI; head of the education programs of private companies; and faculty members from three higher education institutions in the Philippines engaged in teacher professional development. Relevant policy documents were also reviewed. This brief was prepared by Monalisa T. Sasing, under a subcontract issued to FIT-ED, Philippines. It was edited by Sarah Pouezevara (RTI) prior to publication.

This report is an analysis of the education technology (EdTech) ecosystem in the Philippines. This report seeks to identify opportunities for EdTech alternatives to help the Philippines break away from the status quo in teaching and learning. It will contribute to ongoing policy review and curricular reforms intended to improve country-wide achievement in basic education. The information was gathered by a team of researchers from the Foundation for Information Technology Education and Development, Inc. (FIT-ED), and RTI over the course of four months in the second half of 2019. The study team interviewed over 50 key informants from government, civil society, and the private sector and visited schools, consulted relevant documents, and administered a large survey, all designed to answer the questions: what technology is being used in education, how is it being promoted and adopted, what are the effects, and how can good practices be scaled up? The result is the following ecosystem profile, based on the Scaling Equitable Education Technology (EdTech) Ecosystem Model published by Omidyar Network, now Imaginable Futures,1in 2019 (Omidyar Network, 2019a). Cite this report: Pouezevara, S. (2020). Philippines EdTech ecosystem profile. Prepared for USAID under the All Children Reading-Philippines Project, AID-OAA-TO-16-00017. Research Triangle Park, NC: RTI