Coastlands Hotel – Durban, South Africa 22-24 November 2016 CSTL Sharing Meeting 2016 ………………. Scaling Up Guidance and Counselling Life Skill Education Curriculum (LSE) at Secondary School level Lindiwe Nana Dlamini-CSTL FOCAL PERSON Swaziland Coastlands Hotel – Durban, South Africa 22-24 November 2016

Presentation Outline A description of the programme or policy Achievements Challenges Opportunities/Emerging Issues Key lessons learnt

A description of the programme or policy Guidance and Counselling Life Skills Education Curriculum (LSE) for secondary schools The process started in 2010 and was finalised in 2016. (panel formation, assessments, designing or writing, piloting and launching). The curriculum is structured in three strands: Career Guidance, Health Promotion, and HIV and AIDS.

Description cont’d The curriculum has been supported by the development of a coordinated LSE teachers’ handbook. It ranges from level 1 to level 5, covering ages from 12 years to 18 years and above. These themes are based on a spiraling approach. Each concept is followed through from form one to form five.

Achievements In July 2015 it was officially launched by Minister of Education & Training. It was rolled out to all 261 secondary schools in 2016. Beyond curriculum development, scale up activities have included LSE orientation of stakeholders, school principals and their deputies. Parent LSE sensitization meetings are ongoing.

Achievements cont’d Other activities that supported the scale up have been the training of teacher support teams from ETGPS and NCC. The above cascade the trainings, offer refresher courses and support and monitor the teaching of LSE The country has successfully trained 1457 LSE teachers in 2016 as we scale up LSE. The ministry issued a circular calling for a formal timetable LSE teaching slot. These activities were led by Ministry Of Education and Training with the support of development partners.

Achievements There is a strong coordinating mechanism-Subject Panel that regulates materials targeting schools, ASRH/CSE TWG that governs CSE issues at school, clinic and community level and NCU/RCUs that coordinates CSTL issues. There are classroom and school based monitoring tools in form of LSE lesson attendance registers.

Challenges In-service is expensive There are some partners who do not declare their LSE agendas with MoET Heavy dependence on volunteering teachers who may be fatigued in the long run. Training will never be enough-no matter how strong the program structure is, there will always be elements of discomfort, attitudes and religious clashes-so training should be on going to address such.

Opportunities/Emerging Issues Inclusion of HIV sensitive indicators into EMIS will help measure sector response and the contribution of EDSEC to the national HIV response. The approval of the CSE Cabinet will support the development of National CSE framework to govern both in and out of school LSE activities. Tertiary LSE modules will help cut in-service costs and ensure sustainability

Key Lessons Learnt Participation in regional programs and exchange visits helps in picking good practices, innovative ways of HIV Prevention programming and skills building. Capacity building have improved confidence of MoET Officers and teachers, but there is still more to be done. Negotiating for LSE in strong cultural settings like Swaziland needs a well thought out strategy & time to accommodate protocol and maturing of ideas amongst stakeholders

Comments and Questions from the Floor & Other Panellists.