1. Goal 4 - Literacy
11th EFA Coordinators’ Meeting
Bangkok

2. Group members: Chair: Mr. Charon Souvong, Lao PDR
Rapporteur: Raquel Castillo, ASPBAE
Indonesia
Malaysia
Myanmar
Lao PDR
Philippines
Cambodia
Thailand
Brunei
Fiji
Bangladesh
Development Partners : DR. Hakeem (UNESCO), Room to Read (Joel Bacha)
Facilitators from UNESCO Bkk: Ichiro and Roshan

3. Progress and Achievements : South East Asia
Improvements but slow pace, and low achievement rates
Promoting community education through CLCs
Reaching those in the border areas of a number of countries
Expansion of concept of literacy- functional, life skills and to lifelong learning
More ways of service provision – not just one way of delivery and not limited to 3R’s
More effective accreditation and equivalency programs

4. Progress and Achievements : South East Asia
At least Philippines says they have reached their own targets on functional literacy for 2010
More collaboration with NGOs and private sector – grand alliance concept
Integrating Goals 3 and Goals 4 in the national education plan
Countries like Cambodia and Brunei showed increases in literacy rates from a decade ago, especially women
Data collection system has been strengthened – workforce literacy survey in Thailand

5. Challenges Psychological barriers to access literacy (Indonesia)
Children not fully participating in schools are those at risk of being illiterates later on – challenge of identifying them – Malaysia
Data gaps, especially for rural areas
Lack of ongoing assessments
Geographical barriers compounded by income disparities – to reduce disparity among states and regions

6. Challenges
Literacy for migrant workers’ children in receiving countries – Indonesia
Irregular attendance of learners – Cambodia
Lack of separate budget for non-formal education program (eg. Myanmar)
Calamities and disasters, conflicts, increasing populations pose challenge
Lack of community understanding of gender equality in literacy – Vietnam

7. Challenges Policies on literacy not given priority nor sustained
Diverse cultural and ethnic contexts
Lack NFE personnel and facilities to improve the literacy activities – Lao PDR; low salaries for literacy teachers and delays in contracting them – Cambodia
Lack of funding, and in cases like Cambodia, changing funding levels from year to year

8. Challenges – South Asia (Bangladesh)
Low investment
Coordinating providers
De-learning – reverting to illiteracy
Variable textbooks
Not able o reach remotew and hill areas
Monitoring and evaluation
Equivalency with formal education have not been established

9. Progress and Achievements : South Asia (Bangladesh)
Established NFE and MIS system
(Decrease in literacy rate)
PPP approach has been followed to accelerate literacy achievement

10. Innovative Practices – South East Asia
Linking lifeskills to income generating programs to address psychological barriers
Involving other members of community like students and army people in the delivery – Indonesia and volunteer services from basic educ teachers and NGOs in Cambodia. ‘Love of Reading volunteers’ in Thailand
Focusing on lifelong learning and more on functional literacy – short adult courses, esp. Women – Malaysia
Skilled- based training – Institute for Rural Advancement – management skill for rural community (Malaysia)

11. Innovative Practices - SEA
Summer literacy programs
Implementing MLE in first levels of learning – eg Philippines
Reading promotion campaigns towards Lifelong learning society – Thailand (providing quality reading centers in each tambon)
Making use of celebrations and announcing national days, getting the support of royalty and prominent national persons - Thailand

12. Good Practices – South Asia (Bangladesh)
Addressing Gender parity
Minimising drop-outs in primary to stop increase in illiteracy
Vocational educ
Lifeskill programmes
Basic Literacy Project
Campaign to eliminate illiteracy by developed a programme with consultants and development partners
Involving of local governments

13. Good Practices – South Pacific (Fiji)
E-community learning

14. Ongoing and Post 2015
Focusing on literacy in early grades and strong linkages to adult literacy over time
Diversification of literacies  eg New literacy in ICT – come up with diversified learning activity designs – CDs, DVDs etc
Disaggregated data collection
Effective framework and training for programme evaluation
Focus on those groups and local regions with lowest literacy rates
More investment in this goal – (3% of education budgets?)
Monitoring, assessments and evaluation of literacy skills

15. Post 2015 agenda
Linked databases shared among different relevant Ministries (eg Labor or Workforce), which should be updated regularly (and so capacity building for this is needed)
Framework of a continuum of literacy, not a dichotomy between literate and non-literate
Developing literate environments

16. Shukriya Terima kasih Thank you Kop chai Kob-kun ka Maraming Salamat
Chizu tinbartei
Cam on
Maraming salamat
Shukriya
Terima kasih