The usual response?

It is now over a week since we blogged about the large grant from ADB to Nepal's government to spend on education projects and we followed it up by writing to Barry Hitchcock, the Nepal Director of ADB .......... twice. And guess what? No response, just like our own DFID!

So we thought you might like to see what we wrote to him, and if you were so inclined maybe to write to him too by visiting the ADB Nepal website and using the form to contact him here ADB Contact.

Send us a copy too.

"Dear Barry,

I am writing to thank and congratulate you on your recent grant to the Nepal government of $65 million of which $500k is a technical grant towards developing the education system. As a group of people working towards the same goal we are encouraged by ADB's obvious care and concern for Nepal and the education of its children.

We are not so encouraged however by the way the way the government intends to spend the money. It seems to us that they are perpetuating the "same old way" of pouring vast sums into building schools (often in remote areas only), policy development, monitoring and other ethereal tasks that have no direct and immediate benefit. 

In many ways this is like the endless constitution creation that has been going on for several years, occupying the lawmakers time when they should be working on electricity supply, water supply, roads & traffic problems, job creation and of course ..... education development. It is the complete lack of any "customer focused" thinking on their part that infuriates us as we ourselves attempt to train/retrain 400 teachers in Kathmandu every year in some key concepts of quality education and child centred learning techniques at primary school level. Since inception 5 years ago we have developed 7 inner city schools via a programme of School Leadership, Material Aid, Teacher Training to the extent that we have measured evidence of growth and improvement. In fact the proof has been so overwhelming that we are now setting up a teacher training Academy based on UK teaching techniques which we will deliver free to 400 community and government teachers a year, with 300 of these returning annually for advanced training.

Why am I telling you this? NOT because I am seeking money or funding, but because sooner or later the government has to accept that it has NO clear definition of quality education and that however it is defined it will never be achieved by building schools or developing policies and monitoring frameworks. It is teachers who will deliver the goods, trained teachers who have the right techniques (at primary level) and the motivation and tools to deliver them. We have tried to involve our own country's DFID in a dialogue on this as well as the Ministry of Education but it seems our results don't speak loudly enough compared with the size of our wallets! Can we influence ADB to speak with a similar voice (because your wallet is bigger than ours!), can we interest ADB even in meeting with us to discuss the issue?

Regards"