This letter was sent a week ago to Nepal's Ministry of Education addressed to the Minister and two Under Secretaries. Enclosed with it was a document outlining a process of transformational change which could be used to develop the "whole system".
To: The Minister of Education.
Dear Sir,
I am sending this note to you via one of your colleagues which I hope you will receive in the respected manner in which it is sent to you. Your colleague Mukunda can brief you more fully on our work and efforts over the past 5 years which has now spread from developing 7 Kathmandu schools to providing free training to ANY primary teacher in the Kathmandu valley.
Our reason for sending this note and document is because of our care for the children of Nepal and the way in which their education is bounced around like a football between the politics internal to Nepal and the completely uncoordinated inputs of foreign donors and agencies. Surely the time for this to end is upon us, we need to take stock of creating a clear vision of a better (primary) education system, a plan for it's implementation, and a plan for the complete coordination of the transformation process. In essence this is NOT a job for an education specialist, but for a completely different type of person with a competence related to transformational change rather than education.
As an example and an introduction to my document here is something we at Nepal Schools Aid face regularly in our own efforts to develop teacher capability:
1. We run short 5 day courses for Nepali primary teachers, free, funded from UK donors.
2. The courses are focused on giving teachers skills in child centred learning
3. When the teachers return to school excited and well trained they hit a number of barriers as follows:
4. The Principal isn't interested/motivated/skilled in making any changes
5. Colleague teachers are satisfied in their comfort zone and uncooperative to listen to the trained teachers or to take training themselves
6. The physical environment of each classroom cannot accommodate small layout changes for group work or participative lessons to enable child centredness
7. The trained teachers have no means to get even the simplest of resources such as paper, card, string, crayons, marker pens .....
We could go on, but the issue is beyond our means to solve on a wider scale, but surely in the hands of ADB, DFID, Ministry of Education and other NGOs together and in a coordinated manner. Without such coordination our own efforts are wasted at worst, diluted at best, and the children of Nepal will never receive the quality of education the deserve.
Respectfully yours
Dr Brian Metters
Chairman, Nepal Schools Aid.
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