ADEA presents results of AU EMIS meeting at UIS workshop for Anglophone Africa

ADEA WGEMPS participated in the UNESCO Institute of Statistics (UIS) Regional Workshop on Education Statistics for Anglophone Africa in Harare from the 26th – 29th of May 2014. It was attended by 22 member states and three partners, namely UNICEF, UNDP and WGEMPS. The main objective was to build country capacity to meet international and national education statistics reporting requirements using the new International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) 2011 system.

The meeting discussed the role of Education Management and Information Systems (EMIS) in informing policy planning, implementation and evaluation of all domains of education. The organizers also shared the Africa Regional Module and took participants through the review of ISCED mappings and the UIS questionnaires. Participants also shared some of EMIS best practices based on their experiences.  UNICEF presented the EMIS guide and pilot on inclusion of children with disabilities and the Teacher Development Information Systems (TDIS).

WGEMPS presented the outputs of the AU EMIS Restricted Technical Committee meeting which took place in Ghana, in April 2014. Participants echoed the value of the WGEMPS-developed AU Outlook on Education Database in monitoring progress made in the AU Plan of Action.

A majority of the countries expressed the need for UIS to use national population data instead of data from UNPD, given that in most instances population censuses are undertaken in collaboration with UN national offices. Consequently, international data is significantly different from the national data. The concern was using international data may misleadingly create an impression that international development goals have not been reached yet calculating the same indicators with national population data would imply a much more accurate picture  on the attainment of these goals. The closing sessions dealt with ongoing efforts to monitor progress towards EFA goals and the process to formulate the Post-2015 education agenda.

All the member states had an opportunity to participate in bilateral meetings with UIS. The two Zimbabwe education ministries (primary and secondary education as well as higher education, science and technology) and UIS invited WGEMPS to participate in the Zimbabwe bilateral meeting the following day. Definitions as well as programmatic and conceptual issues were clarified in the questionnaires. A discourse on the ISCED mapping elucidated various issues like the minimum entry requirements, theoretical entrance age and duration for various programmes. The programmes and levels were classified to the most appropriate ISCED levels taking cognisance of whether a given programme or level leads to insufficient, partial or full completion of  the level being studied

For more information contact Brighton Mutasa, Statistician, WGEMPS, b.mutasa@adeanet.org