In 2009, the Zambian Ministry
of Education, the Examination Council of Zambia, UNICEF, the University of
Zambia, and the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University launched
the Zambian Early Childhood Development Project (ZECDP) to close knowledge gaps.
The ZECDP was launched in an effort to measure the effects of an ongoing
anti-malaria initiative on children’s development. From the final report on the
ZECDP I learned that Zambia is one of the poorest counties in the world. I also
learned that about 76% of children suffer from Malaria during their first year
of life. The ZECDP developed a tool to assess children’s physical,
socio-emotional, and cognitive development before and throughout their
schooling careers, the Zambian Child Assessment Test (ZamCAT). This assessment
tool is the first of its kind in Zambia. It was interesting to find out that no
assessment has really been done on the many developmental skills on children. I
was glad to know that there are advances being made to improve the health and
success of children in Zambia.
Zambia has a population of about
13 million and is divided into many provinces. Many children in the rural parts
of the country do not attend school at all. Many children in Zambia do enroll
in school, however about 25% of students drop out before completing the seventh
year of their primary education. Early childhood care and education is
underdeveloped therefore about 83% of children lack skills needed for first
grade. From their assessment, there was a great difference between children from
urban and rural provinces and between the wealthier and poorer children.
Hopefully through this
assessment, child development in Zambia will begin to develop and all children will
have access to quality early care and education.
Reference:
http://developingchild.harvard.edu/activities/global_initiative/zambian_project/
Dorcas,
ReplyDeletethank you for sharing such fascinating information. Reading about the education issues in Zambia really puts things into perspective. It is really interesting the Zambia only recently implemented an assessment tool. I hope their findings assist them in improving the education system, making it effective and accessible. I did a quick google search, and it appears that education is free through the 7th year, which explains why 25% of the children drop out ... I wonder if there are any efforts behind made to allow those with little money to still be able to attend school.
Thanks for sharing your post!
Lydia
Did it mention if these results would be shared with the government to change education in the whole country or are these organizations just doing the work alone, and thus will have to act in isolation, one village at a time?
ReplyDeleteWOW! Thank you for sharing the information you have learned. Its awesome to hear about how they are going to improve to close the knowledge cap. Assessment has always been a great way to find out what the children know and work on what the children needs to learn. It has alway broken my heart to read about how children from other country's don't get the education that our children get in the US. It would be interesting to know the outcome of their assessment tools.
ReplyDeleteDorcas, it seems that we both went through similar struggles this week. I never thought making contact was such an ordeal! Well, I am glad you got a chance explore Zambia instead. I agree with your comment that learning more on what’s happening gives way for improvement. Thank you for your informative post.
ReplyDelete