International capacity-building seminar on the Measurement of Literacy Acquisition

In Africa, the evaluation of learning is a weak point in literacy policy. In most cases, assessment is narrowly related to curricula and/or carried out internally by the course provider. This practice reduces the scope of evaluation to merely that of justifying the resources used. It is rarely carried out with quality assurance in mind as a means of opening lifelong learning opportunities to learners.

For this reason UIL initiated in 2008 a multi-country action research project to develop and test tools to measure learning outcomes from literacy programmes. These tools will be developed on the basis of a common reference framework that investigates the real reach of learning outcomes. The project will also ask if the competencies gained support and lead to lifelong learning.

The action-research has the following three specific objectives: (1) to encourage the use of comparative approaches in participating countries; (2) to contribute to the strengthening of national capacities in measurement, monitoring and evaluation; and (3) to enhance South-South cooperation.

A seminar, which is being held in cooperation with the Regional Bureau for Education in Africa (BREDA) from 9 to 11 February 2011 in Dakar, brings together the five African countries participating in the research: Burkina Faso, Mali, Morocco, Niger and Senegal. The aim of this technical seminar is to clarify conceptual underpinnings of the common reference framework for operationalisation in this comparative study.