By Mohamed Jaward Nyallay
The World Bank has approved US$50 million grant for Sierra Leone’s Free Quality Education program. The money, which was approved on Monday, according to a news released from the Bank, will go into improving learning outcomes and addressing the urgent infrastructure challenges facing the sector, among many other components.
The Free Quality Education program is the flagship policy of the Sierra Leone Government, introduced by President Julius Maada Bio when he took office in 2018. The government says more than two million children are currently benefitting from the program.
In the last two years, the government has committed the bulk of its budgetary resources to education.
The world Bank’s statement quoted its Country Manager, Martin Gayle, saying: “The project focuses on strengthening the education system in areas of policy, governance, accountability, and administration as part of the World Bank Group’s Country Partnership Framework for Sierra Leone.”
She added: “This financing will support the government’s commitment towards achieving a more inclusive approach to quality education, increasing the retention of girls, especially in secondary schools, and improving the learning environment for children with disabilities.”
Mari Shojo, World Bank Senior Education Specialist and Task Team Leader, was also quoted saying that the support aligned with World Bank and the Sierra Leone Government’s priorities.
“This project is well aligned with the Government’s and the World Bank Group’s priorities, focusing on addressing education sector challenges and transforming the education system over the long term for the children of Sierra Leone. It emphasizes on the importance of investing in human development as well as decentralizing delivery of basic education services,” she said.
This announcement comes just in time for the partial reopening of schools across the country, for some pupils to prepare for public examinations.
It is not clear yet how much impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the country’s primary and secondary education. However, education campaigners have warned that the loss of teacher-student contact time could have an impact on the school curriculum and possibly learning outcomes.
World Bank said specifically this project will “will finance the construction of approximately 510 furnished classrooms to meet the immediate infrastructure needs in basic education and provide community-managed and performance-based grants to primary schools for improved school performance and accountability.”
The Free Quality Education has led to increased enrollment in schools across the country, putting a huge demand on schools to accommodate the growing number of pupils.
According to the 2019 school census, over 700, 000 were enrolled in schools last year.
Other components will focus on strengthening governance and accountability in school systems. Mechanisms like reporting sexual based violence in schools will be strengthened to prevent and deal with those incidents if they occur.
The support is expected to benefit 2.4 million pupils, 9, 300 schools and some 75, 000 teachers and school authorities in the country in the next three years.
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