Education system coherence in Ethiopia: The case of Education Management Information System (EMIS)

• In Event: Education quality in Ethiopia and Sierra Leone

Proposal

Ethiopia’s effort and commitment to education is observable from the budget allocation to the education sector, which is usually more than a quarter of the total annual budget. As a result, there has been an expansion of primary schools, even in rural and remote locations, and sustained growth of the enrollment of students over nearly three decades now. This significant progress reflects an education system that is coherent around primary education access. However, until recently, improving student’s learning outcomes has not received the same attention. This is now changing with the introduction of the General Education Quality Improvement Program for Equity (GEQIP-E), Ethiopia’s large-scale education reform package which seeks to improve equitable learning outcomes for all students. Drawing on data from the system diagnostic carried out in the first year of the RISE Ethiopia research project - which seeks to assess the uptake, implementation and impact of GEQIP-E - this paper will explore coherence and incoherence in the system around the purpose of improving quality and student’s learning outcomes. Interview data collected from various stakeholders including Ministry of Education, Regional Education Bureaus, Development Partners and other stakeholders is analysed using the Pritchett’s (2018) Accountability Framework. In this paper we give special emphasis to the Education Management Information System (EMIS), which is used to highlight in/coherence in the overall education system. The interview data, which was voice recorded, was transcribed verbatim and managed using thematic analysis with the help of NVivo software. The findings explore how coherent the accountability relationships were among the various levels of accountability, i.e, Delegation, Finance, Information and Motivation (DFIM). Initial findings point to incoherence in accountability relationships at various levels of the education system, from Ministry of Education to the school level and also across education directorates at the federal level. In particular, concerns were raised about the delayed nature of the gathering and dissemination of data, and doubts were cast by some concerning the validity of the data collected. Hence, the education system was not coherent around information or feedback in terms of informing on how well the system is or is not functioning. Furthermore, EMIS has not collected or reported data on student learning outcomes, which was incoherent delegation at the Ministry of Education level. Drawing together these emerging findings, this paper seeks to identify ways in which incoherence in the education system can be addressed, which in turn will help to promote the sustainability of the education system and promote student learning outcomes.

Authors

• Belay Hagos, Addis Ababa University

• Amare Asgedom, Addis Ababa University

• Tassew Woldehanna, Addis Ababa University

• Louise Yorke, REAL Centre, Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge