KIX EMAP - Same policy challenges, different solutions: The X factor in KIX learning exchanges

• In Event: Moving evidence into action through inter-country knowledge exchange: Lessons from the Global Partnership for Education Knowledge and Innovation Exchange (KIX)

Proposal

The KIX regional hub for Europe, Middle East and North Africa, Asia and the Pacific (EMAP) comprises thirty-five GPE partner countries. The hub has developed a multi-level model to reach (i) national policy analysts, experts, or researchers, (ii) decision-makers, and (iii) other stakeholders in the education system. At the base are activities that mobilize a “critical mass” to support innovations or reforms (see Centola, 2021), such as webinars and podcasts developed in collaboration with national partners. At the medium engagement level are policy analysts, experts, or researchers that work either at a ministry, a research institution, or a civil-society organization with think tank functions. They are mainly engaged through learning cycles. At the highest engagement level are influential catalysts of change: policy advisors and decision-makers considered change leaders in their own country. The hub offers this group in-depth exposure, access to policy fellowships, and customized country support.

The speaker presents the rationale for these levels of engagement and zooms in on the design of the learning cycles, offered five times to date. Given the high demand for these 5-7 week guided policy analysis opportunities, a targeted recruitment strategy has been established through which KIX national teams identify the key national policy analysts, experts, or researchers to participate.

The presentation focuses on two research questions around the learning cycles: First, in which institutional settings is the policy expertise, or the recruited participants? The 2023 KIX EMAP survey, and the composition of learning cycle participants, challenges the assumption that all policy-relevant analytical work is done in planning units of line ministries. Assuming a “polycentric governance,” (Cairney et al., 2019) as well as a polycentric production and use of research evidence for policy and planning, is more accurate. Second, the X in KIX stands for “eXchange,” also called South-South collaboration or regional cooperation (see Steiner-Khamsi and Chisholm, 2009). Many policy challenges are universal in countries of the Global South. For example, (i) countries with large differences in rural and urban living standards face chronic rural teacher shortages; (ii) global competency-based curriculum reform – tailored after OECD’s Definition and Selection of Key Competencies framework (OECD, 2003) – reached many GPE partner countries but implementation stalled, typically at the central level, barely reaching the school level; (iii) small island states face challenges ensuring equitable access to schooling. Although these and other challenges are experienced by many countries, making cross-country peer-exchange useful, solutions to these policy challenges vary greatly, as the presentation will show.

REFERENCES

Cairney, P., Heikkila, T. & Wood, M. (2019). Making policy in a complex world. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Centola, D. (2021). Change: How to make big things happen. Little Publisher.

Chisholm, L. and Steiner-Khamsi, G., eds (2009). South-South Cooperation in Education and Development. New York and Cape Town, South Africa: Teachers College Press and HRSC Press.

OECD. (2003). Key competencies for a successful life and a well-functioning society. Edited by D.S. Rychen and L.H. Salganik. Paries: OECD.

Authors

• Marina Dreux Frotté, NORRAG

• Jose Luis Canelhas, NORRAG