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System Diagnostics: A Practical Approach for Bringing Local Voices into Program Design

Thu, March 14, 3:15 to 4:45pm, Hyatt Regency Miami, Floor: Terrace Level, Gardenia C

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

Relevance of the session: This session explores the shift among donors in international education from top-down, solution-driven to participatory, locally-led, and context-driven approaches to program design. In particular, the session will focus on how systems-thinking methodologies for diagnosing problems within education systems can offer both a locally-led methodology and holistic approach to understanding root causes of education and learning outcomes. Traditional education assessments have primarily focused on improving the quality of education service delivery and inputs needed for delivery of services. Often there has been less focus on the accountability and responsiveness of these education services to student and community voices and collective action of all stakeholders. Systems diagnostics offer a holistic understanding of the factors that affect the education system in order to advance both the effectiveness and accountability of the education system. In addition, systems diagnostics prioritize participatory methodologies in which diverse local stakeholders analyze their own system and inform decision-making. These methodologies offer a way to decolonize context assessments by moving away from top-down expert-led context assessments to an approach of facilitation and mutuality with donor agencies, program participants, and partners.

Context and Need: While there are more students accessing education than ever before, there is a crisis of students learning. According to a joint report by UNESCO, UNICEF, and the World Bank in 2021, before the COVID-19 pandemic the share of children living in Learning Poverty in low- and middle-income countries was already over 50 percent, but since the pandemic, they estimate it has risen sharply up to 70 percent. COVID-19 exacerbated both the immediate and underlying causes of the learning crisis. According to the World Development Report 2018, the larger underlying and systemic causes of the learning crisis relating to the politics of education at all levels and their misalignment to learning are where more attention is needed.

While multiple education evaluations cite the importance of understanding political and systemic factors and generating local ownership for program design, traditional assessments and design processes often fail to address these. Traditional processes for program design are led by “experts” at donor agencies and international organizations. They typically include a limited analysis of education service provision and some consultations with Ministry of Education staff. The students, teachers, and communities most affected by the learning crisis are often excluded from program design. Solutions tend to focus on symptoms of the crisis, failing to capture how systemic factors such as education accountability and civil society engagement in education reform might represent strategic entry-points for reform.

System diagnostics utilizing participatory methods have the potential to offer a more equitable and effective approach to program design. By engaging local stakeholders to identify root causes of the problems they see affecting the education system, program designs can more accurately address the real barriers to learning in that context. Participatory approaches also offer the opportunity for diverse stakeholders to understand and reconcile differences in perspectives to generate common understanding of challenges, a critical basis for later identifying solutions. According to Norrag’s 2023 Systems Thinking in International Education and Development Book, system diagnostics offer the promise of an answer to the question of ‘why’: “Why, despite the investments made, were student learning levels remaining persistently low?”

Objectives: The main objective of this session is to make the case for increasing the use of systems diagnostics to inform program design. The first presentation will set the scene by exploring the shift among donors in international education from a solution-driven to a problem-driven investment approach, resulting in a proliferation of new diagnostic tools employing systems thinking. The second presentation will dive into USAID’s 5Rs framework and how the Agency has utilized it as a simple and practical framework for understanding local education systems in a holistic way. The third presentation will describe a new toolkit USAID has developed and piloted in several countries for conducting participatory, system diagnostics. The final presentation will provide a case study of a systems diagnostic to illustrate what this looks like in practice. Presentations will be followed by a moderated panel discussion. The participants of the session will learn why systems diagnostics are important, how they can be used, and what effect they have on the effectiveness and local ownership of donor investments.

Contribution: The contribution of this session and presentation content highlighted will be to offer practical pathways for shifting from systems thinking in theory to systems thinking in practical program design. The session will provide both a macro overview of many different approaches for incorporating systems thinking into program design utilized across agencies, while also providing participants the opportunity to learn in-depth about USAID’s toolkit on system diagnostics and a case study of the toolkit application in practice.

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