Optimizing Remote Coaching via government support to FLN programs in rural Namibia

• In Event: Highlighted Session: Testing What Works: Refining Coaching and Teacher Support Models Through Implementation Research

Proposal

Meerkat Learning supports the Namibian government to scale-up a foundational literacy and numeracy remediation program nationally. In 2025, we ran two A/B tests to find out: What is the relative effectiveness of support calls and school visits for TaRL implementation in Namibian primary schools? On this panel, we’ll present our findings from this implementation research project which specifically targeted the most rural and marginalized communities. The challenges teachers face while adopting new pedagogies are predictable; there is an initial increase of workload, decrease in teacher confidence, and demand for instructional coaching (Fullan, 1982). However, Namibia, similar to many countries, does not have the structures for education officials to provide FLN instructional coaching to teachers; namely, a 1:15 ratio of education officers and transport for 3 classroom visits (Piper et al, 2018). To respond to this challenge, we studied cost-effective alternative instructional coaching strategies.

In this implementation research, we deployed a quasi-experimental A/B test, an experimental methodology traditionally used by the technology sector (Kohavi et al., 2020; King et al., 2017; Siroker and Koomen 2015). We adopted the Youth Impact approach to A/B testing, which has been successfully applied for the past seven years in Teaching at the Right Level (TaRL) programs (Angrist et al., 2025). One of the benefits of this methodology is that you can run multiple tests in rapid succession rather than one high stakes test every several years. Back in 2023, a pilot A/B test revealed that education officers can deliver 1-on-1 coaching phone calls with teachers and these 15 minute coaching calls reduced student attrition by 23% and increased learning gains by 25%. These results inspired our next test. Across 2024 to 2025, an A/B test was designed to see if government education officers could provide remote teacher coaching that is equally effective to in-person school visits. Participants were randomly allocated at a cluster level across 60 schools. As allocation to the intervention type is random, we can interpret differences in outcomes between the groups as caused by the ‘tweak.’ At this panel, we will present our findings that show both support packages were similarly effective at improving students ability to perform basic operations, improve number recognition and manage attrition, and we were able to reduce implementation costs by about 20%.

By the time of the CIES conference, we’ll also share our next steps—how we’ve scaled the findings so far and what options we’re exploring going forward. For example, schools that have implemented TaRL over multiple cycles may now benefit from coaching delivered entirely through calls. These insights will be valuable for others who are exploring different models of teacher coaching and ongoing teacher support.

Author

• Angelica Towne Amporo, Meerkat Learning