Building FLN programs and evidence: Implementation of and impact evidence from state-wide and top-up district-level FLN interventions in India

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

Foundational Literacy and Numeracy (FLN) reforms are urgently needed—and they are needed at scale. India’s NIPUN Bharat Mission represents one of the world’s most ambitious attempts to meet this challenge by embedding structured pedagogy within government systems serving over 200 million children. But while national missions set direction, the real test lies in how reforms are implemented across large, diverse, and decentralized states. This panel will present evidence and insights on how such reforms can be delivered at scale, focusing on two complementary models: state-led implementation (SNP) and district-level implementation support (DIS).
At the state-wide level, NIPUN Bharat demonstrates that large-scale reform is possible when political leadership, bureaucratic ownership, and academic inputs align. Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh illustrate two distinct but equally important trajectories. Uttar Pradesh shows the power of mission-mode reform—where visible political commitment, strong accountability, and integration of pedagogy into administrative routines can produce rapid scale. Madhya Pradesh, shows the potential of steady, decentralized adoption—where district and block officials gradually internalize new practices, building resilience even amidst leadership changes. Together, these cases highlight both the promise and the limits of state-led reform: it can create visibility, momentum, and structure, but sustaining quality at the classroom level requires more than top-down directives.
This is where district-level intervention support (DIS) becomes critical. Interventions in select districts of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh show how targeted mentoring, localized teacher forums, and adaptive monitoring can complement state systems by addressing the everyday realities of teachers and schools. District-level interventions led by implementation partners illustrate how DIS can help reposition middle management cadres as instructional mentors, create feedback loops between classrooms and government reviews, and nurture teacher agency even within structured pedagogy frameworks. These efforts show that last-mile support can deepen adoption, improve fidelity, and create spaces for contextual adaptation, thereby reinforcing state-wide programs.
Evidence from independent evaluations confirms that both SNP and SNP+DIS models can improve foundational learning, but in different ways. State-led programs drive visibility and uniformity, anchoring FLN within bureaucratic routines. District support adds granularity, flexibility, and instructional depth, helping teachers translate system mandates into classroom practice. Importantly, the interaction between the two suggests that neither model alone is sufficient: state programs create the architecture, while district support brings it to life in classrooms.
By bringing together evidence from Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, this panel will highlight what it takes to achieve large-scale reform, what role different governance layers play, and what trade-offs systems must navigate between pressure and support, scale and depth, ownership and accountability. The discussion will go beyond pedagogy to examine the governance models that determine how pedagogy is absorbed, adapted, and sustained.
In doing so, the panel contributes new insights for Global South systems grappling with similar challenges: how to translate national ambitions into local realities, how to design layered models of reform that are both effective and durable, and how to think about scale not as replication but as alignment across governance levels. The central message is that FLN reforms can work at scale—but only when state-wide missions and district-level support are seen as complements, not substitutes.

Sub Unit

• Global Literacy SIG

Chair

• Benjamin Piper, Gates Foundation

Individual Presentations

• Insights and learnings from district level implementation of FLN mission (Mission Ankur) in Madhya Pradesh, India - Poornima Garg, Room to Read India Trust; Rishi Rajvanshi, Room to Read India Trust

• Scaling foundational literacy and numeracy: Evidence from a three-year quasi-experimental impact and process evaluation in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh - Gayatri Vaidya, Educational Initiatives

Discussants

• Dhir Jhingran, Language and Learning Foundation

• Akashi Kaul, Central Square Foundation

• Pranav Kothari, Educational Initiatives