4. In which ways is the initiative creative and innovative?
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As a policy aimed at improving Education, the Pact for Education Program has followed six steps to implement its strategy: i)a diagnostic analysis conducted on Education in the state, including participation by civil society; ii)the Governor´s decision to develop a policy aimed at improving Education; iii)creation of an Executive Management Committee for the Pact for Education Program; iv) creation of a Managing for Results Unit based in the Education Secretariat; v)development of a strategic plan for the Pact for Education Program; vi) ensuring strategic integration and coordination across the 17 Regional Education Management Districts to address implementation, monitoring and evaluation issues of the program plan.
The first step entailed conducting an initial situational analysis on education in Pernambuco, considering structural and legal aspects, performance levels, resources and institutional culture. Suggestions resulting from the “All for Pernambuco seminars”, conducted to generate and incorporate the key concerns of citizens in regions throughout the state, incorporated the general public’s perspective.
The second step was the Governor’s decision to develop a policy aimed at improving Education, assigning the Planning and Management Secretariat (SEPLAG) with the responsibility to plan and coordinate actions in conjunction with the Education Secretariat.
The third step was the creation of the Executive Committee for the Pact for Education Program, led by the Governor and composed of the Planning and Management Secretariat, Education Secretariat, Executive Secretaries for Education, Executive Secretary for Managing for Results from the Planning and Management Secretariat and Directors from the 17 Regional Education Management Districts (GERES).
Goals and objectives were defined as a start to the implementation of Managing for Results methodology.The main product of this phase was the setting of goals, objectives and indicators of the Pact for education Program
The fourth step was the creation of the Managing for Results Unit comprised of the General Manager and Analysts from the Planning and Management Secretariat, physically based in the Education Secretariat and assigned the task of generating data and monitoring indicators (process and outcome indicators).This information is shared through multimedia projection systems that display data on schools in the state. The Managing for Results Unit facilitate the monitoring meetings with the Executive Management Committee to address on-going data, outcome and process indicators, outcomes analysis and also conduct management meetings with schools for analyses of indicators.
The fifth step entailed the planning of actions to be carried out by the Pact for Education Program: determining needed resources, agents to be involved and timelines for execution.Institutions and individuals responsible for each project within the Pact for Education were defined.
The sixth step involved debate and strategic alignment with the Education Secretariat’s Regional Districts and project managers. After their designation, these public sector managers were given guidance on goals, tasks, timetable and operational aspects of the specific monitoring and evaluation model.
Following these initial stages, implementation began for the diverse actions planned within the Program, such as: modification of education methods, purchasing and distribution of tablets/PCs, selection of students to participate in the Conquer the World Program, building of technical schools and adaptations to full-day schools and establishing timeframes for on-going monitoring and evaluation meetings.
The Pact for Education Executive Management Committee’s first meeting took place on June 28, 2011, launching the monitoring and evaluation process.This component links the verification of targets/indicators and corrective actions regarding the commitments for continuous improvement adopted by the program. Multimedia presentations display data on indicators and are used as a key instrument for assessment and deliberation.
Two years after the program began in 2011, the Pact for Education Program’s monitoring process now covers all Secondary Education schools in the state public education system.
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5. Who implemented the initiative and what is the size of the population affected by this initiative?
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Conception of the Pact for Education was based on the overarching State Government Program and input generated from civil society throughout the state through the “All for Pernambuco seminars”. The state’s citizens were thus the first agents to contribute to the design of the Pact for Education Program.
The Executive Management Committee is the highest level delegated with deliberation powers within the Pact for Education Program. Committee meetings are usually led by the Governor and coordinated by the Planning and Management Secretariat. The Executive Management Committee consists of Executive Secretaries from the Education Secretariat, the Executive Secretary for Managing for Results from the Planning and Management Secretariat and the Education Secretariat’s Regional District Managers.
A team of professionals provide on-going technical and operational support to Executive Management Committee Managers. This team consists of technical staff from the Education Secretariat, as well as Managers and Analysts from the Planning and Management Secretariat.
Project managers, Secondary Education school directors, teachers and technical staff from Regional Education Management Districts and education specialists are direct implementers of the actions within the Pact for Education Program.
It is important to highlight the key role of institutions responsible for developing management systems and pedagogical structures for use with portable computers, carrying out activities that are critical to implementation of the Pact for Education Program. Other institutions were also contracted to provide support for the curricula parameters and application of external evaluations – which are standardized assessments tests carried out by a private institution. Civil construction companies engaged in the building of technical schools, whereas international institutions have provided language courses and support the student exchanges.
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6. How was the strategy implemented and what resources were mobilized?
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The need was detected for investing in technologies capable of making classes more attractive for students and, in turn, reducing the high dropout level existing in the state public school system. The state government invested in the acquisition of portable tablets/PCs containing educational tools, videos and didactic material with a cost of R$873.99 (Brazilian Reais) per student. Equipment is loaned to students for as long as they are enrolled in the Secondary Education system. However, those students who complete their Secondary Education without repeating a school year and remaining enrolled during the entire three-year period are allowed to keep the equipment upon completing their final year.
Language training and study abroad exchanges have required an outlay of R$121,309,360.64 (Brazilian Reais). These resources were needed to cover the costs of preparing students, along with their travel and project management.
Expansion of technical education - within the scope of Secondary Education - required an investment of R$107,902,043.68 (Brazilian Reais) to increase the number of technical schools in operation in the state from a total of 12 to 26. It is important to highlight that these technical schools also provide follow-on vocational courses that are offered to youth who have completed their Secondary Education. The creation of specific courses and enrollment slots in vocational training courses is guided by the economic development and commercial realities in each region of the state.
Over 17 million Brazilian Reais were invested in reformulating the curricular guidelines within Primary and Secondary Education. It is important to emphasize that the approved guidelines were also made available to municipalities throughout the state in support of their pedagogical policies and projects.
Expenditures for teacher-training were made at a level of R$15,779,932.28 (Brazilian Reais). These costs covered selection and training of administrators so as to ensure and optimize their use of management tools. Teacher training also aims at keeping them up to date in their specific areas, providing them with knowledge on the technologies employed by the state ,and ensuring their understanding and the implementation of revised universal curricular guidelines.
The majority of these investments were covered with resources from the state of Pernambuco’s own budget. In addition to the direct financial cost, human resources were deployed to work in the program through the creation of the Managing for Results Unit for Education – made up of Analysts from the Planning and Management Secretariat. Technical resources were also applied, such as in the creation of the Pernambuco Comprehensive Education System (SIEPE), which established a system for inputting data from schools, along with the Online Government Dashboard for monitoring meetings, which is utilized to present and discuss the status and progress with the Government’s prioritized goals and targets. These technical resources were essential for the program to operate. The entire amount of resources invested in the program has benefitted approximately 335,000 students enrolled throughout the entire Secondary Education system in the state.
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7. Who were the stakeholders involved in the design of the initiative and in its implementation?
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The Pact for Education Program’s most significant results are: i) development of the Curricular Parameters that provided the foundation for developing the common public school system curriculum; ii) training of education professionals; iii) expansion of full-day schooling and vocational education; iv) the Conquer the World Program; v) technological investments in public schools.
Its first product – the development of Curricular Parameters - fomented debates, development and validation of curriculum parameters for compulsory education and guided the development of common curricula for compulsory education, while also guiding development of common curricula for state and municipal public schools.
The second product is the Training of education professionals: it offered Specialization Courses in Management and Evaluation of Public Education, with a course load of 360 hours, to 2,813 education professionals. Besides, about 3,000 teachers are regularly trained each year in specific academic content.
The third product of the Pact for Education Program was the creation of the largest full-day schooling system in Brazil: a total of 260 full-day schools in 2013 will increase in 2014 to a number of 300. The number of state technical schools also increased from 12 in 2010 to 26 in 2013. These schools are focused on meeting labor market demands for professionals trained at the technical level, linked to the economic development reality in each region. A total of 40 state technical schools are projected for 2014.
Its forth product – the Conquer the World Program - was created in 2012 and has engaged a total of 49,000 students in intensive foreign language courses, with 806 teachers trained in foreign languages by native speakers and 1,739 students participating in study abroad in the United States, Canada, Spain, Australia, New Zealand, Chile and Argentina.
The increase of technology in schools has been its fifth product: distribution in 2012-2013 of portable computers tablets/PCs to over 252,000 Secondary Education students. Educational software and Office and Media applications were installed, along with Educational Games and Education Technologies content, English courses and digital books and references to Educational Links. The government also invested in wireless connectivity in schools and in the distribution of 11,000 multimedia projectors with computers in all public schools in the system: one per classroom for utilization by teachers in presenting complementary classroom material and to make classes more appealing to students.
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8. What were the most successful outputs and why was the initiative effective?
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The systems that were created to monitor progress and evaluate activities in the Pact for Education Program were: i) development and consensus on goals and targets; ii) external evaluations; iii) monitoring and evaluation meetings at strategic, tactical and operational levels.
Goals for each school are established and agreed upon with school administrators at the beginning of the year. Goals are based on results from the Compulsory Education Development Index for Pernambuco (IDEPE) obtained during the prior year and projected for the coming year based on the planned level of effort. Priority goals for education in the entire state are also defined and planned.
Bi-monthly Management meetings are held for monitoring and evaluating results at the strategic, tactical and operational levels. Strategic-level meetings are held by the Pact for Education Program’s Executive Management Committee. Meetings entail presentations of results based on the state’s education indicators and those for the Regional Education Districts and schools with lower and higher performance levels in each Regional Education District. Progress on priority goals is also monitored. Follow-on based on evaluation results are defined to address specific problems that are identified. Meeting minutes with follow-on actions designate those who are responsible for each action, along with the respective deadlines. Follow-on actions are then monitored by the Managing for Results Unit. The Pact for Education’s Executive Management Committee Strategic makes the decisions that guide the state’s education policies. Government leaders and state secretaries participate in this meeting to offer and respond to immediate issues, impediments and problems debated in the monitoring process.
Tactical-level meetings take place at the Regional Education District headquarters with the Planning and Management Secretariat. Regional Education Secretariat managers and school administrators participate. Meetings involve a broad presentation on the local situation and provide information on each school’s performance. Main weaknesses in schools are identified and, based on data presented, follow-on actions for improvements are developed and assigned to respective school administrators.
Operational-level meetings take place in schools with the Planning and Management Secretariat, with participation of the entire school staff. Monitoring processes and actions are presented to those involved in the program, with discussions on results achieved by the school. Evaluations from outside institutions are conducted each semester since program start-up. Secondary Education students are evaluated; these evaluations are fundamental for measuring results and providing inputs for the monitoring and evaluation reports.
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9. What were the main obstacles encountered and how were they overcome?
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The principal obstacles faced in implementing the Pact for Education Program have been: i) institution-based cultural barriers; ii) absence of a single system for gathering education-related data; iii) learning deficits among students enrolled in Secondary Education; iv) geographic and physical scope of the state’s public Secondary Education system, consisting of 796 schools.
Managing for Results initiatives are still recent within public administration.For this reason, some cultural barriers and resistance among more conservative teachers make it difficult for their schools to quickly assimilate the model. The process has been facilitated through meetings in all Regional Education Districts, where presentations are made and uncertainties are addressed.
Initially, the lack of a single system for gathering education-related data on schools made it difficult to conduct assessments and develop action plans. The alternative solution was to consolidate data from multiple databases and add information collected through collaborative efforts with schools in order to create a specific database for the program. The Education Secretariat invested in contracting a system for managing education-related information, thus making it easier for schools to provide data and for data to be compiled and analyzed. Schools had to be convinced about the importance of inputting data into the system and staffing groups to work with the Planning and Management Secretariat analysts responsible for analyzing the data received.
The learning deficit for Secondary Education students remains an obstacle. That said, the adoption of full-day education and the use of technological tools have been essential for supporting these students to improve their performance.
Another difficulty is the significant size and scope of the state’s public Secondary Education system. Analysts are assigned to implement Managing for Results principles in hundreds of schools, what requires field work.Schools are prioritized based on results, and logistical effort required in order to work in more remote areas.
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