What is the South-South Programme?
The South-South programme, initiated by the Lemann Foundation Programme at Oxford, aims to support education leaders from low- and middle-income countries, providing them with the means to exchange evidence and practices on how to foster cross-sectoral coalitions and advance reforms to improve fundamental learning. The first edition ran from February 2022 until March 2023 and has focused on building coalitions in two countries, Kenya and Pakistan, with Brazil as the host country for an immersion and knowledge-exchange trip.
The Lemann Foundation Programme also measured the strengthening of education policy coalitions through this first edition.
What are global public goods?
Global public goods (GPGs) are goods and services with two main features: they are non-rivalrous (which means, someone using them does not affect another person doing the same) and non-excludable (which means nobody can be prevented from accessing or benefitting from them). In this context, we use GPGs to describe materials created as part of the South-South Programme that are freely accessible for pedagogical purposes. Please refer to this original report to better understand how global public goods have been relevant in different policy areas.
What is the purpose of this library?
The purpose of this library is to share free learning resources that will enrich conversations among educational leaders in low- and middle-income countries by recounting relevant stories and experiences relating to improving foundational learning. Our hope is that this will inspire them to improve the quality of deliberation within education policy coalitions and further clarify among themselves the reforms that would be most useful in their own contexts.
How were the global public goods produced?
The global public goods were designed through a mix of basic research and interviews with experts and South-South Programme fellows, who helped to choose which topics would be selected.
How can I use these materials?
Each of these learning documents is accompanied by a podcast that introduces the topic, tugs at some of the key debates within it, and extends the discussion beyond the country that the document focuses on. Each of the learning tasks are designed to guide pedagogical use of learning documents. These outline exercises are for those interacting with the material on their own, as well as in groups.
We would like to hear about how you are using these materials, so please contact us at lemann.foundation@bsg.ox.ac.uk. We can also be contacted for access to materials not yet available to download, and we aim to continue adding to this library over time.
Materials
🇧🇷 Brazil
The campaign for common curriculum standards
Produced by the Case Centre for Public Leadership, this case study tells the story of Movimento pela Base, a coalition to advance national common curricular standards in Brazil. The coalition was able to withstand strong political shocks, such as the impeachment of former president Dilma Rousseff, and opposition from both the left and the right, until the reform was made into law and ultimately implemented. The case study provides valuable lessons as to how to build and sustain a coalition, particularly in challenging political contexts, and how to navigate difficult trade-offs in the process.
- Download case study (to come – please contact us for a copy) |
- Podcast audio
🇧🇷 Brazil
Reproducing success in foundational learning
Produced by the Case Centre for Public Leadership in partnership with the Lemann Foundation Programme, this case study focuses on the challenges of sequencing reforms to improve foundational learning outcomes, as well as building political support for them. It features a newly appointed secretary of education in a Brazilian municipality in the state of Rio de Janeiro, looking for inspiration in other municipalities including Sobral, a city in Northeast Brazil known as an example of education reform. However, he finds resistances to his proposed changes and different roadblocks on his way.
- Case study
- Case study (Portuguese)
- Download learning tasks
- Download learning tasks (Portuguese)
- Podcast audio
🇵🇰 Pakistan
Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) in education
The Pakistan materials explore the experience of Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) to improve access and quality in foundational learning, with a focus on the province of Sindh. The materials investigate the types of education PPPs that exist and how the relationship between the public and the private sector in education works in practice. They also feature the best evidence available on the topic and highlight eight areas that educators and policymakers should be mindful of when considering PPPs in their own context.
- Learning document
- Learning document (Portuguese)
- Learning tasks
- Learning tasks (Portuguese)
- Podcast audio
🇰🇪 Kenya
National literacy and numeracy programs
The Kenya materials are about two foundational learning programs funded by international organisations and implemented on a national scale: Tusome (literacy) and PRIEDE (numeracy). These experiences are used as a starting point for a discussion on the complex relationships between international development funders and local stakeholders. The materials also explore how the perceptions of reforms being from the outside-in or the inside-out affects issues of local ownership, stakeholder buy-in and policy sustainability.
- Learning document
- Learning document (Portuguese)
- Learning tasks
- Learning tasks (Portuguese)
- Podcast audio
Related material
The Lemann Center, a partner organisation for this Programme, hosts further materials relating to the South-South Programme.