Key details
| Location | Sierra Leone |
| Start date | December 2021 |
| End date | December 2023 |
| Client | Dubai Cares |
Background
Funded by Dubai Cares via the Interagency Network for Education in Emergencies’ E-Cubed research grant, the Tich Mi Ar Tich Dem (‘Teach me to teach them’) programme research addresses the Sierra Leonean government’s need to optimise and validate an effective model for in-service teacher professional development (TPD) in crisis-vulnerable areas of the country. A distributed TPD model is currently being favoured, and our research provides crucial and timely evidence to shore up current government plans for a scalable, effective intervention.
Our Approach
Our research identifies whether this TPD model addresses the needs of rural / disadvantaged teachers. The study focuses on a sample of teachers and students from schools in rural / semi-rural areas to understand whether and how school-based TPD initiatives promote student learning (as an alternative to traditional centralised and cascade models). The study addresses three key gaps that currently exist in the literature surrounding TPD in emergency contexts in the following ways:
- Examining learning outcomes. Examining the relationship between TPD and student learning outcomes, using an exploratory mixed-methods design that goes beyond the limited approaches of previous studies.
- Examining conceptualisation of TPD. Investigates the relative importance of education system components and aspects of TPD.
- Examining definitions of ‘emergency’. The study focuses on Sierra Leone, where the population has experienced multiple, overlapping forms of emergency, and fills the gap in the EiE evidence base on improving learning outcomes despite contextual pressures.
contribution
ODE staff are responsible for the following activities:
- Conducting and management of all design-based implementation research and randomised control trial activities, iterating in cycles from two to over 200 schools across peri-urban and rural Sierra Leone. This includes management of a team of six researchers and 24 enumerators, in partnership with EducAid
- Development of contextually-specific data collection tools for collection, analysis, and reporting of both quantitative data gathered from large-scale fieldwork in Bombali and Tonkolili regions
- Stakeholder liaison and management, building partnerships with research organisations and programmes in Sierra Leone, and developing relationships with key governmental stakeholders such as the Teaching Service Commission
