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Bilingual Education in Niger


The bookIn 1973, Niger undertook an experiment in the introduction of national languages into primary education. The aim was to examine the possibilities for the use of French and Niger’s national languages in teaching. This book, which is devoted to bilingual education in Niger, describes that experiment.

The results of the trial conducted in around forty schools are positive, especially in terms of academic attainment. It transpires from the various evaluations carried out that bilingual education is more effective than education in a single language, especially one that is foreign. While bilingual schooling appears more costly than traditional schooling, this difference is offset by the higher quality of the education, which reduces drop-outs, exclusions and grade repetition.

After providing a presentation of the context of the experiment, the book goes on to highlight the background to and justifications for the introduction of Niger’s national languages into teaching, the goals assigned to bilingual education, the chosen strategies for achieving those goals, the results obtained, an evaluation of the quality of the teaching in the experiment compared with traditional teaching, the funding obtained and the costs incurred. In conclusion, the study formulates a number of observations and recommendations.

The authorsThe text was written by a team of high-level staff at the Ministry of Basic Education in the Republic of Niger, the members of which were as follows: Hamidou Amadou, adviser to the Minister of Basic Education and national coordinator of the study; Abdou Mijinguini, Director of Educational Reform and Promotion of National Languages, the study’s technical manager; Laouali Amani, head of the National Languages Department at the National Institute for Pedagogical Documentation, Research and Action (INDRAP); and Jafarou Saley, co-coordinator of the MEB-GTZ/2 Bilingual Education Project.

Nazam Halaoui, researcher at the Department of Linguistics and Translation at the University of Montreal, also provided input for the completion of the publication as coordinator of the study on behalf of ADEA.

Association for the Development of Education in Africa

African Experiences - Country Case Studies

Papers published in this series* :

1. The Reform of Pre-Service Primary Teacher Training in Guinea: Assessing Implementation

2. The Faire-Faire Strategy in Senegal: Decentralizing the Management of Education and Diversifying Supply

3. Improving the Quality of Nomadic Education in Nigeria: Going Beyond Access and Equity

4. Zambia’s Primary Reading Program (PRP): Improving Access and Quality in Basic Schools

5. Practicing Critical Reflection in Teacher Education in Namibia

6. Investigating Quality Factors in Private Schools in the Gambia

7. EQF norms for Monitoring the Quality of Education in Benin

8. An Approach to Improving the Quality of Education in Mauritania

9. Impact of the Primary Education Reform Program (PERP) on the Quality of Basic Education in Uganda

10. Bilingual Education in Niger

* Series published in English and French


Authors:Amadou HamidouAbdou Mijinguini

Laouali AmaniJafarou Salley

Coordinator of the study on behalf of ADEA:Nazam Halaoui

Association for the Development of Education in Africa

ADEA

This document was commissioned by ADEA as part of the exercise on the qua-lity of education in Sub-Saharan Africa commenced in 2002-2003. It was later published in the collection “African Experiments – National Case Studies”. The views and opinions expressed in this document are those of the authors and cannot be attributed to ADEA, the members of ADEA, the organisations affiliated to it or to any person acting in the name of ADEA.

The work undertaken in the context of the exercise on quality of education and this document was financed from the programme funds of the Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA) to which the following or-ganisations have contributed: African Development Bank (AfDB); European Commission; United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisa-tion (UNESCO); United Nations International Children’s Fund (UNICEF); The World Bank; Federal Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Department of Deve-lopment Cooperation, Austria; Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA); Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Finland; Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Department of International Cooperation and Development, France; Ger-man Cooperation; Department of Foreign Affairs, Ireland; Japan Internatio-nal Cooperation Agency (JICA) ; Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Netherlands; Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD); United States Agency for International Development (USAID); Calouste Gulbenkian Foun-dation (Portugal); Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), Switzerland ; Department for International Development (DFID), United Kingdom.

Published by the Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA). ISBN-10: 92-9178-100-2; ISBN-13: 978-92-9178-100-3First print-run: January 2010The French translation of this book is entitled «Bilingual Education in Niger» ISBN-10: 92-9178-099-5; ISBN-13: 978-92-9178-099-0

Graphic design for the cover and internal page layout: Marie Moncet

© Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA) – 2010

Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA) African Development Bank (AfDB) – Temporary Relocation Agency

13 avenue du Ghana – BP 323 – 1002 Tunis Belvédère – Tunisia tel: +216/ 71 10 39 86 – fax: +216/ 71 25 26 69

E-mail: [email protected] – web site: www.adeanet.org

Table of conTenTs 5

Table of contents

Foreword ..................................................................................9Abstract .................................................................................111. Introduction ........................................................................152. General considerations on Niger ..........................................173. A brief history of the experiment .........................................214. The context and justification of the experiment ....................23

Presentation of Niger’s educational system ............................................24Formal education   ........................................................................... 24Non-formal education ...................................................................................25

Description of the dysfunctionalities of the situation ............................25Dysfunctionalities relating to the system’s ultimate purposes, goals and targets ............................................................................................25Dysfunctionalities relating to pedagogical aspects ........................................26

5. The goals assigned to bilingual education ............................29The general goals of bilingual education ................................................29The specific goals of bilingual education ................................................29

6. Strategies for achieving the goals ........................................31Pedagogical strategies ...........................................................................31

The curriculum .............................................................................................31Teaching staff ................................................................................................33

Legislative strategies ...............................................................................38External strategies .................................................................................41Evaluation strategies .............................................................................42

7. The Results obtained ...........................................................43Regarding the linguistical and pedagogical research ......................................43With regard to school attendance and the availability of the teaching personnel ...................................................................................43With regard to linguistic policy and law .........................................................45

8. Quality evaluation ..............................................................47The 1982 evaluation ...............................................................................47The 1985 evaluation ...............................................................................48

The items to evaluate .....................................................................................48The 1987 evaluation ...............................................................................51The 1998 evaluation ...............................................................................51

9. Financing and costs .............................................................53The internal financing within the framework of the national budget ......53The external financing within the framework of international cooperation ............................................................................................54

6 bilingual educaTion in niger

The analysis of the expenditures ............................................................55General approach regarding the expenditures ................................................55The additional expenditures ...........................................................................58

10. Observations and recommendations ...................................5911. Conclusion ........................................................................6112. Bibliography .....................................................................63

List of figuresPopulation density map........................................................................................................................ 18Diagram 6.1. The bilingual education model thus described

can be represented as follows in diagrammatic form: .......................................... 33

List of tablesTable 4.1. Rates of grade promotion, grade repetition and drop-out ...................................... 26Table 6.1. Bilingual education disciplines and times ...................................................................... 32Table 6.2. Teacher training content ................................................................................................ 34Table 7.1. Appreciation of the use of national languages............................................................. 44Table 8.1. Results obtained in the tests in the experimental schools and in

the traditional schools ................................................................................................. 52Table 9.1. Share of the budget and education within the budget .............................................. 53Table 9.2. Average costs of a teacher at mid-term of career and a class of 35 pupils ......... 56Table 9.3. Promotion, repetition and dropout rates in the ESs and the TSs .......................... 57Table 9.4. Rate of success, repetition and dropout of the ESs between 1980-81

and 1985-86 ................................................................................................................... 57

acronyms and abbreviaTions 7

Acronyms and abbreviations

ACCT Agency for Cultural and Technical CooperationALPHA Literacy programmesBEPC Certificate of secondary education (Brevet d’Études du

Premier Cycle)BREDA UNESCO Dakar Regional Bureau for Education in

AfricaCELTHO Centre for linguistic and historical studies based on oral

traditions (Centre d’études linguistique et historique par tradition orale)

CE2 Fourth year of Primary School (Cours élémentaire deuxième année)

CFCA Literacy programme leader training centreCFEPD Primary school certificate (Certificat de Fin d’Études du

Premier Degré)CI First year of Primary School (Cours d’initiation)CMI Civic and Moral Instruction CM1 Fifth year of Primary School (Cours moyen première

année)CM2 Sixth year of Primary School (Cours moyen deuxième

année)CP Second year of Primary School (Cours préparatoire)DAF Directorate of Financial AffairsDELAN Description of languagesDIMO Monolingual dictionary DSE German foundation for international development

(Deutsche Stiftung für internationale Entwicklung)DREPLN Directorate for educational reform and the promotion

of national languages (Direction de la réforme de l’enseignement et de la promotion des langues nationales)

EDF European Development FundES Experimental SchoolFWA French West Africa GTZ German development cooperation agency (Deutsche

Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit)HDI Human Development Index


INDRAP National Institute for Pedagogical Documentation, Research and Action (Institut national de documentation, de recherche et d’animation pédagogiques)

L1 Language 1L2 Language 2LEXIS Specialist glossaryMEBA Ministry of Basic Education and Literacy (Ministère de

l’Éducation de base et de l’alphabétisation)MEN-DEP Ministry of National Education – Studies and

Programming Directorate (Ministère de l’Éducation nationale-Direction des études et de la programmation)

NL National LanguageOAU Organisation of African Unity PDDE 10-year Education Development Programme

(Programme décennal du développement de l’éducation)2PEB Basic Education Project/Promotion of bilingual

education PE Physical Education PPA Practical and productive activities PROSEF Sectoral Basic Education Project (Project sectoriel

d’enseignement fondamental)PRS Poverty Reduction StrategySIL Société Internationale de LinguistiqueSNV Netherlands Development Organisation (Stichting

Nederlandse Vrijwilligers)SP-CNRE/PS Permanent Secretariat of the National Commission for

Educational Reform and School Enrolment Planning (Secrétariat permanent de la commission nationale de la réforme de l’enseignement et du plan de scolarisation)

TS Traditional School (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit)

UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural

OrganisationUNICEF United Nations Children’s FundUSAID United States Agency for International Development

foreword 9

Foreword

The various surveys of levels of academic attainment carried out between 2000 and 2005 in establishments dispensing basic pri-mary education in Niger reveal a brutal reality: at no level and in no discipline do school pupils in Niger achieve the desired level of competence. Failure to master the teaching language (French) is advanced as one of the main determining factors in this poor performance. And it is true that in the specific context of Ni-ger, poor mastery of the French language affects the capacity of pupils to acquire knowledge, including other subjects such as mathematics or environment studies.

It was in order to address this problem that as long ago as 1966 the broad focuses of educational policy in Niger highlighted the imperative necessity of building links between school and learn-ers’ sociocultural environment. This reform saw the beginnings of application with teaching in national languages initiated in 1973 in Zinder teacher training college. The satisfactory results this yielded supported the idea of the concomitant use of French and national languages as a way of improving the learning proc-ess for pupils.

Given the constraints limiting the quality of that learning, the need must be to assess the relevance of bilingual teaching (i.e. the use of French and national languages as languages of instruc-tion) and to assess the chances of success for this option. The ex-perimental schools were evaluated in 1984 by UNESCO and by the Bilingual Education Project (2PEB) in 2003. They conducted a critical analysis of the educational system inherited from the colonial era and the bilingual education experiment initiated in Niger in 1973.

Those evaluations led to the conclusion that children learn better and faster when the learning process starts in the language spo-ken in their environment; this protects them from certain mental


blocks and ensures that they are readier to open up to the acqui-sition of knowledge in a foreign language.

The pedagogical and legislative achievements observed at the conclusion of this experiment are the subject of the present case study which is undoubtedly an essential tool for the various ac-tors in systems of education. It will notably be of interest to tech-nical workers in their search for a model for bilingual education suited to the social and cultural realities of Niger and in choos-ing relevant strategies for the geographical and linguistic exten-sion of this teaching, as well as for politicians, to whom it offers a reference framework suitable for guiding their decisions in this domain.

It is my hope that this case study, which is intended for research-ers, educationalists and political decision-makers alike, will pro-vide food for thought on the ways and means of allowing schools in Niger and other African nations to create a melting pot for skills and a centre for excellence.

Dr Ousmane Samba MamadouMinister of National Education, Niger

absTracT 11

Abstract

In Niger, like many countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, levels of enrolment in primary education have risen sharply over the last twenty years, but this increase in numbers has not been matched by an increase in quality – in some cases we have even seen a de-terioration in the quality of the education provided.

The authorities in Niger have therefore attempted various exper-iments aimed at improving quality. One is bilingual education, defined by Hamers and Blanc (1988) as “any system of school education in which, at any given time and for a varying amount of time, simultaneously or consecutively, instruction is planned and given in at least two languages, one of which is the pupil’s lan-guage”. In Niger, one national language and French were used in the trial analysed in the present study.

This study of the experimentation in bilingual education relates essentially to the following aspects:• General considerations on Niger;• The limitations, inadequacies and dysfunctionalities of schoo-

ling in Niger;• The goals assigned to schools for their improvement;• The results of the experiment;• Quality evaluation;• Cost analysis;• The lessons to be learned from the experiment.

As early as 1975, Niger laid the foundations of bilingual educa-tion which must:• drive economic, social and cultural development;• permit proper development of children’s intelligence through

constant reference to their environment and individuality;• educate citizens who are responsible, capable of initiative and

able to contribute effectively to the local community and to the nation.


This study reviews the pedagogical strategies used, indicates the bilingual education subjects and times, and describes recruit-ment and training strategies for teaching staff, in addition to the local monitoring put in place to assist teachers. It then goes on to analyse the key issue of school books and the need to create manuals written in one or other of the national languages and to publish them in Niger. It was necessary to put language legisla-tion in place and to create official bodies and institutes charged with the implementation of the linguistic policy adopted by the country. And lastly, in order to provide this bilingual education, Niger was able to obtain the help of development partners who in fact played an active part in the internal and external evalua-tions of bilingual education in Niger.

The mobilisation effort devoted to setting up bilingual teaching produced over three decades results in the following areas:• Linguistic and pedagogical research: description and trans-

cription of several national languages and the production of several dictionaries;

• School attendance and availability of teaching staff: nearly 30,000 pupils were able to follow this bilingual syllabus in 42 schools in urban and rural areas taught by 422 teachers duly trained for that purpose;

• Linguistic policies and legislation.

Evaluations were conducted in 1982, 1985, 1987 and 1998. These covered the following:• The ability to continue studies into secondary education with

success above the national average in the examination for the diploma at the end of primary education in French and a rate of grade repetition lower than in traditional schools: these fi-gures indicate that there need be no anxiety as to the future of this new form of schooling;

• The ability to become a part of the economic life of the na-tion;

• The ability to achieve literacy in a national language and in French.

absTracT 13

The evaluation also focused on the problems of cost and grade repetition: the average rate of repetition is 15% in traditional schools and just 1% in bilingual schools; 99% of pupils move up into the next year in bilingual schools, compared with 75 % in traditional schools. This reduces accordingly the overall cost to the Ministry’s budget, despite the fact that these innovations have added costs to that budget.

In conclusion, all these different assessments have justified the assertion that bilingual education embodies an opportunity for Niger: children have considerable capacity for learning in their mother tongue; ownership by the local population is a positive factor; interest from fund donors is not insignificant; learner self-confidence is also a very important factor. Nevertheless, the study does not mask the fact that mobilisation of the resources of the various organisations for pedagogical and linguistic devel-opment, the results of the various evaluations, legislative meas-ures and expansion of bilingual schools are still failing to come up to expectations.

1. inTroducTion 15

1. Introduction

In the euphoria of independence, the vast majority of African leaders responsible for education opted for a policy focused on massive increases in the numbers of children to be enrolled in school. This attitude was encouraged all the more by the fact that all concerned were totally convinced that the solution to the underdevelopment of poor nations would necessarily involve an acceleration of school enrolment by every means possible. For this reason, at the conference of African Heads of State on edu-cation in Africa in Addis Ababa (OAU, 1961), the target of 80% enrolment by 1980 was set because all believed in the absolute link between school enrolment and sustainable development.

In so doing, many countries devoted enormous effort to expan-ding the coverage of their school systems. Lacking sufficient means to enrol all young people, those countries made use of alternative solutions, the most familiar of which are, among others, double-flow classes, large groups and the sharing of ma-nuals by three or four pupils.

In the space of a few years, it became apparent that despite all the difficulties, the percentage of the population attending scho-ol was rising. But did this necessarily mean that all was well in African countries where education was concerned? Certainly not. Indeed, while attendance rates often rose significantly, it was difficult, if not impossible, for those countries to conduct at one and the same time developments aimed at enhancing both qua-lity and quantity in education given their circumstances of scar-city of resources. And the outcome of these palliative measures for the problems in the development of school systems led a few years later in virtually all these countries to a very advanced state of deterioration in their educational systems, so much so that every statement about schooling in Africa held alarmist over-tones and negative assessments expressive of deep pessimism


among managers, actors and partners of school systems where educational quality was concerned.

Governments set out once again to seek solutions, approaches and techniques likely to help them improve the quality of their educational systems. In Niger, several experiments were in fact undertaken in order to improve the quality of education, among them: • The school television experiment, the aim of which was to

reach out to as many pupils as possible with a minimum of teachers and to improve the quality of teaching of French.

• The educational companions experiment in which pupils in secondary education still in their villages were mobilised du-ring their free time to help schoolteachers with their teaching activities.

• The bilingual teaching experiment, the subject of the present study, attracted unanimous approval. Like Hamers and Blanc (1988), we define bilingual teaching as “any system of school education in which, at any given time and for a varying amount of time, simultaneously or consecutively, instruction is plan-ned and given in at least two languages, one of which is the pupil’s language”. In the case of Niger, the two components of bilingual teaching are a national language and French.

This study focuses essentially on the following aspects:• General considerations on Niger; • The limitations, inadequacies and dysfunctionalities of schoo-

ling in Niger; • The goals assigned to schools for their improvement; • The strategies envisaged to achieve those goals; • The results of the experiment; • Quality evaluation;• Comparative cost analysis; • The lessons to be learned from the experiment.

2. general consideraTions on niger 17

2. General considerations on Niger

Niger is a Sahelian-Saharan country. It is a continental country located in the north-eastern part of West Africa. It covers an area of 1,267,000 square kilometres. Its capital is Niamey. Ni-ger is bounded to the north by Algeria and Libya, to the east by Chad, to the south by Nigeria and Benin and to the west by Burkina Faso and Mali. The northern portion of the country is desert in its entirety. Only in the south is rainfall sufficient to permit farming, which nevertheless does not provide any genuine security of food supply. The deterioration of the ecosystem is very marked across the country as a whole.

Demographically, Niger has a population of 10,790,3521 of which 52% are women. The characteristics of the national popu-lation are the following:• It is essentially rural (86%).• Its spatial distribution is uneven: it is denser in the south in

the crop-growing areas and less dense in the north in the arid zones. Population density varies from south to north (cf. map); the mean figure is eight inhabitants per square kilometre, among the lowest densities on the continent. This underpopu-lation can be explained in part by the difficult climatic condi-tions over a large part of the country’s territory. The vast ma-jority of the population (around 75%) lives in the southern belt, which accounts for a quarter of the total land area.

• It is expanding rapidly: Niger’s population is in fact growing at an annual rate of 3.4 %. As a consequence, it is doubling every 23 years.

• It is young: under-15s account for 49% of the total population. Youth is an important human potentiality for development, but where the proportion becomes excessive this places a bur-den on the working population in terms of the investments

1. Ministry of Social Affairs and Population [2001] General population census.


needed to meet the needs of health, food, employment and, above all, education.

• Its multilingualism is relatively limited, with ten national lan-guages : Arabic, Buduma, Fulfulde, Gulmancema, Hausa, Kanuri, Songhai-Zarma, Tamajaq, Tasawaq and Tubu. The experiment involved the five main languages: Hausa, Songhai-Zarma, Fulfulde, Kanuri and Tamajaq, whose speakers repre-sent nearly 90% of the country’s population.

Population density map

2. general consideraTions on niger 19

In addition to its fairly tight socio-demographic constraints, Niger is faced with an economic and financial crisis linked to a geo-economic environment rendered extremely difficult by the following factors:• Drought and expanding desertification are worsening environ-

mental deterioration.• The fact that the country is landlocked: Niger has no access to

the sea and the port nearest its capital, Port Harcourt, is over 600km away. In terms of navigability, the Niger River permits access to the Atlantic Ocean for only part of the year.

• The fall in the market price for uranium, Niger’s most impor-tant export, and deteriorating terms of trade allow the econo-mic and financial crisis to continue, along with poverty. Niger ranks 173rd out of 174 according to the Human Development Index (HDI) of the United Nations Development Programme.

• Its economy is largely rural, depending on agriculture, lives-tock farming and fisheries. Ninety percent of the population work in these three sectors.

As for the political context, it continues to be marked by the ongoing process of democratisation and decentralisation. Ni-ger returned to democracy after a period featuring two military coups d’état that led to unlawful or transitional regimes. The decentralisation process, after being halted momentarily by the cancellation of the local elections in 1999, is once again up and running. New elections intended to lead to the setting up of local municipalities are scheduled to be held during the present term of the legislature (2000/2004).

3. a brief hisTory of The experimenT 21

3. A brief history of the experiment

Convinced of the correlation between the level of education of a community and its social, economic and cultural development, since its independence in 1960 Niger has prioritised the training of its national managers to take over gradually from the forei-gners omnipresent in all state sectors. Similarly, in the education and training sector efforts were directed at every level to meeting the challenges of a barely nascent school system.

In quantitative terms, efforts were made to raise the rate of scho-ol enrolment, aiming ambitiously at an increase from 3% to 80% in the space of twenty years. In the same spirit, Niger concurred with the goals of Education For All at Jomtien.

In both cases, the rise in rates never followed the curves projected in Addis Ababa or Jomtien. The level of enrolment in prima-ry education progressed from 3% in 1961 to 28.5% in 1982 and 37.3% in 2000. The targets set in Addis Ababa and Jomtien did not take into account all the obstacles to be overcome and the challenges to be met, especially those intrinsic to a school system inherited from the colonial era: the content of the teaching was that of French West Africa (FWA) in 1949; the only teaching language was French. All the teaching materials were produced abroad.

Qualitatively, one of the concerns expressed in the various fo-rums on education between 1961 and the present day was the building of a school system to suit the needs of the economy and the sociocultural aspirations of Nigeriens. The 1966 reform project, despite the grip of strong external support in a newly independent country, set the ambitious goal of reforming scho-ols in terms of their quality, bringing children closer to their home environment and addressing the issue of adult literacy. The 1975 reform project, encouraged by a change in political re-gime that raised hopes of genuine reform, looked forward to a


radical transformation of the educational system based around a nine-year core curriculum (basic cycle) and the use of natio-nal languages as teaching vehicles and timetable subjects from the first to the fourth year, and subsequently as a taught subject in the fifth and sixth years. French is introduced as a timetable subject during the second term of the second year and becomes a teaching language in the fifth and sixth years. Since then, bi-lingual education has begun to build a framework of legitimacy destined to evolve along with the formalisation of experimental bilingual schools from 1980 onwards and the development of the institutional framework that has underpinned them since then.

The experiment in bilingual education began with the Hausa lan-guage in 1973 in a practice school for the Zinder teacher training college. A team from the teacher training college conducted a programme for research/action and the monitoring of the pe-dagogical changes made. The Zinder experiment was evaluated, with satisfactory results (Perret et al, 1974). The results of this work were published in the form of technical papers used later in expanding the experimentation to other languages. The trial was extended in 1976 with the setting up of a second school in Tillabéri using the Zarma language. In 1979, with the opening of an additional seven new schools across the country, the lin-guistic coverage broadened to include the Kanuri, Tamajaq and Fulfulde languages.

These experimental bilingual schools have been a richer source of inspiration and served as the basis for a gradual overhaul of the educational system: the reform of school curricula in 1988 contained a recognition of the official bilingual programmes for the first time. Following considerable debate and the recommen-dations of national meetings on the educational system, Law 98-12 of 1 June 1998 on policy focuses for the educational system finally formalised the bilingual education option in Niger.

4. The conTexT and jusTificaTion of The experimenT 23

4. The context and justification of the experiment

It transpires from an analysis of the historical evolution de-scribed above that bilingual teaching in Niger is the result of a long process arising from Nigeriens’ constant desire for reform of their educational system. Moreover, although in the years 1960-1970 the development plans were a basic reference for the evaluation of the role of the system in the macroeconomic con-text of the country, this was not the case throughout the years 1980-1990, a period in which unlawful or transitional regimes gradually yielded to the construction of a democratic system. Following this period of political changeovers, new frameworks and approaches to the management of economic policy devel-oped. Law 98-12 (Niger, 1998), which laid the foundations of the legislation on bilingual education, was promulgated at a time when Niger was engaged in a radical movement towards admin-istrative decentralisation backed by a Poverty Reduction Strat-egy (PRS).

The educational dimension of that strategy is the 10-year Edu-cation Development Programme (PDDE) the active period of which covers the years 2003-2012. Under this programme, Niger intends to mobilise its internal resources and international coo-peration to achieve the plan’s core objectives, these being:• to increase significantly the rate of access to the basic cycle; • to increase the rate of completion of the basic cycle; • to improve learners’ performance in both formal and non-for-

mal systems.

It was in this context of general mobilisation that the PDDE defined improvement of the performance of bilingual education by means of a curriculum development strategy common the whole system, a training plan for teaching staff and a plan for


the production of teaching materials, all of this with a view to generalised application.

Presentation of Niger’s educational systemThe educational system defined by Law 98-12 covers both formal and non-formal education.

Formal education  This comprises the components described below.

Preschool education: dispensed in kindergartens and nursery school classes for children aged three to five. The coverage of preschool education is limited, and is available only in urban centres. In 1999-2000, only 1% of children eligible for prescho-ol education were enrolled in such classes. State intervention in this sector is relatively recent. It dates from 1973. Private sec-tor involvement in the development of preschool classes is quite extensive (23.4% of establishments and 36.3% of enrolments in 1999-2000).

Basic Cycle I (primary education). This takes in children aged six or seven. It comprises four (4) types of establishment: monolin-gual French-language schools, French-Arabic schools, bilingual schools (national languages + French) and specialist schools for the physically handicapped. The six-year study cycle ends with an examination for the Primary School Certificate (CFEPD – Cer-tificat de fin d’études du Premier Degré). Enrolment in basic edu-cation currently stands at 41.7%2.

Basic Cycle II (first secondary cycle). This is open, following a competitive examination for entry into its first year, to children aged eleven to thirteen for a four-year cycle ending in an exami-nation for the BEPC certificate.

Intermediate education (second secondary cycle). This is the se-cond level of education and comprises a generalist curriculum

2. MEN-DEP: Education Statistics Directory


alongside technical and vocational subjects. Access to the inter-mediate level is open to holders of the BEPC.

Higher Education. Niger has two universities: Abdou Moumou-ni University in Niamey and the Islamic University in Say. In addition, there are also research institutes and technical and vo-cational training establishments.

Non-formal educationThis educational sub-system covers literacy and vocational train-ing for adults, faith-based schools and joint training centres.

The target population is composed of young people not enrolled in school or no longer in school, and adults. The general literacy rate is 19.9% and 10.6% for women. These figures are an elo-quent demonstration of the limited effectiveness of the institu-tional system set up to further this type of education.

Description of the dysfunctionalities of the situation Having inherited the colonial socioeconomic and cultural sys-tem, the development of Niger’s educational system failed to accord in either content or form with Nigerien aspirations and realities.

To point to a few examples, we look below at dysfunctionalities relating to the system’s ultimate purposes, goals and targets and to its pedagogical dimensions.

Dysfunctionalities relating to the system’s ultimate purposes, goals and targetsImmediately after national independence, only the quantitative aspect of schooling was a concern for those managing the educa-tional system. This was hardly surprising given that the target set in the reform project of 1961 was to raise the rate of enrolment from 3.6% to 30% in twenty years. The qualitative aspect was thus put to one side or ignored, along with all the links that need


to be present between schools and the different branches of the national economy.

The outcome of this policy is that schooling and school enrol-ment in Niger have continued to be unsatisfactory.

Expansion in enrolment rates has been very limited (8.2% in 1965 and 10.7% in 1970), with social and cultural rigidity acting as a brake on enrolment, especially where girls are concerned. The imbalance between town and countryside, the inequality between girls and boys, which are products of the school system, are in themselves indications of poor schooling.

Dysfunctionalities relating to pedagogical aspects

Curricula and methodsDue to the unsuitability of its content and its methods, and des-pite the enormous effort devoted to it, education in Niger still suffers from grave inadequacies in terms of its internal and ex-ternal effectiveness. The figures for grade promotion, grade re-petition and drop-out illustrate clearly its inadequacies where internal effectiveness is concerned.

Table 4.1. Rates of grade promotion, grade repetition and drop-out

CI CP CE1 CE2 CM1 CM2

Grade promotion 86.5% 82.7% 80.8% 80.2% 75.7% 31.7%

Repetition 1.9% 8.5% 10.4% 12% 14.6% 37.5%

Drop-out 11.6% 8.8% 8.8% 7.8% 9.7% 30.8%

Source: Inné, 1975

It can be seen here that the schooling situation of one cohort is particularly critical at the end of the cycle, with a grade promo-tion rate of 31.7%.


Where external effectiveness is concerned, the educational sys-tem continues to be an ineffective instrument for combating un-derdevelopment.

This is so because instead of the imaginative reflection that it should be developing, “it cultivates a negative attitude in young people in school where productive and manual work is concerned, and reinforces social prejudices against occupations in the key sec-tors of the national economy: agriculture, livestock farming and craft work” ( Niger, 1975). And lastly, and this is the aspect that seems most important here, such education, taught in a foreign language, confirms the break with the student’s personal envi-ronment of which it denies the psychological parameters for de-velopment.

How could it be otherwise given that we know that language and culture are intimately linked and consequently inseparable?

How can children attach value to their culture when they receive their education in a language that is not their own?

How can children enrich their technical and scientific knowledge through a language that they have not fully mastered?

Surely the above questions go to the heart of the issues surroun-ding bilingual education?

Teaching materialsThe unsuitability of syllabus content and teaching methods and their failure to match the level of training of the teachers have been aggravated by the absence of any national policy on teachi-ng materials. This lack of policy has had the following conse-quences: • It has restricted any initiatives for the design and production

of teaching materials.• It has encouraged the distribution and massive use of teaching

aids produced elsewhere.• It has thus fostered a feeling that national organisations lack

the capacity to take charge of curriculum development and


teaching methods as well as the design and production of the materials that provide a vehicle for them.

Teacher trainingTraining was still conducted along the lines of the 1949 curricula, of which certain teaching practices have continued to present serious obstacles to the personal development of children. One example of this is the use of the “symbole”. The “symbole” is an object passed to any pupil daring to speak in their mother ton-gue. A pupil who receives this object is severely punished.

5. The goals assigned To bilingual educaTion 29

5. The goals assigned to bilingual education

Addressing the dysfunctionalities of the educational system in place, the policy memorandum of 1974 laid the foundations for the building of a new school system that would be democratic and aimed essentially at fostering the personal development of individual Nigeriens in school through the teaching of their cultural values. To that end, the 1975 reform project itself des-cribed the broad lines of the new system in the form of the goals set out below.

The general goals of bilingual educationThe 1975 reform project, one of the major innovations of which was bilingual teaching, assigns the following goals to schools:• To drive economic, social and cultural development;• To foster the development of children’s intelligence by constant

reference to their environment and individual personalities;• To turn out people who are responsible, capable of initiative

and able to contribute effectively to the local community and to the nation.

The specific goals of bilingual educationIt must respond to two concerns:• At the psychoaffective level: to avoid creating mental blocks in

pupils by means of teaching in national languages in order to ensure that “school should no longer be foreign to pupils, but a place in which they can fulfil themselves with a view to their har-monious integration into society” as is indicated by the metho-dology of teaching in national languages (Niger, 1981);

• At the pedagogical level: to reduce the incidence of academic failure by means of a more flexible and surer progression that leads pupils to invest consciously in the learning process.


In this way, from the standpoint of this reform, the following specific goals have been defined for bilingual education:• To revise curriculum content and teaching methods;• To introduce technology and productive, practical activities

into the curriculum;• To use national languages as vehicles for teaching and as time-

table subjects, alternating with French;• To revise the structures and practicalities of teacher training;• To focus and energise research in order to embed bilingual

education;• To produce teaching aids suitable for bilingual education.

6. sTraTegies for achieving The goals 31

6. Strategies for achieving the goals

The strategies described below have been applied in order to achieve the goals thus assigned. These relate to four areas: teaching, legislation, finance and evaluation.

Pedagogical strategies This strategy covers curriculum, teaching staff and school ma-nuals.

The curriculum At the time when the first experimental bilingual schools were set up (1973-1976), conventional monolingual French-language schools were using the curricula of 1949, which were unsuitable in any event. In those curricula, the view was taken that “the existence of vernacular languages is a serious obstacle to the lear-ning of French” whereas today there is general agreement that the best educational strategy cannot afford to dispense with the child’s mother tongue.

It should be borne in mind that the first bilingual schools be-gan to operate without any curriculum. However, bodies such as INDRAP, SP-CNRE/PS, the University of Niamey and teacher training colleges were mobilised to resolve two related problems: the issue of the internal innovations required by the use of French and national languages as teaching media and timetable subjects, and the issue of the unsuitability of existing curricula.

On the basis of critical analysis and evaluation of the older curricula, these bodies conducted research/action programmes with the aim of arriving at a curricular model “intended above all to be pragmatic and educational”, as the Ministry document stated in 1988. How were these curricula developed?


Teams were then set up for each discipline. They had the neces-sary documentation to hand, and this was updated if required. They were then trained in curriculum evaluation and develop-ment. Lastly, these teams created basic curriculum units on the basis of a project for a body of content previously defined by targets for each level. In this way, in the years 1985 to 1987, the teams worked on the design, development and experimental tes-ting of curriculum components linked to the body of the subject content. This was later formalised and validated in 1988 as the official national curriculum.

The teaching is dispensed according to the weekly timetables shown in the table below. In the first year, teaching is entirely in a national language (100%). The teaching of French as a time-table subject starts in the third term of the second year, orally. The national language continues to be a timetable subject and a teaching discipline from the first to the fourth year. French, which is gradually consolidated from the second to the fourth year, becomes teaching discipline and taught subject in the fifth and sixth years.

Table 6.1. Bilingual education disciplines and times

Disciplines 1st year

2nd year

3rd year

4th year

5-6th year

National languagesFrenchPPAHistoryCMIGeographyMathematicsPhysical sciencesNatural sciencesPEArt-Sociocultural activitiesRecreation

13.5 hrs-

4.5 hrs-

30 min-

5 hrs--

2 hrs2 hrs

2.5 hrs

11 hrs3 hrs4 hrs

-30 min

-5 hrs

--

2 hrs2 hrs

2.5 hrs

5 hrs6 hrs

3.25 hrs1 hour45 min1 hour

5 hrs1.5 hrs

2 hrs2 hrs

2.5 hrs

3 hrs8 hrs3 hrs

1 hour1 hour1 hour

5 hrs1.5 hrs

2 hrs2 hrs

2.5 hrs

3.5 hrs6 hrs

3.5 hrs1 hour1 hour1 hour

5 hrs2 hrs

2 hrs2 hrs

2.5 hrs

Total30

hours30

hours30

hours30

hours30

hours


Diagram 6.1. The bilingual education model thus described can be represented as follows in diagrammatic form:

1 2 3 4 5 6

National languagesFrench

It can be seen here that the timetable space taken up by national languages, which are substantially predominant in the first four years, shrinks dramatically in the fifth and sixth years. This phe-nomenon can be explained by the fact that training in national languages is not included in graduation examinations.

Teaching staffBilingual teaching in the experimental schools requires high-quality teaching staff. Recruitment and training strategies have been implemented to ensure that this is the case.

RecruitmentTeachers are selected by the inspectorates on the basis of a num-ber of criteria. Candidates for bilingual teaching must be moti-vated and meet the following profile:• Perfect oral mastery of the mother or first language.• A degree of mastery of the official language (French).• Five or six years’ experience of teaching in monolingual

French-language schools.• Classroom leadership skills and an ability to work as a mem-

ber of a team.

Training• For the initial training in primary teacher training colleges, the

programme includes two hours’ national languages each week


(cf. teacher training college curriculum). Training involves learning how to transcribe the national language, mastery of the grammar, reading, and text composition.

• For further training, teachers attend courses of variable dura-tion in applied linguistics and bilingual teaching methodology.

Table 6.2. Teacher training content Discipline Goal Content Required documentationGeneral structure of the teaching language.

To introduce student teachers to the structure of the national teaching language.

- The different sentence types. - The principal grammatical categories. - Practical exercises.

-Specialist glossaries for 3rd year grammar in the five teaching languages. - Existing grammar manuals. - Existing dictionaries.

Correct writing and fluent reading in the mother tongue used in teaching.

To lead the student teachers to read and write the mother tongue correctly.

- Official decrees laying down spelling rules for the national languages used in teaching. - Reading of a variety of texts. - Exercises and spelling correction. - Routine reading exercises. - Text composition (writing).

- Reading text projects.- Various texts for reading. - Various official decrees laying down spelling rules.

General methodology

To introduce the student teachers to the principles and methods governing experimental teaching.

- Methodology fundamentals. - Formal tools for the methodology. - Pedagogical approaches.

A method-ological guide to teaching in the national languages.

Teaching in the mother tongue.

To introduce the student teachers to teaching theory for the mother tongue.

- Pedagogical issues. -Structuring (presentation of the various relevant disciplines). - Pedagogical approaches.

Preparatory document.

Mathematics - To train the student teachers in the issues surrounding the teaching of mathematics.- To introduce the student teachers to the use of new teaching materials for mathematics in national languages.

- Arithmetic.- Geometry. - Measurement. - Logic and reasoning.

- Primary school teacher’s guide (1st and 2nd years). - Pupil’s exercise book (1st year). - Specialist mathematics glossaries.


Environment studies

- To train the student teachers in the issues surrounding environment studies and subsequently in the methodology of the teaching of French as a second language.

- Pedagogical issues.- Structuring (presentation of the various relevant disciplines). - Content and approach.

French - To introduce the student teachers to the issues relevant to and subsequently the methodology of the teaching of French as a second language.

- Relevant issues. - Pedagogical approaches.- Contents and institutional provisions.

- CI (First year) language guide.- CP (Second year) language guide.- Reading and writing in the first year (CI);- Reading and writing in the second year (CP).

Practical and productive activities and family economicsEvaluation - To introduce the

student teachers to the definition of the key concepts for evaluation methods.- To train the student teachers in different evaluation methods.- To introduce the student teachers to the evaluation of a learning class.

- Teaching methods. - Type of teaching according to class level. - Practical exercises. - Learning about the methods of docimology.

Language Dictionary and evaluation dictionary.

Physical Education PE).

-Sociocultural goals (traditional and modern PE). - Preventive and curative biological goals. - Educational goals: improvement of motor control, affective and cognitive dimensions, aspects complementary to other disciplines such as mathematics.

- Athletic games. - Team games. - Oppositional and cooperative games. - Games for developing bodily expression.- Games of orientation.

-Collection of games for PE sessions in first and second primary years (CI and CP).

Three approaches to training were trialled over the period 1978 to 1988.

In 1978, a training course lasting nine months was organised for eleven teachers at the CFCA, the literacy programme leader trai-ning centre (Centre de formation des cadres de l’alphabétisation).


On completion of this training the teachers were promoted from deputy primary school teachers to full primary school teachers.

The training includes theory classes and periods of practical ex-perience in experimental schools.

From 1979 to 1988, approximately 180 teachers with five (5) à six (6) years’ teaching experience in monolingual French-language schools were trained. This training lasted three months:• One (1) month of practice in experimental schools.• Two (2) months of theory at INDRAP and SP-CNRE/PS on

applied linguistics, general bilingual teaching methodology, pedagogical theory for the various disciplines and the use of the new teaching aids and new terminology.

The third approach focuses on the monitoring of the teachers in the schools:• Local monitoring provided by the directors of the schools and

the educational advisers;• Supervision and pedagogical leadership tasks undertaken by

teams of teacher trainers.• During the summer holidays, gatherings for top-up training

and retraining organised for teachers in experimental schools.

In addition to these training courses and retraining sessions, tea-chers in nearby schools within a radius of five kilometres orga-nise professional development days.

For distance teaching, special programmes are broadcast by the “Voix de l’enseignement” for teachers in experimental bilingual schools.

The school manualWhen these trials began, bilingual education needed to address a major problem, the non-existence of teaching aids in general, and manuals in particular. Various strategies were developed in order to deal with this issue:• The development of an integrative methodology founded on

integration of the school into its surrounding environment,


active participation of the learner at all levels in the learning process, integration of school disciplines, and collective pro-duction of texts to be used as teaching materials in the various subjects, especially for reading activities. The various texts are posted up on the walls of the classrooms or compiled with a view either to encouraging the pupils to write or for subse-quent use in teaching. Also worth mentioning is the school journal produced by the pupils.

• The collection and transcription of oral texts in order to create books for reading: a body of texts from the oral tradition has been built up, enabling the first reading manuals to be deve-loped in three volumes in each of the five national languages used in bilingual teaching up until that point. Each volume was printed in three thousand copies to meet immediate needs and to form a stock in anticipation of the creation of addi-tional classes. These books were designed to include the rudi-ments of teaching aids.

This trial encouraged UNESCO in 1985, and the World Bank, as part of the Sectoral Basic Education Project, PROSEF, in 1990, to organise the first training courses in school manual development for key Nigerien staff. Despite this training, the beneficiaries of these courses were confronted with three categories of problem: • What should the content be and what is the right pedagogical

approach ? What skills should be developed in the child at the various levels of schooling?

• What type of teaching material should be developed, at least for the first educational levels (Guides? Pupil’s manuals?)

• What linguistic tools should be used: Which dialectal variant? What level of language? What terminology? And so on.

Where terminology is concerned, one of the goals was to har-monise usage for all schools using the same language. Generally speaking, the preferred terminology was that supported by a consensus during the national workshop on this topic.


To address these issues, which were often methodological in cha-racter, the German foundation for international development (DSE) provided technical and financial support in a system of training/action on publishing for the following countries in the sub-region: Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. A Level II reading book was produced and published.

At the present time, school book production has two main fo-cuses:• Reinforcement of national publishing capabilities with a view

to significant development of the literate environment across national territory as a whole.

• Implementation of specific publishing programmes for IN-DRAP, DREPLN and 2PEB for the publication of books and guides in mathematics, pedagogical dictionaries and spelling dictionaries for reference.

And finally, in connection with the regional context, Niger has generally been present at the various regional and international gatherings devoted to linguistic issues. Niger has also taken part in a range of linguistic projects and programmes developed with certain international partners such as the Agency for Cultural and Technical Cooperation (ACCT), UNESCO, BREDA, GTZ, among others, whose experimentation in the area of linguistic cooperation in schools has been widely used to further institu-tional development conducive to the emergence of a new type of bilingual school. As an example of this, the linguistic coope-ration projects in the 1980s initiated by ACCT, (DIMO, LEXIS, DELAN, etc.) made possible the production of a monolingual Zarma dictionary and a bilingual dictionary in that same lan-guage. UNESCO also funded the coproduction of reading texts in Hausa and Fulfulde for countries in the West African sub-region.

Legislative strategiesLegislation on language is a recent concern in Niger. During the first two decades after independence, language issues, and essen-


tially their practical aspects, were dealt with by the literacy de-partment alone. For example, given the need to produce reading materials for adults in literacy programmes, in 1967 the Ministry of Education issued an official decree defining the alphabets of the Fulfulde, Hausa, Kanuri, Tamajaq and Zarma languages (decree ref. 017/MEN/ALPHA of 27 April 1967).

Since that time, the scope of national language use has ex-panded, with responses frequently being limited to the sources of requests, these being educational and training bodies, the me-dia in general, communication in the sectors of health, justice, agricultural advisory services, and so on. Indeed, it was in the 1970s that the majority of the language development bodies in Niger were set up: • The Linguistics Department at Niamey University; • CFCA – Literacy programme leader training centre;• The National Languages Department at INDRAP;• GEPLN – the study group for the promotion of national lan-

guages;• SPCNRE – the permanent secretariat of the national commis-

sion for educational reform; etc.

Encouraged by the completed projects and practical achieve-ments of these bodies and the provisions contained in the Na-tional Charter of 1988, the Constitution of 1989 stipulates in Article 6 : “The national languages are the following: Arabic, Ful-fulde, Gulmancema, Hausa, Kanuri, Songhai-Zarma, Tamajaq and Tubu. The official language is French”.

The National Sovereign Conference issued the second official edict recognising and granting national status to ten languages: Arabic, Fulfulde, Hausa, Buduma, Gulmancema, Kanuri, Son-ghai-Zarma, Tamajaq, Tasawaq and Tubu. (cf. Edict no. 23 of the National Sovereign Conference).

Following on from the above, the 1992 Constitution stipulates in Article 3 that “All communities comprising the nation of Niger shall enjoy the freedom of using their own languages in respect to


each other. The law shall lay down the manner in which the na-tional languages shall be promoted and given official status. The official language shall be French”.

Where the 1999 Constitution is concerned, this provides as fol-lows: “All communities comprising the nation of Niger shall enjoy the freedom of using their own languages in respect to each other. These languages shall have equal status as national languages. The law shall determine methods of promoting and of formalising the national language. The official language shall be French”

What transpires from all these official provisions is that the constitutionality of the national languages is undoubtedly a fact, but the other aspect, the most significant, is the bilingual dimen-sion of that constitutionality, in that it recognises the French lan-guage as having official status. Given this, the school system can but derive inspiration from it. Indeed, Law 98-12 of 1 June 1998 on the policy focuses of Niger’s educational system stipulates in Article 10 that: “the languages of teaching shall be French and the national languages. Other languages may be present as subjects taught in schools and universities”. That same law, 98-12, confers upon mother tongues and first languages the status of teaching languages in basic cycle 1 and French as a taught subject in that cycle (cf. Article 19).

The latter provision, which formalises for the first time the use of the national languages in the school context, logically creates a new type of bilingual school, trying out an educational model that differs from that of 1972. But it is impossible for this new bilingual schooling to achieve its goals other than within a natio-nal and regional environment conducive to it.

On 31 December 2001, Law 2001-037 was promulgated with regard to the national context, and with reference to the 1999 Constitution. This law, which lays down the principles and prac-ticalities of the promotion and development of the national lan-guages, offers a suitable framework for adding value to languages in various sectors, this being a necessary precondition for the


development of bilingualism that is promotional, balanced and additional to schooling: optimum use of the national languages by the media, development partnerships and higher education establishments will create an environment highly favourable to the promotion and development of the national languages. This situation will have the effect of generating a new perception of language and its use in schools, leading to a better understanding by children of the content of courses in both their mother ton-gues and French.

External strategies Such strategies relate to infrastructures, equipment, manuals, supplies, payroll costs and financing. Central government has defined a policy to meet the expenditure requirements under all these headings. A funding envelope has been earmarked in the investment and operating budget.

Development partners have also been asked to provide financial support. One can point here to the Niger/USAID project phases I and II which has provided funding for the production of the first reading manuals in five national languages (1980-1983), teaching guides and the pupil’s mathematics manual for the first two years of schooling.

However, Law 98-12 opted for the sharing of costs between cen-tral government, local authorities, families and all concerned private individuals and legal entities, as is stipulated by Article 60 of the law on policy focuses for the educational system: “The funding for teaching and training in public establishments shall be provided by central government, local authorities, families and all other private individuals and legal entities”.

The practicalities of each partner’s contribution are to be defined by regulations.

The costs are allocated as follows: • Central government: infrastructure, equipment, manuals and


supplies, teacher training, payroll costs, research, logistics, scholarships.

• Local authorities: infrastructure, equipment, supplies, payroll costs, scholarships, maintenance, electricity, water, telephone.

• Families: supplies, school cleaning.• Development partners: infrastructure, equipment, teacher

training, scholarships, research, logistics.• Companies: training, research, scholarships, professional im-

provement and top-up training.• Others: private individuals, legal entities – donations and

bequests.

Evaluation strategies The organisations managing the bilingual education experiment begun in 1973 felt it necessary to evaluate this form of teaching in order to demonstrate its worth. For that purpose, three types of approach have been applied:• An internal approach: illustrated by the evaluations of 1982

and 1998 carried out by multidisciplinary teams. Where the 1998 evaluation is concerned, the team benefited from finan-cial support provided by the GTZ through the Basic Educa-tion/ Promotion of bilingual education project (2PEB).

• An external approach using outside expertise. This was the 1985 evaluation, for which Niger requested UNESCO exper-tise in order to gain an external view of teaching in the natio-nal languages and school learning processes.

• A research-based approach, in the 1987 evaluation conducted as part of the activities of the psychology department of Nia-mey University and focused on precisely defined aspects. This involved intelligence tests relating to the acquisition of ideas underlying the conservation of pearls, liquids, substances, weight and volume.

In all three cases, the aim was to conduct a comparative study of academic achievement in the two systems. The outcomes of these evaluations are described in the next chapter.

7. The resulTs obTained 43

7. The Results obtained

Below are listed the results obtained by a system of bilingual education at the end of its first three decades (1972-1997), thanks to the effort made to mobilize those actors concerned with its implementation:

Regarding the linguistical and pedagogical research• Five of the ten national languages have been subjected to des-

criptivism so that they could be used as the language of edu-cation; they are Fulfulde, Hausa, Kanuri, Songai-Zarma and Tamajaq.

• Various doctoral theses and dissertations for a master’s degree have been written in these languages, as well as works on their popularization. (cf. Hamidil, 1996)

• Specialized lexicons, grammar reference textbooks, and tea-chers’ grammar textbooks, as well as reading and arithmatic books have been written in these languages. Three collections of reading books and two language dictionaries have already been published; ten other dictionaries (five reference dictiona-ries dealing with spelling and five teachers’ dictionaries) are being prepared, and arithmatic textbooks for the first and se-cond year are at present being published.

• A methodology of the Study of the Environment (integrated approach) has been developed and is used as a framework for the teaching and learning pedagogical approaches, and va-rious guides and documents are available. In 1988, for the first time, programmes specifically aimed at bilingual teaching were adopted.

With regard to school attendance and the availability of the teaching personnel• During this period, nearly 30,000 pupils took a bilingual

course in these schools, given by some 422 teachers trained in


the new teaching methodology. The evaluation results at the end of the cycle have been most satisfactory (see Point 8: qua-lity evaluation). The experience was carried out throughout the entire national territory with 42 various types of rural and urban schools having been established.

• The parents’ attitude was generally positive. According to UNESCO’s 1985 evaluation report, the following was noted: «the most important aspects of the new school are the practical and productive activities. These activities allow children to ma-nage their own work».

• Another aspect which is often emphasized is the capacity of children in experimental schools to become more easily inte-grated into active life; later on, such pupils are more responsible and demonstrate a higher level of self-discipline (Raymaekers, Erik, et al, 1985).

• The 1998 evaluation emphasizes that the characteristics and advantages of the experimental schools’ aproach influence the parents’ attitudes as shown the following table:

Table 7.1. Appreciation of the use of national languagesItem ES* TS** Signif.School results worse than in traditional schools NL schools offer third-rate educationNL already known by children; no need to teach it NL in school incurs problems regarding disciplineNL in school facilitates understanding of the lessonInstead of the NLs, use Arab in order to read Koran

- 0.31- 0.81- 1.37-1.081.78

- 0.24

0.54- 0.23- 0.84- 0.55

1.470.26

0.0000.0010.0010.0030.0040.008

The child learns much more easily in the NLChildren can start in French «type of school»Not useful, lack of reading materialExpression of national sovreigntyThe child learns to appreciate his/her own cultureFavorizes development of a balanced personalityNL in school allows children to talk more freelyNL in the school is too difficult for the teacherNo country develops in a foreign language

1.77- 0.09- 1.19

1.751.841.761.81

- 0.541.08

1.490.42

- 0.851.501.631.521.60

- 0.180.70

0.0100.0100.0180.0180.0230.0240.0260.0280.032

NL in school stimulates early learningMore time given to French, the quicker it is learntNL at school stimulates the development of NLsNL at school hampers the opening onto the worldTeaching in the NL is to the detriment of French

1.760.821.70

- 1.06- 0.54

1.541.111.49

- 0.73- 0.24

0.0490.0530.0600.0650.069

7. The resulTs obTained 45

It is too expensiveNL in school jeopardizes France’s supportNL reconciles the child to his/her environmentIt endangers national unityNL in school complicates the learning of FrenchNL teaching reduces the number of failuresFrench is needed to obtain employmentNL in school is favourable to the success of girls

0.030.171.81

- 0.59- 0.46

1.040.620.97

0.230.381.74

- 0.45- 0.35

0.960.520.93

0.2380.2470.4230.4550.5120.5920.6140.784

*ES = Experimental Schools; ** TS = Traditional Schools

With regard to linguistic policy and lawA harmonization plan relating to linguistic usage has been deve-loped and texts have been adopted on the harmonization of the spelling of the above-mentioned languages. A law containing the principles and details of the implementation with regards to the use of national languages in education has been promulga-ted, and a plan regarding the extension of bilingual teaching has been developed.

8. QualiTy evaluaTion 47

8. Quality evaluation

Bilingual education was chosen due to the identity crisis of the existing school. In order to reinforce convictions or dissipate reservations, the Minister of Education needs to be able to com-pare the performance of the experimental bilingual school com-pared to the unilingual French-language school. That is why, during the two phases of experimentatiion, various evaluations have been undertaken in order to assess the results obtained.

The first phase of bilingual education covered the period 1972 to 1998, date of the promulgation of the Law 98-12. The experi-ment was undertaken on the basis of a model of alternate usage of two languages as follows:• from the first to the fourth year, the mother tongue is the lan-

guage used for teaching, and, as from the 3rd trimester of the first year, the French language becomes a subject matter;

• as from the fifth year, the mother tongue becomes a subject matter, and the French language is used for teaching.

The successive evaluations undertaken in 1982, 1985, 1997 and 1998 were established on the basis of the principle that the bi-lingual school take the opposite course from the negative image formed by the unilingual school both with regard to its mitigated acceptance and to its internal and external output.

The 1982 evaluationIt was undertaken by a national team, which, on the basis of a battery of tests, compared the results of the experimental scho-ol of Zinder with those of two traditional schools in the same town. The pupils of the experimental school had better results from all points of view in comparison to the unilingual schools in French. A film was made within the framework of this evalua-tion showing, moreover, the difference in behaviour or attitude of the pupils and of the teachers in both systems.


The 1985 evaluationIt was undertaken by a team of UNESCO experts according to the following terms of reference:• Undertake a comparative study of the initial project of both

the reform of education and of its experimentation;• Study the implementation of the experiment and review and

sum up the results obtained;• Decide on the applicability or not of the initial project, ta-

king into account the results obtained and the economical and social environment of the country, drawing up recommenda-tions with regard to the reform that has been undertaken.

The items to evaluate

a. to continue studies at the level of secondary education• the level of comprehension of the pupils in the experimental

classes is at least equivalent to that of the traditional classes at the end of only 4 years of French, but with, in addition, the ability to master a national language;

• the social origin of the pupils has not constituted an obstable to succeeding at school;

• the success in the CFEPD (end of primary school certificate) in French is always higher than the national average: 60 to 75% against 20 to 25% for the period covering 1980 to 1985;

• the level of repetition varies between 2 and 3% in experimental education, when it varies between 18 (in the CP – age 6-7) and 38.3% (CM2 – age 10-11) in the traditional schools;

• It also appears that dropouts are clearly fewer in the experi-mental schools, where the learning environment is less res-trictive than in the traditional schools: the pupil/teacher re-lationships are more natural, thus more favourable towards learning in the first instance, and the language in which the children learn is an important factor in this improvement.

These data indicate that a future for this new school can be se-riously considered.


b. being initiated into the socio-economical life of the countryParticular attention has been given to this objective which is of capital importance. Actually, the limited possibilities of em-ployment in the structured sectors have led to the orientation of training towards the creation of autonomous and endogenous employment and production.

In the experimental schools, it has been the practice to privilege activities which are the least commercial to the detriment of those which are more profitable. These activities of a conventio-nal type aim, above all, at helping the child to acquire a certain level of dexterity and, more generally, manual skills. They also enable contact to be made with the subject matter and favourize the acquirement of a taste for the work.

The evaluation, however, has shown that the conditions regar-ding the attainment of this objective are not satisfactory. It has been noted that:• on an economic level as well as on a national scale, the idea

of practical and productive activities (APP) in the education system does not appear in any development plan, in spite of the rôle that these activities could play in the promotion of the craft industry in Niger.

• on a teaching level, the optimization of the quality of educa-tion integrating practical and productive activities has remai-ned an objective to be attained. It has been noted that some of these APPs of a conventional type are questionable with regard to their educational value; the educational value of the essence of such activities has been underrated both as a vector of learning and of economic development; there are insuffi-cient pedagogical aids available and trainers trained.

c. being literate in the national language and in FrenchThe evaluators did not explicitly reply to this question; however, the following comments show that the children are literate in na-tional languages and in French:


«The methodology is centered on the environmental study; the reading texts are developed on the basis of research un-dertaken in the cultural environment in which the pupils live, the texts are then structured by the pupils under the direction of the teacher. The pupils learn to read the texts developed in the classroom and not in a reading textbook.

When the teachers are asked their opinion, they emphasize that the children find it easier to express themselves, to learn to read and write, and are more creative than other children of the equivalent age-group and level of education. With re-gard to learning difficulties, the teachers remarked that when the mother tongue is replaced by French, the most frequent problems occur in writing, pronunciation and comprehen-sion.» (Salonilde, 1985).

Furthermore, Raymaekers (1985) explained that:«The child who is literate in the national language as from the age of 7-8 (CE1) sees its progressively dimishing si-gnificance and thus the results of his/her own efforts in the French language. In addition, the admission exam to secon-dary education does not contain questons on the national languages».

d. Difficulties encountered in the implementation of the experi-mentationThe evaluators turned their attention above all to the difficulties of an institutional kind such as:• the fact that the acquisitions in national languages and in

practical and productive activities (APP) are not validated by the end of a primary studies certificate (the CFEPD);

• the 9-year cycle recommended by the 1975 reform project has still not been applied;

• the teachers in the experimental classes are insufficiently trai-ned in management;

• at the end of the primary cycle there is a lack of the structures necessary for the reception of pupils.


In their recommendations, the UNESCO consultants, after ha-ving drawn their conclusions on the stronger points of the new educational system, the areas which needed reinforcement, and the bottleneck situations, encouraged the continuation of the ac-tion undertaken and even its expansion.

The 1987 evaluationThis was a study on the influence of the three educational sys-tems (traditional, experimental, Medersas) on the development of the intelligence of Nigerian children. On the basis of Piaget’s theories, the author of the study, Mr Ismaël Yenikoye, professor and researcher at the University of Abdou Moumouni in Nia-mey demonstrated that the individual pupils in the experimental schools, aged from 7 to 12, succeeded much better than those of the (Franco-Arab) Medersa and traditional schools in the in-tellence tests covering their knowledge of preservation. These results reinforce the theory of the positive rôle played by the new teaching/learning methods in the improvement of the learner’s cognitive function as regards language

The 1998 evaluationWhen the above-mentioned results were made available, the Mi-nistry of National Education, with the support of the German cooperation, proceeded, in 1998, to make a comparative evalua-tion of bilingual experimental education covering 18 Experimen-tal Schools and 18 Traditional Schools. The tests on cognitive skills, drawn up in French and in the national languages, were given to the 1,664 pupils in the two systems The levels of achie-vement at this level appear in Table 8.1. and they show that:• Achievement in reading in the experimental system is better

than in the traditional schools in all the classes, even when the texts are in French.

• In the 8-9 age group (CE2), the pupils in the traditional scho-ols read the national language in the same way as they read French.


• The totals in arithmatic are, in both types of school, always higher in the version of the test which is in the national lan-guage. As the two versions of the tests (in French and in the national language) are identical, this shows the effect of the language, which, in this case, leads to a systematic underesti-mation of the existing skills in arithmatic.

• The average scores in the experimental schools in arithmatic are higher in each of the three classes. This shows that the pupils learn better in the experimental schools.

• Generally, the differences are more pronounced at the 8-9 age-group level (CE2); this is less clear-cut in the 10-11 age-group level (CM2).

Table 8.1. Results obtained in the tests in the experimental schools and in the traditional schools

Version of test Subject Level*** ES* TS**In French Language (total) CE2 6.8 5.6

Language (total) CM1 10.1 9.4CM2 12.8 14.0

In the national language CE2 14.2 5.2Langage (total) CM1 13.3 7

CM2 14.7 9.9In French CE2 4.8 2.7

CM1 5.7 4.5CM2 6.4 6

In the national language S/Total Reading CE2 5.9 2.6CM1 6.2 3.3CM2 6.3 4.0

In French Arithmatic CE2 5.7 5.8In the national language CE2 7.8 7.0In French CM1 6.8 8.5In the national language CM1 9.8 9.2In French CM2 2.9 2.9In the national language CM2 4.3 3.5

*ES = Experimental Schools; ** TS = Traditional Schools*** Grade Abbreviation Age Cours préparatoire CP / 11ème 6 -> 7Cours élémentaire première année CE1 / 10ème 7 -> 8Cours élémentaire deuxième année CE2 / 9ème 8 -> 9Cours moyen première année CM1 / 8ème 9 -> 10Cours moyen deuxième année CM2 / 7ème 10 -> 11

9. financing and cosTs 53

9. Financing and costs

Bilingual education in Niger has evolved according to two types of financing: the internal financing by the State by means of the national budget, and external financing by certain development partners within the framework of their cooperation with the na-tional structures and institutions.

The internal financing within the framework of the national budgetDuring the last twenty years, the following table shows that the portion of the budget given over to education has varied between 20 and 12% of the national budget.

Table 9.1. Share of the budget and education within the budget

1980 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995

Education budget 17,916 20,354 25,075 17,851 24,376 26,776

National budget 115,176 109,610 125,900 121,600 166,800 163,718

% education budget/national budget 15.56 % 18.57 % 19.92 % 14.68 % 14.61 % 16.35 %

1996 1997 1998 1999 2000

Education budget 26,387 24,848 25,037 25,756 26,435

National budget 173,942 194,405 204,031 205,909 217,282

% education budget/national budget 15.17 % 12.78 % 12.27 % 12.51 % 12.16 %

Source: DAF/MEBA

About 80% of this budget goes towards the salaries of the per-sonnel, 16% towards teaching supplies and material, and 4%3 to the operating costs. The infrastuctures represent a smaller part

3. Corrected by the editor


within the budget put aside for investments, as they are of inte-rest to the development partners.

With regard to the first element mentioned above, the costs of the salaries of the bilingual teaching personnel as of those for the teaching materials and for the infrastructures are essentially covered by the internal effort of the State. The 252 teachers in bilingual education only represent an infinite proportion of the totality of the active teaching personnel (2.1% of the 12,000 tea-chers). Amongst the teaching materials, it should be noted that there are ordinary school supplies which are the same as those used by the established unilingual schools. Activities regarding linguistic and pedagogical research, the production of teaching aids, the training of the teaching personnel, and the follow-up-evaluations are carried out by the SP-CNRE, the INDRAP, and the Linguistic Department of the University of Niamey.

The external financing within the framework of international cooperationThis part concerns linguist research, the production of teaching material, the training of the teaching personnel, the follow-up-evaluations and the supervision of the experiment, which is car-ried out within the specialized departments/units set up by the Ministry of Education through the specific forms of cooperation established with certain partners.

Thus from 1979 to 1998, the following sectors of activity benefi-ted from the lines of financing by the following bi- or mulilateral cooperations:• The training of the teaching personnel was financed by the

USAID, the UNDP and UNESCO, the Swiss Cooperation, within the framework of the CFCA, the SNV, the German Cooperation and UNICEF.

• The production of teaching aids was supported by the USAID, the UNDP-UNESCO, the FED, the World Bank, the GTZ and the DSE.


• Pedagogical and linguistic research benefited from financing by the USAID, by the CELHTO/OAU, the Swiss cooperation, the ACCT of the International Linguistic Society, and by the GTZ.

• To these specific interventions have to be added the regio-nal projects of linguistic cooperation financed by UNESCO or by the Agency for Cultural and Technical Co-operation (ACCT).

• The follow-up-evaluation activities were undertaken thanks to a contribution from the national budget and to the interven-tions of UNESCO and the GTZ.

• The external partners’ interventions concerned the training of the teaching personnel and the production of teaching aids, which were considered by them to be priorities.

The analysis of the expendituresThe expenditures will be analyzed according to a general approach and according to the additional expenditures.

General approach regarding the expendituresIt is not easy, within the framework of the present study, to ob-tain all data that is relevant to the financing of the last three de-cades of bilingual education in Niger. However, we have tried to describe the annual inputs which need to be taken into account in the running of an average class.

Of particular interest is the teacher’s annual salary, the cost of the joint teaching material, textbooks and stationery for the pu-pils, the maintenance of the classrom, and expenses related to the interaction between the school-community within the fra-mework of the integrative methodology.


Table 9.2. Average costs of a teacher at mid-term of career and a class of 35 pupils

Teacher Salary A or B

Joint teaching material metrical

compendium chalk; teacher guidelines

Textbooks and school stationery for pupils

Mainten-ance and

interaction schools and community

Infrastructure and equip-

ment amorti-zement

Total annual cost

1st year A

86 000 x 12 = 1 032 000 F

15 000 F + 10 000 F + 10 000 F =

25 000 F

2000 F + 5000 F =

7 000 F

(1 032 000 F 25000) : 35 élèves + 7 000 F

= 37 200 F (+amortizement and equipment

costs)

1st year B

122 000 x 12 = 1464 000

25 000 F 7 000 F

(1 464 000 F + 25 000) : 35 pupils + 7000 F = 49 542 F

(+ am.)2nd year

A1032 000 F

Idem as in the First year

2nd year B

1464 000Idem as in the

First year

3rd year A

1032 000 27 000 F 10 000 F1 059 000 : 35 pupils : 35 pupils) + 10000 =

40 257 F (+am.)

3rd year B

1464 000 27 000 F 10 000 F(1491 000 : 35

pupils).+10 000 = 52 600 F (+ am.)

4th year A

1032 000 27 000 F 10 000 F idem

4th year B

1464 000 27 000 F 10 000 F idem

5th year A

1032 000 35 000 F 15 000 F(1 067 000 : 35

pupils) + 10 000 F = 45 485 F (+am.)

6th year B

1464 000 35 000 F 15 000 F(1 499 000 F : 35

pupils) + 15 000 F = 57 828 F (+am.)

This sample of the analysis shows that the costs can vary noti-ceably according to three parameters:• the grade of the teacher (teacher/deputy) and the degree of

use of the methodology at the same level;• the quantitative importance, particularly of the joint and indi-

vidual teaching materials, for each pupil according to the level (from the 1st to the 6th year).

With regard to this second point, it should be noted that when the teaching material is locally produced, the cost is less than when it is imported. But this gain is otherwise minimized to the extent that the pedagogical transfer from one (L1) to another language (L2) implies a duplication of certain of the pupils’ books.


The costs of maintenance and amortizement of the infrastruc-tures are not taken into account to the extent that they should be approximately the same as for the unilingual schools in French.

On the other hand, when one analyzes the results of the eva-luations of the two systems: that undertaken by the ministry in 1992, and that undertaken by Salonilde Ferrera Maria in 1985, with regard to their internal output, that is, admission into a higher class, repetitions and exclusions, the following can be ob-served (see Tables 9.3 and 9.4).

Table 9.3. Promotion, repetition and dropout rates in the ESs and the TSs

Promotion rates Repetition DropoutExperimental schools 99% 1% 0%Traditional schools 75.39% 15.98% 8.63%

On the basis of this observation and for the comparative tables of expenditures up to age 9 (CM) of the pupils , it can be said that the dropouts represent direct losses on the investments which have been made up to then for each pupil, and the re-petitions result in additional expenses or expenditures. In both cases, repetition and exclusion put a strain on the unit cost of the traditional system, whilst the unit cost of the experimental system remains stable.

Table 9.3 gives a representation of the internal output of the two systems for the year 1984. Table 9.4 shows, between 1980-81 and 1985-86, the same indicators of performance solely for the expe-rimental schools:

Table 9.4. Rate of success, repetition and dropout of the ESs between 1980 81 and 1985-86

Numbers Success rate Repetition Dropout80-81 129 125 97% 3 2% 1 1%81-82 205 197 96% 7 3% 1 1%82-83 310 100% 306 98% 4 2% 0 0%83-84 388 385 99% 3 1% 0 0%85-86 466 451 96% 12 3% 0 1%


The additional expendituresTeaching in national languages necessarily implied additional activities related to the mastering of the innovations that this produced. Teachers participating in the experiment had to be retrained or reoriented, which had supplemental effects not only on the unit costs but also on the quality of the teaching and the results obtained. The costs of the retraining sessions and those of its management, as well as the follow-up and evaluation of the schools, should not be lost from sight with regard to the general appreciation of the expenditures related to the implementation of bilingual teaching in Niger.

10. observaTions and recommendaTions 59

10. Observations and recommendations

In a general manner, the analysis of the results of the various evaluations of bilingual education in Niger allows us to conclude in an objective manner that this model significantly improves the quality of learning in school, and the following elements have been observed:• the potential of this type of education stands the test of time,

in spite of the diminished means available;• the various evaluations show that a child has a considerable

facility to learn in its mother tongue; • the political commitment which has come about through the

passing of the Law 98-12 with regard to the orientation of the Nigerian education system as well as through the Law 2001-037, fixing the methods of promotion and development of the national languages;

• the interest shown by certain donors by their support of this process;

• the adhesion of the communities to this type of education.

In spite of all these results, bilingual education needs new strate-gies and merits consolidation through accompanying measures. Therefore, it would be desirable:• to give further support to the defined policy; • to develop a book policy in liaison with the private sector;• to support the process of bilingual teaching by contributing

to the emergence of a written culture in the national language through:

- the production and distribution of books of a sufficient quantity and by

- the creation of a bilingual institutional environment; • the preparation of a realistic plan for the development of bi-

lingual education which should integrate: - the programming of retraining and reorienting the teachers;


- the programming of the research within a parnership framework;

- the preparation of a communication plan for the technical managers, the teachers, the pupils and their parents, as well as the political, traditional and academic authorities;

• to continue this process of preparation of texts for application in Law covering the orientation of the education system;

• to restore the cooperatives, the practical and productive acti-vities (APP) to construct better links between the school and everyday life.

In relation to the above-mentioned elements, Niger needs to re-ceive additional support in order to conduct the linguistic and pedagogical research necessary to bring about a substantial im-provement in its bilingual education programme.

11. conclusion 61

11. Conclusion

The experience which has been described only constitutes the first phase of the history of bilingual education in Niger. The second phase has just been entered into with the passing of the Law 98-12 covering the orientation of the Nigerian education system.

As it can be observed, implementing such an education system mobilized many ressources even before the creation of any insti-tutional or legislative mechanisms. Everything took place as if the organizing of education was first and foremost the work of those technicians and departments/units responsible for the pe-dagogical operation of the system before becoming the concern of the State, which holds the unique responsibility of deciding on the overall policies and orientations within the sector.

It is thus not astonishing that this phase of the Nigerian expe-rience in bilingual education has been both an entire yet hesitant procedure:• An entire procedure with regards to the fact that it concerned

the essential international and external actors of the school: the pupils, the teaching personnel, the administrators of the system, the communities, and the development partners, each one having expressed their thoughts on the feasibility and the reliability of this educative model. This experience has given those in the technical departments/units of education in Ni-ger the opportunity to perfect their pedagogical practice and to make significant advances in such domains as educational planning, programme develop-ment, publishing of school ma-nuals and textbooks in national languages and in the French language;

• A hesistant experience to the extent that, in spite of the practi-cal mechanisms set up in aid of its confirmation: for example, the mobilization of various departments/units dealing with its pedagogical and linguistic development, and the results of the


various evaluations, the legislative measures and its expansion fall well short of expectations.

In any case, as it has been emphasized in the Raemaykers report (1985), bilingual schools offer a solution to adopt in order to transform basic education into a useful tool for national deve-lopment.

12. bibliography 63

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African Experiences – Country Case Studies

ADEA’s African Experiences – Country Case Studies are intended to highlight promising experiences that are taking place on the African continent.

Identifying, analyzing and promoting successful experiences is an essential part of ADEA’s methodology and contribution to the de-velopment of education in Africa.

Based on this praxis-oriented approach, ADEA endeavors to find solutions in Africa to the challenges facing the development of the continent’s education systems. ADEA thus contributes to institu-tionalizing a culture of learning based on the critical analysis of ex-perience in order to promote future development.

To this end, ADEA systematically encourages the countries in Africa to document and share experiences that they consider successful.

The case studies are generally carried out by national teams in the African education ministries and concern a wide variety of subjects, including: experiments to expand access, to promote equity, to en-hance relevance, to improve management and the use of resources; strategies to scale up and sustain effective policies and practices; promising initiatives to fight HIV/AIDS and to improve the quality of education for all.

The series African Experiences – Country Case Studies draws on this wealth of experience to make available the best studies, those that are capable of providing inspiration to other countries as they seek to renovate and improve their educational systems.

ADEAA forum for policy dialogue about education in Africa

A network of professionals, practitioners and researchers in the field of education

A partnership between education ministries and development and cooperation agencies

A catalyst for educational reform

The Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA) has been in existence since 1988. Then called Donors to African Education (DEA), it was set up to promote discussion about educational policy in Africa and to establish a framework for better coordination among development agencies.

Since its foundation, ADEA has come to represent a genuine partnership between African education and training ministries in sub-Saharan Africa and their technical and external partners. It has also developed into a partnership of professionals, educa-tors and researchers, and, based on its capacity to foster policy dialogue, a catalyst for educational reform.

Policy dialogue takes place within programs and activities car-ried out by the ADEA Secretariat and the Working Groups. The Biennial Meetings organized by ADEA are events of the greatest importance for education in Africa. African ministerial conferences and ADEA Steering Committee seminars are also auspicious occasions for promoting regional policy dialogue and exchanges concerning the agenda for educational cooperation on the continent.

ADEA Working Groups also foster policy dialogue around edu-cational priorities that have been set by the African countries. There are currently eleven Working Groups, which focus on the following areas: education sector analysis, communication for education and development, early childhood development, non-

formal education, distance education and open learning, higher education, finance and education, books and learning materials, the teaching profession, education statistics, and the teaching of mathematics and science. Four ad hoc groups have been set up to explore concerns related to, HIV/AIDS, the quality of educa-tion, policy dialogue and post-primary education.

Among its other activities, ADEA encourages the sharing of African experience and know-how through its program of intra-African exchanges. The purpose of this program is to facilitate both study visits between countries and consultancy missions of African professionals sent to assist countries that request them. ADEA also provides support for national coordination of fun-ding agencies. Since 2001 it has held the Africa Education Jour-nalism Award to encourage the African press to cover education and thus promote public debates in this area.

ADEA is also a source of baseline information about education in Africa. It manages a number of databases on its activities, on external funding programs and projects, on educational statis-tics concerning Africa, and on African education specialists and professionals.

Finally, ADEA has a publications program which seeks to share the lessons of the Biennial Meetings and to highlight ongoing successful experiences in Africa. The Secretariat also publishes a quarterly Newsletter and a monthly Bulletin of Briefs.

For more information about ADEA please see its web site:www.adeanet.org