Ravel Notoavina is a 2018 Mandela Washington Fellow. He attended the Business and Entrepreneurship track at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana, USA. As a teacher and co-founder of Ayhay, a Montessori school in Antananarivo, he is convinced that quality education is the key to the country's development.
Notoavina is also the 2021 Falling Walls Lab Winner for Madagascar
You can connect with Ravel Notoavina on Facebook and on LinkedIn.
Education is a fundamental human right, a public good and the best possible investment to build a powerful human capital. Our world stands at a turning point as the pandemic and natural disasters exacerbated the quality of our education. We must seize this opportunity to rethink education as we are witnessing its change and transformation. Yes, we are living it now. It is never too late to start investing more in education. Now is the right time.
How did COVID and natural disasters affect our education in Madagascar? “My child's education level has gone worse since the school shut down,'' said a parent during the school year 2019-2020. Some schools have prepared a pandemic or natural disaster plan, but not all the schools in Madagascar. Education is now the most affected priority sector in the world, a dangerous path as without education, our country will not be able to fight against social inequalities and inequities. As we celebrate the fourth International Day of Education, we must stand up for the idea that “schools must be the first to open and the last to shut” (International Day of Education: Changing Course, Transforming Education webinar, Jan. 24 2022). But how? We want our loved ones to be safe and to be well-educated.
What are the practiced alternatives and its barriers? Schools have suffered from shut down and many extended breaks since 2020 without a clear solution from the Ministry of Education to tackle the school year disruption. Since then, school leaders and teachers have developed their creativity and resilience skills to tackle the disruptions made by the pandemic; some schools provided homework activities, some provided recorded lessons with exercises, and the privileged ones could take advantage of Learning Management Systems such as Google classrooms, Canvas and Moodle. Distance learning is for now the only way to cover the gap of non-in-person classes. But we are in Madagascar, a country with limited access to technology and limited access to the internet. Not all parents and students have an internet connection, computers and smartphones. Not all schools can afford technology in addition to the lack of good school infrastructure and teacher professional development. In-person classes are the best way to learn at school, but distance education covers the gap of non-in-person classes. Undoubtedly, students learn less through distance education but as it is indispensable, we must promote its access so that they are provided the right to education. We must invest more in the quality of education and reduce the inequalities in distance learning.
What’s the future of education? The new global report on the Futures of Education: Reimagining our futures together “A new social contract for education” was released In November 2021, by UNESCO. Here are three big questions that the report proposes: What should we continue doing? What should we abandon? What needs to be creatively reimagined? The questions are addressed to everyone and the answers will benefit the whole nation. One thing is clear: we need to make sure that education is inclusive, equitable and that all students are receiving a quality of learning. Education is a common good.
Recommendations:
To mark this International Day of Education, here are three recommendations:
The pandemic and natural disasters remind us that we are interconnected in many ways and must collaborate. We can only move forward to the transformation of education together, through solidarity and cooperation. Teachers need support so that they can build real connections with their students, help them achieve the highest levels, and offer real-time solutions to the obstacles they face in the classroom and at a distance. Parents need assistance and necessary resources to be in tune with the school’s program and values. Above all, students need encouragement to believe in themselves, develop their talents and reach their full potential. To rethink education, we need an education system that empowers the intelligence of humankind.
Reference: International Day of Education: Changing Course, Transforming Education UNESCO Webinar, Jan. 25 2022
Happy Education Day! The International Day of Education is celebrated on January 24 every year. It is important to celebrate since the role of education is to bring global peace and sustainable development around the world. Education is the foundation of development. It is the tool to eradicate poverty today and tomorrow. We must therefore harness our potentials to reduce the barriers to education in Madagascar and across Africa.
The country’s Education Sector Plan (ESP) for 2018–2022 seems bold and credible to improve quality (learning), access, and governance (World Bank Madagascar Basic Education Support Project (P160442). However, there are various barriers to education that we must tackle as soon as possible in Madagascar. More so than anything else, there is a vicious cycle that we must fight together: the lack of quality education is the root cause of poverty, and poverty is the primary barrier to education.
The Global Citizen Movement has released the top ten barriers of education, such as the decrease or lack of allocated budget or funding for education, the increase of untrained or lack of teachers, no classrooms and the lack of learning materials, the distance from home to school, the exclusion of children with disabilities, hunger and poor nutrition, political instability, and the cost of education.
Similarly, the National budget allocated to education in Madagascar has decreased to less than 15 percent and the national budget allocated to research has decreased to only 0,01 percent in 2017. About 80 percent of the teachers have no formal teacher training and public primary school teachers clearly lack pedagogical competences. Students learn more when the teacher has a higher level of education, including teacher training preparation. And 47 percent of children under 5 years in Madagascar develop insufficiently in the early years due to malnutrition and poor health as reported by the World Bank (Madagascar Basic Education Support Project (P160442).
Harnessing the potential of Education leaders in Madagascar is a great as way to tackle the barriers to education and implement innovations. As to that example, during the West Africa Regional Convening in June 11-12, 2019, the Mandela Washington Fellows 2018 (President Barack Obama’s YALI Flagship Program) joined forces by “Harnessing their potentials to reduce barriers to education across Africa” in Accra, Ghana. As a result, here is a summary of the initiatives taken by the Fellows:
We must train any existing teachers, especially primary ones, with leadership skills so that they will find effective solutions by themselves. The inclusion of civic leadership, public management and business and entrepreneurship theme subjects in secondary curriculums are essential. Kindergarten’s curriculum should include Information Technology. A designed educational apps in tablets will help with the shortage of qualified teachers. We must include coding in our curriculums depending on the context and class level of each country. We are to train teachers for children with special needs and set up a policy for an authentic inclusive education. As a global language, English needs be used to leverage education system without despising mother-tongue. It is important to educate students with African stories to know the values and implement concrete contextualized lessons with learning materials.
While speaking of contextualizing lessons and teachings, we need to be aware that “first, Madagascar is blessed by having many resources that we must consider as big advantage for Malagasy people. However, if the next generations are not aware of what they possess in the backyard and how fortunate they are, then it is not just a shame but a big loss. Others will surely take advantages of our richness. Therefore, children should learn about their possessions from their age, such as, the endemic fauna and flora, the precious stones/gems, or the marine ecosystem and many others. There must be an ongoing field activity for practical learnings and discoveries rather than just theory in our school programs. In other words, active learning is a crucial component as a method that teachers should use at school.” Professor Jonah Ratsimbazafy, President of GERP Madagascar.
To add the propositions of Education innovations, Mrs. Zo Raveloson, Founder of Sweet First Years Montessori School Madagascar advises that “there are many ways of educational approaches in the world that one can use. We need to initiate Montessori pedagogy to parents and educators, even for part time at schools because it can cover the lack in our education system and approach.”
When looking for innovations in education, we must take into account the culture, character traits and backgrounds of the students. Professor Jonah Ratsimbazafy, highlights that “we must consider the culture and attitude of Malagasy children when finding new technics of education. Serious discussions must be done to encourage innovation technics for good education program. How can we enable children to create, innovate and think and what is the vision? In the all education system at all levels, innovative discoveries must be encouraged in Madagascar if we really want to take charge the future of our country.”
Educational leaders, educators, teachers, and quality education enthusiasts! We must harness our potentials to reduce the barriers to education in Madagascar and across Africa. We need perseverance and hard work to make it happen. Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela cheered his people: “It always seems impossible until it’s done”. We must empower one another and encourage any teachers throughout their career by providing training opportunities. Let us prepare the educators of tomorrow and be open to innovations in education. The lack of quality education is the root cause of poverty, and poverty is the primary barrier to education. We must fight.
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This website was funded by a grant from the United States Department of State. The opinions, findings and conclusions stated herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the United States Department of State.
