How Cambridge supported curriculum reform in Ethiopia

Quick read

• Cambridge carried out in-depth research to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the existing curriculum, providing recommendations for a new curriculum.
• Following the success of the first project, we carried out a second phase of work, providing further training, piloting textbooks and reviewing progress so far.
• Working in collaboration with local and international partners, we trained 3,200 textbook authors, editors, designers, and reviewers to enable them to develop materials for the new curriculum.

A partnership for change 

Ethiopia’s Ministry of Education planned to develop a new general education curriculum. Its goal was to modernise the way subjects were taught in classrooms, while enhancing and promoting indigenous knowledge. This was to be an Ethiopian curriculum, designed by and for Ethiopians. 

The ministry and UNICEF chose Cambridge Partnership for Education and Elixir, an Addis Ababa-based education consultancy, to collaborate on the project, providing technical expertise.

Why Cambridge? We have long international experience in curriculum development. We know what is needed to create high-performing education systems, and appreciate the enormous importance of local context and insight. Crucially, in this case, we also had relevant recent experience in supporting Kenya and Ghana in the redevelopment of their primary curriculums. 

Daniel Morrish, Head of Curriculum Projects at Cambridge Assessment International Education and our lead education expert on the project, said: “This was a great fit for us, drawing on our experience in curriculum reform in Africa and beyond. We know too that our partners value the rigour and academic credentials that Cambridge bring to this type of project”.

Strong foundations

Starting in 2018, in the early phases of the project, we gathered information and evidence to identify the strengths and weaknesses of Ethiopia’s existing curriculum. This involved detailed analysis by our subject experts, reviewing areas such as: the content coverage, the progression within each subject, the cross-curricular linkage, the balance of competencies, knowledge, skills, and values.

We also held a wide-ranging consultation to gather the perspectives of diverse stakeholders within the education system and the wider community. This included local education stakeholders across different districts across Ethiopia, as well as parents, community groups, students, teachers and other stakeholders. 

Our local partner, Elixir, was a key part of this work, complementing our international experience with essential local insight and education knowledge.

As part of this first stage of work, we also reviewed curricula in a select group of other countries. This provided insights into how they had incorporated the key themes and approaches that Ethiopia intended to embed in their own curriculum. 

We used the results of this in-depth research to provide recommendations for the new curriculum framework and materials, as well as the process of creating the new curriculum. 

Next steps

After the success of the initial work, the ministry invited us back to help with a second phase of the project, which involved a review of the curriculum the ministry had developed. 

We then began helping them with the development of textbooks to support the new curriculum, for grades 9-12. We provided training events for authors, as well as providing reviews and feedback. 

This project is ongoing and learning materials for grades 9 and 10 are being piloted at schools, for roll-out in September 2023; we are helping the Ministry learn lessons from this pilot.

The results of our work

In total, during the project we:

• Trained 30 staff to develop the new curriculum.
• Reviewed 186 curriculum documents, providing feedback to the curriculum developers.
• Developed quality guidelines and evaluation frameworks for curriculum, learning and teaching materials.
• Trained 3,200 textbook authors, editors, designers, and reviewers, and provided feedback on 56 teacher and learning materials.
• Developed monitoring and evaluation tools, as well as capacity development support to help the Ministry of Education evaluate the impact of the reform during a pilot period.

This was a true partnership, working together to support the development and implementation of Ethiopia’s new curriculum. 

Daniel says:

This is truly Ethiopia’s curriculum, but we – working closely with our vital local partners Elixir – are proud to provide technical expertise and support to help make it a reality. 

The education reform is judged on its long-term impact, but feedback from our partners has been very positive. 

Sileshi Yitbarek (Ph.D), General Manager of ELIXIR Research and Consultancy, said:

The ELIXIR family is honoured to work with Cambridge Partnership for Education as a local partner in Ethiopia. I learned a lot about co-creation, flexibility, systems thinking with due emphasis on coherence, and alignment in the education arena.  

All local actors, including ELIXIR consultants that I represent, the MoE, and Regional Education Bureau experts, have gained new insights on how to map stakeholders and gather relevant curriculum information as well as how to co-create frameworks, quality criteria, and guidelines relevant to our own contexts. We want to strengthen this collaboration so that we, as a local partner, are better prepared to contribute to better learning and life outcomes for Ethiopian children and beyond.

If you’re working to improve the quality of your country’s education system, then please contact us to find out how we can help you achieve your goals.