EXPERTS MEETING ON 10,000
PRINCIPALS LEADERSHIP PROGRAMME
Contributions from IIEP/UNESCO
Buenos Aires’ experience
Marcelo Souto Simão, Programme Specialist
14-15 January, 2013, UNESCO HQ, Paris, France
Background
• IIEP/UNESCO Buenos Aires Office, 1998
• 1990’s – Educational reforms in Latin America
• De-centralisation
• Change of school management procedures
• Massive training programmes
• 2000:
• Limits and criticism of previous reforms
• Revision of training programmes
• National technical capacities in areas of curriculum design and
development
• IIEP research: need to complement existing programmes
in areas of cross-cutting competences in school
management
Background
Training programmes delivered by IIEP/UNESCO Buenos
Aires related to school leadership
• Trainers: Angola, Argentina, Mexico, Uruguay
• Inspectors/ supervisors: Angola, Argentina, Costa Rica,
Uruguay
• School principals: Argentina, Brazil, Costa Rica, Guatemala
IIEP/UNESCO Buenos Aires’ institutional strategy
• Move from training principals at grass-roots level
• Focus on policy advice and technical assistance towards
capacity building
• Training when linked to knowledge development (piloting) and
capacity building
Meeting (qualified) expectations
Demand of national
counterparts
• Update on international and
regional social and educational
trends and policies
• Enable access to world-class
professionals and academicians
and state-of-the-art knowledge
• Practical orientation:
professional training instead of
“academic training” provided by
universities
• Replication of IIEP’s Regional
Training Programme and/or
other training programmes
developed at national level
• Raise learning achievements
IIEP/UNESCO Buenos Aires’ response
• Close articulation with national counterpart to
discuss training needs, programme and strategies
• Proposed intertwinement of training, technical
assistance and research
• Balance between contents that refer to
international/regional trends and context-specific
issues
• Invitation to senior policy makers and researchers
• Pedagogical and didactical approaches conducive to
reflexive practice (within material constraints):
workshops, case studies, practical assignments,
intervention projects, etc.
• Tailor-made programmes that substantially differ
among them (for each programme it is usually
necessary to elaborate new training materials, even
when some of them are based on materials
developed in the framework of prior initiatives)
• Foster dialogue around effective quality education
policies and capacity development.
What outcomes does IIEP/UNESCO Buenos
Aires try to promote when engaged in
training?
• Learning at individual and group level
• Team and network building
• Building and sharing knowledge
• Capacity development at institutional and national level
• Policy development
Feasibility of reaching outcomes beyond individual and group
level varies among projects, depending among other things on
the demand of the national counterpart.
Designing training programmes
Concerns when defining training expected outcomes
• Assessment of training needs
• Articulation with national educational policy
• Coherence between expected learning outcomes and material resources
available (teaching and learning time)
• Focus on areas covered by IIEP’s mandate and comparative advantages (avoid
overlap with existing national technical capacity)
• Sustainability
Selection of training strategies to contribute to competence
development:
• Promote dialogue between theoretical claims and professional experiences and
practices
• Provide opportunity for learners to recognize, value, share and systematize the
knowledge acquired along their own professional histories
• Practical assignments and field work related to professional routines to enhance
relevance
• Blended learning also as a means to increase learning time
• Alternate training workshops with practical assignments (dual model) to foster
reflection about action and gradual competence building
Designing training programmes
Recurrent themes:
• International and regional trends in education policy options in areas such as
access to education, rights-based approach, equity and diversity, teacher
policies, curriculum reform, quality monitoring and evaluation systems.
• Cross-cutting competences to educational management: school leadership,
communication, teamwork and conflict management.
• “National component” usually developed in partnership with national
counterpart institution.
Training materials:
• Tailor-made. Provide conceptual frameworks for the analysis of situations
relevant to professional practice. Draw from international bibliography and IIEP’s
research and work in the field.
• “Toolbox” for competence development of school management teams. Based on
mini case studies drawn from Latin American public schools, continually adapted
and improved.
• Assignments that enable debates among peers, encourage the reflection about
action and the systematization of professional knowledge, while promoting
understanding and ownership over new concepts and proceedings.
Traning of trainers: special concerns
• Build on existing programmes, contents and approaches that are
familiar to them.
• Ensure that trainers have the opportunity to experience innovative
strategies and contents they are supposed to teach. For instance,
use didactical strategies similar to those they are expected to
employ with their students and foster meta cognition; promote
action-research.
• Actively engage trainers in the design of the training programmes
they are expected to deliver and, most importantly, to prepare their
training materials.
• Build teams of trainers: enhances institutional capacity and
programme sustainability, besides contributing to local adaptation
and ownership.
• Provide supervision and coaching throughout training delivery.
The Angolan case: reform of
educational inspection
Demand:
• Training in cross-cutting competences
• Inspectors and supervisors at national, provincial an
municipal levels
• Cascade approach
Response:
• Training needs assessment
• Policy gap/overlap identified
• Open for policy dialogue, prior to delivery of training
The Angolan case: reform of
educational inspection
Project phases:
1.
Policy dialogue, 2009 (six months)
• Policy guidelines
• Design of training programme to provincial inspection teams
2.
Action-research within training, 2010 (nine months, +400 hours)
• 8 provincial inspection teams trained
• +200 primary schools reached
• Inspection methodology (institutional evaluation) tested and improved
3.
Training of trainers, 2011 (nine months, +400 hours)
• Focus on pedagogy and didactics applied to training programme
• Fine-tuning of the inspection methodology
• Design of training programmes by teams of trainers
• Development of training materials
4.
Supervision of training, 2012 and on-going
• Distance-based (e-learning platform)
• Direct observation
• Community of practice
5.
Technical assistance in other policy areas, such as pedagogical supervision