Second Additional Financing for the Rwanda Quality Basic Education for Human Capital Development Project

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The proposed Second Additional Financing (AF) to Rwanda Quality Basic Education for Human Capital Development Project (QBEP) supports the Government of Rwanda (GoR) in recovering and accelerating the education sector’s progress towards improved learning outcomes and teacher competency. The proposed AF is designed to strengthen project alignment to sector needs and developments. More specifically, it will (a) help the education system recover from COVID-19 as well as build back better to address pre-pandemic barriers to equity and quality in learning, (b) support a more robust and comprehensive plan for teacher competency development with additional efforts towards newly recruited teachers, (c) address financial deficit in existing activities to accommodate changes in scope and pricing, and (d) adopt more feasible results targets given the drastic changes in the context since the parent project approval.Key activities include (a) a revised and more comprehensive plan for developing teachers’ English language and digital skills proficiency, (b) strengthening of teacher training colleges and model schools to prepare more teachers and with improved pre-service training support, (c) strengthening of pedagogic skills of the newly recruited teachers, (d) equipping schools with rainwater harvesting and retaining walls, (e) supporting quality assurance through school inspection and learning assessments, (f) ensuring disability accessibility of learning content for early learning, and (g) supporting remedial education with necessary teaching and learning materials. Specifically, the project will prioritize learning in early grades to build a solid human capital foundation, target critical areas to achieve transformational change in basic education, focusing on equity and the use of technology to create an enabling environment and tools for accelerated learning and improved classroom practice. The Project builds on the success and recommendations of the ongoing human development operations and advisory services as well as complements the rapidly changing and evolving landscape of education policy and investments in Rwanda. It will build on the substantial progress made towards expanding school infrastructure, established remote learning support strategies, the high-level ownership the project has maintained and improved monitoring, using GEMS. The Project is well aligned with Rwanda Country Partnership Framework FY21-FY26 objective to improve human capital gains specifically addressing learning outcomes of early grade students and the equity gap in education. The Project Development Objective (PDO) of the AF project remains the same as the parent project, i.e., to improve teacher competency and student retention and learning in basic education.