Experts on learning assessments and from major international survey programs gathered at the World Bank’s Headquarters in Washington DC to discuss challenges and opportunities to address gaps in the availability of learning data in low- and middle-income countries. The workshop, entitled “Measuring Learning through the Lifecycle in Multi-Topic National Household Surveys: Options for low-income countries”, was convened by the Learning Assessment Platform (LeAP) team, the Skills Thematic Group in the Education Global Practice, and the Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) team in the Development Data Group at the World Bank and UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS). The meeting brought together a mix of experts and institutions active in the collection of learning and skills assessment via different modalities such as, besides the World Bank and UNESCO UIS, UNICEF, World Bank, the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS), OECD, Westat, ETS, national agencies and citizen-led assessment organizations from Mexico, Tanzania, and the West Bank.
The workshop agenda was structured in three parts. The first two parts were a stock-taking of the discussions around the learning assessment modules for pre-school (ECD), school-age children and adults with a focus on the national, regional and international programs. Then, lessons learned from different implementation experiences guided the discussion into exploring examples of technical issues (e.g. sampling strategies, CAPI versus PAPI tradeoff administration) that need to be resolved to facilitate data collection of learning and skills assessment in household surveys. The final session was dedicated to charting a practical way forward in terms of both content and process.
The objective of the workshop was promoting the harmonization of survey instruments for the assessment of learning across national and international survey programs, including: (i) practical guidance for addressing the technical challenges, (ii) identification of the knowledge gaps that need to be closed, and (iii) development of a network of experts and institutions that can work together to identify and support opportunities for skills and learning data collection in household surveys.
The workshop was co-organized by the Learning Assessment Platform (LeAP) team, the Skills Thematic Group in the Education Global Practice, the Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) team in the Development Data Group at the World Bank, and the UNESCO Institute of Statistics (UIS).