91Â鶹¹ú²ú¾«Æ·×ÔÅÄ

The CapED programme is one of UNESCO’s key operational responses to strengthen systems and assist countries in achieving national priorities in the context of Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG 4). Globally, the programme focuses on three priority areas: sector-wide policy and planning, skills for life and work, and teachers. 

Pillar 1: SDG 4 sector-wide policy and planning

The many Member States including Afghanistan are facing critical challenges in monitoring the progress towards SDG 4 targets. The SDG 4 Pilot under CapED aims at providing holistic support and ensuring adequate monitoring of the achievement towards SDG 4 targets. The pilot was initiated in Afghanistan in 2016 to enhance capacities for education sector planning and management with a specific focus on SDG 4.

Since its inception, the SDG 4 Pilot has helped to improve awareness of Afghanistan’s international commitment to the SDG agenda, specifically concerning SDG 4, and of the sub-regional network for SDG 4 established in the South Asian region. Another major achievement is the development of the National Strategy for the Development of Education Statistics (NSDES) (2021-2025). Throughout the journey of NSDES development, a number of milestone achievements have been made thus far:

• Development of the National Education Indicator Framework (NEIF) to enable the monitoring of national education priorities in the context of SDG 4.
• Completion of Data Source Mapping and Data Quality Assessment to identify data gaps and make recommendations for improvement.
• Drafting of the NSDES as a policy instrument with a mid-term vision to enhance the capacities of national education statistical systems (NESS) stakeholders to provide timely, relevant and quality data and statistics for informed decision-making.

The development and implementation of the NSDES has attached great importance to the coordination with key development partners active in education statistics and Education Management Information System (EMIS), such as the World Bank (Education Quality Reform in Afghanistan – EQRA project – EMIS component and the USAID (CBA project).

Pillar 2: Skills for life and work

Afghanistan has been oriented towards the unity of a TVET sub-sector across the formal, non-formal, and informal provisions. The passing of the TVET law in March 2021 further legalizes the mandate and status of the TVET-A for managing formal, non-formal, and informal TVET provisions. 

Since 2010, 91Â鶹¹ú²ú¾«Æ·×ÔÅÄ coordinated efforts to foster skills for life and work in Afghanistan:  enhancing individual and institutional capacities of TVET institutions to deliver demand-driven quality TVET services. Significant achievements over the past decade comprise:

• Development of a TVET Management Information System, first of its kind for TVET in Afghanistan.
• Implementation of a large-scale non-formal TVET leadership training program on local labor market analysis and school improvement planning.
• Development and launch of three National Statistical Reports or Formal TVET.
• Publishing of a report ‘Quality Matters – Learning from the implementation of the Quality Assessment Framework’.
• Development of curriculum materials based on the National Occupational Skills Standards for the non-formal TVET sector.
• Training on competency-based curriculum development for non-formal TVET at the central level with the MOLSA.

UNESCO is currently working with the TVET-A on the enhancement and upgrade of the TVET MIS and the development and piloting of a national approach to School Improvement Planning (SIP). Further strengthening of the TVET MIS aims to build a more open and accessible MIS for timely dissemination and use of TVET data and statistics at central, provincial, and school levels. The national SIP approach aims at developing a national toolbox on school quality assessment, improvement planning, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation as a complete quality loop and piloting the tools in selected TVET schools, coupled with concerned staff’s capacity building.

CapED’s work in TVET has catalyzed a new partnership with the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA). Following UNESCO’s success in assessing the quality of non-formal vocational training centers back in 2017, KOICA approached UNESCO to discuss cooperation on non-formal TVET with a view to transforming the Afghan Korea Vocational Training Institute (AKVTI) into a National Centre of Excellence for TVET in Afghanistan. The partnership agreement was signed in 2020 with a total budget of 6.7 million USD.