Conference to Focus on Early-Grade Literacy in Rwanda

The initiative, managed by Education Development Center (EDC), works in all Rwandan primary schools to improve teaching, increase the availability and accessibility of teaching and learning materials, and ensure children have access to a quality education. Keynote speakers at the national conference on early-grade literacy in Rwanda, hosted by EDC, the Ministry of Education, Rwanda Education Board (REB), and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), will include Rwanda's Minister of Education, Dr. Papias Musafili, and the Director General of the Rwanda Education Board, Janvier Gasana. Conference participants will include Ministry and district education officials, teachers, civil society members, and development partners working to build a culture of reading throughout Rwanda. Conference presentations and interactive sessions will focus on examples of success and lessons learned from the L3 Initiative, which has notably increased the proportion of learners reading at grade level nationwide. The initiative has distributed more than 7 million student books in English and Kinyarwanda, 56,965 teachers' guides, 27,334 read-aloud story collections, and 15,744 cell phones and speakers for playing audio lessons. It has also trained more than 23,328 teachers in literacy instruction. To date, the L3 Initiative has made significant progress in improving early-grade literacy in Rwanda. The program includes initiatives that support improved equity in education, teacher motivation, and community support. By the end of the L3 Initiative, more than 90,000 books for teacher training colleges and 85 community mobile libraries will have been distributed to communities, and 1,250 Parent Teacher Councils will have been trained to promote the culture of reading. The conference will reaffirm the important role of literacy instruction in Rwanda's new competence-based curriculum. By reviewing what has been learned over five years, the conference will enable participants to build on successes and plan for the future to ensure that all children leave primary school able to read and write with comprehension and fluency.