Minutes of DPG Education held 120308

MINUTES OF DPG EDUCATION MEETING HELD ON

12 MARCH, 2008 , VENUE:SIDA CONFERENCE

IN ATTENDANCE:

Anders Frankenberg, Maria-Teresa Bejarano (Sweden; Tanya Zebroff (DFID); Thomas Bayer, Laura Kikuli (USAID); Abdi Ibrahim Younis (AfDB); Sonia Languille (EC); P. Kapichi (UNICEF); Raymond Lataste, Patrick Thomas, Anthea Manasseh (France); Rest Lasway (WB); Dorothea Coppard (GTZ); Beatrice Omari (CIDA)

Agenda 1.0 Briefing on Swedish Ambassador’s meeting with Minister of Education, Hon. Jumanne Maghembe – ( Anders will share the detailed notes)

Key highlights of the discussion:

  • It was a good meeting and the Minister was open, they have had internal meetings on re-structuring the ministry– a process that is on-going, and soon will have the Higher Education departments moved to the line Ministry.
  • The Coordination role will probably remain within the Ministry –but things are still being worked out.
  • Minister agrees that there is need for improved communication and information on results and emphasis on quality of education not only quantitative reports. He recognizes the challenges on capacities and Human resource issues. Showed great interest on research agenda and need to strengthen the universities for deliverables.
  • On PETS – had been briefed by the Director of Policy and Planning – Mwaimu, he responded positively to the plan and indicated willingness for joint planning process led by the Ministry and DPs providing the necessary support.
  • On the revised ESPD – Minister did not seem to be aware of the need for GoT to discuss and own the document and asked to be briefed on this in detail.
  • NB: DPs will offer support on PETS issues and propose a timeline for key actions.

Agenda 2.0 Revised ESDP:

  • Agreed DPs need to be clear on our role in the process and strategize on timing and how our input will facilitate moving the process forward. Agreed also that more stakeholders should be brought on board – CSO. NSA and other agencies.
  • Agreed that DPs think of providing inputs on the 22 proposed key actions for this year as a starting point and take the opportunity to input on the ‘road map’ with possibilities for simulation models.
  • Agreed that the process could entail (a) meeting with the Ministry to sort out the details – hence meetings to be arranged and followed up; (b) having a DP group starting to prepare our input in theprocess based on the proposed key priorities and the ‘road map’. Volunteers for this task included (Rest (WB), Jim (UNICEF), Cecilia (UNESCO), Tanya (DFID) and Beatrice (CIDA).

Agenda 3.0Performance Report for 2008

  • Agreed that the idea is to ensure that the process of preparing the annual report starts early and acknowledge that there are problems trying to utilize the most recent data – hence need to base the report on data provided in the 2007 report.
  • Agreed that there may be some confusion on the template to be used – if another new format is introduced by MoF, and the Poverty Monitoring Group when the Ministry of Education had only used its own once which was last year. Caution was raised on the need to clarify on the template and find out which one is to be used this year.
  • AGREED:
  • Tanya to share the template sample form Finance
  • Discuss and find out from the Ministry the status of the templates and information available
  • Work on establishing the linkages with the ESMIS process which is important in informing and facilitating the development of the Sector Monitoring Framework. It was however acknowledged that a sector monitoring framework will take long to be finalized – so the thinking could be to develop a shorter version of the same document for use this year.
  • Challenges noted – What are we asking this year/ what are the expectations – and what indicators to be used to show good progress?

Agenda 4.0PETS in Primary Education - Updates

  • Agreed that the Chair should share a copy of the letter sent to the Ministry on PETS issue with all DPs for reference and the response thereafter.
  • Noted that there is still a sense of lack of interest from the Ministry staff. Agreed that we need to
  • clarify and be clear in our discussions with the GoT on: What we mean by PETS and define levels as there are many versions of PETS of various levels and some are already taking place in the country mainly at district level and supported by DPs, CSO and GoT – example of USAID, Policy Forum, HAKIKAZI, REPOA, Ministry of Finance etc
  • strategize on how best to share experiences (USAID) with the GoT with a view to scaling up some of the good practices and reducing fear of the ‘PETS” as an audit exercise.
  • USAID to join the team of DP representatives on the PETS issues

Agenda 5.0Division of Labour – mapping exercise

  • Acknowledged that this exercise is important in enabling the group to be clear on the roles of agencies – Active, Delegated,, Lead etc and the investments in the sector per agency and if possible also indicate where agencies are working in the country.
  • Also agreed that the mapping out should include various analytical work done by agencies, researchers which would also lead to update the DP WEBSITE for effective usage.
  • Agreed also that there is need to work out the ToRs for the technical working groups and how best to share information within the DPG –Education group.
  • Agreed that Tanya should share the examples on Water and the Secretariat to follow up on DPG Education WEBSITE and report on what exists and propose how to move forward.
  • Sonia to circulate the final DP Retreat Report for 2007 as it will have some input in the mapping exercise that was already started.

AOB

  • Discussions on Forced Contributions to the Education sector: the group acknowledged the Prime Minister’s response that the community should not be forced especially during the farming season, but agreed that the on-going discussions with Governance group should continue and address the issue on amore broader context to establish the legality of the process and transparency and accountability aspects.
  • USAID reported that during the visit by President Bush, there was a request (through President Kikwete) for support to teacher training – Science, Maths teachers. The US embassy are still working on technical details to establish what is involved in the request.
  • WB – reported that the preparation for an on-going support to Higher Education re: science and maths teaching is on-going and the study on the process has been initiated and funded by the WB. Reported that the SEDP Completion report is still being prepared
  • AfDB: reported that the process of recruiting a field officer to oversee education portfolio is on-going. Noted that the just finished support to the Secondary schools by the AfDB could provide lessons learned. The Education Sector Budget support for $30M up to 2009 has started this year.
  • UNESCO:reported that the Adult Education Conference is being organized – details to be provided by UNESCO. Some expected outputs include – development of life-long learning packages, launching Literacy Assessment process and developing Qualification Framework.
  • UNICEF: reported that the first draft of the Minimum Standards document – support to GoT will be circulated for sharing. The ECD report has also been shared and comments from DPs are expected and should be sent directly to UNICEF.
  • FRANCE: reported that the agency has signed an agreement with Ministry of Education to support a 3-year program initiated for training French Language teachers at Primary, secondary school and Higher education levels.
  • HIV/AIDS: Reported that there was a meeting with TACAIDS – noted that there are concerns with respect to the Expenditure trends in that overall little money is going to Prevention (15%) while Care and Treatment gets a greater share of the budget (64%) an only 8% is allocated to impact mitigation.
  • Revised Education and Training Policy – reported that so far there is no communication on the process but it seems it is not yet ready.

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