South-South cooperation in teacher training. BRAC's experiences in Afghanistan.

1. “When I said to my community that BRAC came
from Bangladesh, which is another Muslim country,
they allowed me to do my work.” (BRAC Field Staff,
Afghanistan, personal communication, 2005)
“When I was assigned to join as programme
manager of the education programme in
Afghanistan, I was told that we are here with a
mission to help our Afghan brothers and sisters in the
field of basic education and to rebuild their
educational structure sharing our Bangladeshi
experience.” (BRAC field staff, Afghanistan,
personal communication, 2005)

2. Building South-South Partnerships in
Teacher Training
BRAC in Afghanistan
Kazi Arif Anwar - OISE
Mir Nazmul Islam - BRAC
CIES, May 3rd, 2011
Montreal, Canada

3. Background
 Preview of paper to be published in Prospects
(2011)
 Primary data collected 2005-6
 Updated with new insights from BRAC staff and
statistics from BRAC Afghanistan

4. North-South and South-South
Collaboration
 North-South collaboration: dominant paradigm
in international development since WW2
 Gradually being supplanted by South-South
collaboration in developing economies
because of
 Increased capacity of Southern NGOs
 Importance of having “roots” in the community
(Lewis, 1999)

5. Afghanistan since 2001
 Not quite “post-conflict”
- Warlordism
- Fragmented government
- Corruption
 Development organizations and workers
associated with unpopular entities such
government and allied forces

6. All players willingly accepted the notion that
Afghanistan was in a post-conflict situation, and
that therefore the role of external actors, including
NGOs, was to support the government. As a result,
the existing capacity for addressing humanitarian
need that had been built up since the late 1980s
and had successfully weathered the Taliban years
(1996-2001), when it represented the only visible
form of the international community’s engagement
in Afghanistan, was dismantled under the fallacious
assumption that it was no longer needed. (Donini,
2009, p. 3)

7. Development worker safety in
Afghanistan
 Violence against development workers rose
steadily from 2002 onwards
 114(18 fatal) incidents total in 2009 (ANSO,
2009)

8. BRAC
 “Biggest NGO you’ve never heard of”
 Largest Southern NGO (originated in Bangladesh)
 Annual budget of US$ 535 million (73% self-funded)
 Works in Health, Education and Microfinance sectors
 Has disbursed more than 1 billion in Microfinance loans
 Runs 50,000 schools in Bangladesh alone; 1 million student
body
 Employs 100,000+ worldwide
 Present in 17 countries

9. BRAC in Afghanistan: the first years
 BRAC arrived in 2002
 First instance of expansion outside of
Bangladesh
 Two-fold goal: Provide schools for girls and in
the process employment for women (teachers)

10. Afghanistan and Bangladesh
 Large land area  Small land area
 Arid, dry climate  Wet, riverine
 Ethnically diverse  Ethnically homogenous
(98% Bengali)
 Linguistically diverse
 Linguistically homogenous
 Geographically separated
population pockets  Densely populated
 Socially conservative  Socially progressive
(relatively)

11. The BRAC difference
 “White SUV syndrome”
 Reduced “economic distance” between BRAC
managers and other development workers (Hossain
and Sengupta, 2009)
 Benefits from perception of originating from a fellow
Southern Sunni Muslim nation (Chowdhury et al.,
2006)
 Managers encouraged to learn local languages
rather than English

12. The problem
 Severe lack of qualified female teachers in
Afghanistan
 Even when qualified, social restrictions to travel
and work apply
 No national daily – i.e. can’t advertise positions
 Villages are geographically remote

13. “Recruiting female staff was one of our major
constraints because we have to select female staff
from local community or nearby area. Finding a
literate woman who at least passed the 10th Grade
in province like Helmand or Kapisa is very difficult.
Even if we find a woman with the appropriate
qualifications there is no guarantee that she is going
to work for us.” (Personal communication, 2005)

14. The solution
 Teachers as para-professionals
 Students cannot wait for infrastructure to catch
up
 “Para-teacher” approach reduces qualification
standards for teachers so more can be
recruited

15. Criticisms of the para-professional
model
 “Short-term” view
 Danger of quantity over quality
 Not a replacement for experienced, trained,
certified teachers

16. Criticisms of South-South
collaboration
 Funding may still come from Northern countries/
donors
 May recreate power differentials of North-South
relationships in a different guise

17. BRAC in Afghanistan: Now
 Working in all 34 provinces
 Staff: 3,440 (185 expatriates)
 Community based schools: 2600
 146,000 students, 84% girls
Also working in Health and Microfinance sectors

18. MERCI!