Quality Reading Project – Tajikistan & Kyrgyzstan

Project

Student laughingKyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are bringing about a paradigm shift in what it means to be a reader, and in how education systems must be restructured to support children’s acquisition of comprehension and critical reading skills. AIR's approach builds on the USAID Quality Learning Project’s work in standards and focuses on supporting and improving existing governmental structures, staff, and initiatives. Specifically, our approach for meeting the educational and social goals for early reading improvement in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan will provide the Ministry of Education in each country with a set of measurable, uniform goals that define what is expected of students, teachers, school directors, district and regional education officials, and teacher mentors.

Read about one Tajik fourth-grade teacher's experiences

Using outcome performance goals as measures, the Ministries of Education of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan will have the tools they need to evaluate people, materials, and programs. In making the goals uniform, the Ministries of Education will have the national standards they need to bring all schools under a unified education system.

Watch short public service announcements produced by AIR for the project

Our operational strategy will be to apply technical expertise, improve communications, and disseminate information about best practices to the institutions that are responsible for creating an environment that supports young readers in the school, the home, and the community and will be guided by the following principles:

  • Leveraging the interconnectedness across program design, implementation, and local vision towards viable and sustainable strategies that can be replicated.
  • Promoting evidence-based and data-driven decision-making.
  • Maximizing government ownership by supporting senior policymakers on the National Steering Committee on Primary Grades Reading (NSC-R) in both Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
  • Expanding opportunities to develop reading competency by integrating reading instruction during portions of the day devoted to subjects such as science, mathematics, and health.
  • Promoting the philosophy that teachers must be learners, too.
  • Recognizing the different opportunities and challenges of working in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.

Related Work

1 Jun 2017
Report

Teaching and Learning Materials in Tajikistan: How Do They Align With Reading Research?

The Quality Reading Project works to improve reading skills among primary-grade students in Tajikistan and the Kyrgyz Republic through four main activities: (1) in-service teacher training; (2) increased availability of reading materials; (3) community support; and (4) government support. This report describes a study that reviewed Tajikistan’s teaching and learning materials for Grades 1–4.
Tajik boy reading
6 Jul 2016
In the Field

Stories from the Field: One Teacher's Experiences in Tajikistan

Through AIR's work with the USAID's Quality Reading Project in Tajikistan, local fourth-grade teacher Guljahon Rahmonova received specialized in-service training. Read about her experiences in her own words.
1 Jan 2015
Service

Reading: Global Focus on Science and Solutions

There has been a significant increase in school enrollment globally, yet millions of children across the world are unable to read a single word even after up to four years of schooling. AIR is focused on improving the quality of learning outcomes by enhancing the science of reading, while developing solutions for the global learning crisis.
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