Promoting Children's Learning Outcomes in Conflict-Affected Countries: Generating, Communicating, and Incorporating Evidence for Impact

在受持续冲突困扰的资源匮乏国家，教育普及和教育质量是最紧迫的问题。目前全世界有7500多万失学儿童，其中一半以上生活在受冲突影响的国家。在受冲突影响地区上学的儿童中，儿童没有学习。例如，我们自己在刚果民主共和国（DRC）东部三个省的研究表明，91%的2-4年级小学生不能正确回答早期阅读评估（EGRA）的一个阅读理解问题，EGRA是专门为中低收入国家设计的测试。我们的立场是，提供高质量的教育可以减轻冲突对儿童造成的一些最严重的后果，并有可能有助于打破贫困和暴力的代际传递——通过有效地提供安全和支持性的空间，促进儿童的学业和社会情感发展。但作为一个国际社会，我们目前在这方面的努力是失败的，因为在冲突和危机的背景下，关于什么能促进儿童的学习，我们“极其缺乏证据”。目前的项目旨在就如何在受冲突影响的环境中促进有效教学和改善儿童的学业和社会情感学习产生、交流并纳入实践的严格证据。我们将通过三项主要战略实现这些目标。首先，我们将通过对2011年至2014年期间由国际救援委员会、纽约大学和其他合作伙伴在刚果民主共和国（DRC）开展的大规模、集群随机、基于学校的干预项目（“治愈教室”）的原始数据分析来生成证据。据我们所知，这是迄今为止唯一一项对综合教师培训/课程发展干预促进CAC学术和社会情感学习的实验性评估。我们将利用这些分析产生的严谨证据：(1)与政策制定者、从业者和学术界进行沟通，采用尖端的社会科学方法来设计和实施CACs的未来教育战略；(2)与伙伴组织合作，将证据纳入世界各地基于学校的干预措施。在产生证据的过程中，我们将超越评估以学校为基础的干预措施是否能促进有效的教学和儿童的学习成果：我们将使用复杂的统计方法来考虑干预措施发挥作用的机制和背景。这些证据对于以下方面至关重要：(1)加强和复制有效的干预机制；(2)根据不同的学校和社区情况量身定制干预措施。鉴于IRC目前正在12个国家（包括刚果民主共和国、中非共和国、阿富汗和乍得）实施治疗教室干预措施，拟议项目产生的证据-与我们的沟通和合并活动相结合-有可能改善世界各地数百万儿童的学习成果。

Nowhere is access to and quality of education more urgent than in low-resourced states afflicted by ongoing conflict. Of the over 75 million children around the world who are currently out of school, over half live in conflict-affected countries (CACs). Of children in conflict-affected areas who are in school, children are not learning. For example, our own research in three eastern provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) indicates that 91 percent of primary school children in grades 2-4 could not correctly respond to one reading comprehension question of the Early Grade Reading Assessment (EGRA), a test designed specifically for use in low- and middle-income countries. We take the position that the provision of quality education can mitigate some of the most severe consequences of conflict for children - and potentially help break the intergenerational transmission of poverty and violence - through the effective provision of safe and supportive spaces that promote children's academic and socioemotional development. But as an international community, we are currently failing in our efforts to do so due to the "stunning lack of evidence" as to what works to promote children's learning in the context of conflict and crisis.The current project aims to generate, communicate, and incorporate into practice rigorous evidence as to how to promote effective teaching and improve children's academic and socioemotional learning in conflict-affected contexts. We will achieve these objectives using three primary strategies. First, we will generate evidence via original analyses of data from a large-scale, cluster-randomized, school-based intervention program ("Healing Classrooms") undertaken by the International Rescue Committee, New York University, and other partners in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) between 2011 and 2014. To our knowledge, this is the only experimental evaluation of an integrated teacher training/curricular development intervention to promote academic and socioemotional learning in a CAC that has ever been undertaken. We will use the rigorous evidence generated from these analyses to: (1) communicate with policymakers, practitioners, and the academic community cutting-edge social science approaches to the design and implementation of future education strategies in CACs; and (2) work with partner organizations to incorporate the evidence into school-based interventions around the world. In generating evidence, we will move beyond assessing whether a school-based intervention works to promote effective teaching and children's learning outcomes: We will use sophisticated statistical methods to consider both the mechanisms by and the contexts in which the intervention worked. Such evidence is essential for: (1) strengthening and replicating the mechanisms of the intervention that do work; (2) and tailoring the intervention to different school- and community-contexts. Given that Healing Classrooms intervention is currently being implemented by the IRC in 12 countries (including the DRC, Central African Republic, Afghanistan, and Chad), the evidence generated by the proposed project - in conjunction with our communication and incorporation activities - has the potential to improve the learning outcomes of millions of children around the world.