Global Projects

The Young Entrepreneurs Program (YEP) aims to better prepare Kosovo youth for work in a growing market economy and for engaged citizenship in a developing democracy. To meet this goal, the YEP team will work together with selected market areas, engaging employers and other local, regional, and national leaders to blend together resources, skills, and policies for a sustainable system of opportunities and supports for out of school and out of work young people.

The Somali Interactive Radio Instruction Program (SIRIP) provides high-quality interactive audio programs to Somali children attending formal, non-governmental, Quranic and community schools. With the assistance of the audio programs, teachers lead the classes and are thus trained in interactive teaching methods which include stories, activities, educational songs and other forms of active learning pedagogy. Supplemental materials accompany the programs, providing schools with the resources to support sound, primary-level instruction.

PAJE-Nièta (Projet d’Appui aux Jeunes Entrepreneurs or Support to Youth Entrepreneurs Project) provides 10,000 rural, out-of-school Malian youth with improved basic education, work readiness and technical training, social and leadership development, and accompaniment towards livelihood activities. Nièta means “progress” in Bambara, a Malian language.

The Literacy, Language, and Learning Initiative (L3) helps Rwanda’s Ministry of Education (MINEDUC) develop and implement new national standards for literacy (in English and Kinyarwanda) and numeracy, aiming to improve students’ reading and mathematics skills in grades 1 to 4, as well as their English language proficiency. In partnership with MINEDUC, L3 works with preservice and inservice facilitators to introduce proven reading and mathematics teaching strategies and with community volunteers to support struggling learners.

The Pre-Service Teacher Education (PreSTEP) program has the primary objective of helping the Government of Pakistan develop, introduce, and implement effective curricula for a new four-year bachelor’s degree in education and a two-year associate degree in education. To achieve this goal, PreSTEP helps provincial governments create systems, policies and standards that ensure the effective execution of these degree programs.

The Benin Teacher Motivation and Training (TMT) Project is working to improve training and performance of teachers. TMT consists of a number of simple interventions focused around a key theme—a set of clear expectations for teacher performance based on international standards of excellence. The use of this clear and universal set of standards will ensure that all systems meant to support and motivate teachers are focused on the same issues—improving teachers’ and thereby students’ chances of success.

The Teacher Professional Development Program is a three-year, nationwide program supported by the United States Agency for International Development that focuses on strengthening primary school education. The program will assist the Ministry of Education set policy and management of the overall education system, improve teacher performance through certification, accreditation, and supervision, develop the Unified Curriculum for teachers, improve gender equity in the education system, improve English language skills, and provide training and learning resources.

The Educational Quality Improvement Program 3 (EQUIP3) is a Leader-with-Associate Award that is designed to improve earning, learning, and skill development opportunities for out-of-school youth in developing countries.

The Skills and Knowledge for Youth Employment (SKYE) project in Guyana seeks to strengthen youth’s access to justice and equip youth with market-driven skills and attitudes to improve their ability to transition to the workforce. SKYE will target a total of approximately 600 youth beneficiaries who do not have the necessary education, skills and behaviors for integration into the workforce; many will be school dropouts and/or involved in the juvenile justice system.

The YES (Youth Employability Skills) Network will connect the supply and demand side of labor in Macedonia through various interventions in order to raise the quality of workers and connect them more readily to jobs.