EARLY LEARNING PARTNERSHIP E L P SEPTEMBER 2016 EARLY LEARNING PARTNERSHIP How do ELP Investments Generate Big Returns for Young EARLY Children? Since 2012, ELP LEARNING has strategically invested $5.5 million in activitiesINTEGRATES to improve the life chances of ENSURES young children GENERATES robust monitoring & in Africa PARTNERSHIP and South Asia. To date these funds have supported 32 activities in countries, 26activities including project assurance of action preparation, $61 MILLION ECD into totaling qualitity research, $ 5.5 and piloting MILLIONand evaluating new approaches. in new funding $301 MILLION $286 MILLION That initial investment has already catalyzed significantly more funding for early childhood as ECD World from activities scale resources, Bank INVESTED for ECD activities host country 32 activities and other donors. This includes $61 million in direct financing for new activities that promote ingovernments, early childhood development (ECD), as well as the integration of ECD expertise, training, and services into preexisting activities totaling $301 million. In addition, ELP funds are providing critical resources to ensure activities totaling $286 million are evidence-based, with adequate monitoring and quality assurance as they scale. INTEGRATES ECD into activities totaling ENSURES robust monitoring & $301 MILLION quality assurance of $286 MILLION GENERATES as ECD activities scale $61 MILLION in new funding for ECD activities $5.5 MILLION INVESTED in 32 activities How does it work? Countries determine how World Bank resources are allocated to different sectors. Historically, investing in the early years has not been a priority area for allocation, despite robust evidence of the benefits. Since 2012, the ELP has been working with World Bank staff and country clients to raise awareness of these benefits and catalyze greater demand for investments in ECD. Now that demand is growing rapidly, we are working with countries to design and implement effective activities. Our approach at the country level is simple. We invite World Bank staff and partners to apply for funding to support early learning and ECD in their work programs. Through this competitive process, we respond to specific country needs and opportunities, stimulate creativity, and ensure that funding goes where it can be used most effectively. Using ELP funds, World Bank staff then work with country clients to develop, pilot, and evaluate activities that will be financed through a combination of World Bank financing, partner funding, and domestic government funds. While the process works differently in each country, there are typically three different scenarios for leveraging or influencing funds: 1. ELP funds are used to develop new project activities, or generate “new funds” for ECD 2. ELP funds are used to ensure that previously funded early childhood services are using evidence-based approaches. 3. ELP funds are used to integrate ECD into planned project activities that did not previously include early childhood. CASE STUDIES: ELP in Practice PAKISTAN ELP funding has supported the design of an innovative early childhood component within the Third Punjab Education Sector Project (PESP III), a Generating new resources results-based project that disburses funds tied to meeting achievement of specific through the launch of a targets and outcomes. massive scale-up of early The early childhood target is 7,000 newly established preschool classrooms childhood education meeting quality standards, including a trained teacher, quality materials, and regular visits by district quality assurance officers to mentor newly qualified FOCUS: Scaling up preschool teachers. Planned project activities also include a strategy for engaging parents and an innovative pilot to partner with district health and nutrition officers to ELP INVESTMENT: $200,000 promote child development. Children’s development and school-readiness will be LEVERAGE: $33 million in World measured throughout the project, which will serve an estimated 210,000 children. Bank finance plus domestic The $200,000 invested by ELP will leverage a projected $33 million in new government commitment to build development finance for early childhood from a World Bank loan to the thousands of new classrooms and Government of Punjab. In addition, the government is hiring 4,200 new early recruit thousands of new teachers childhood teachers this year. In the next 2-3 years the government will construct 6,000 new preschool classrooms and hire an additional 6,000 new teachers. BANGLADESH Bangladesh has the sixth highest rate of stunting in the world, indicating low height for age and a serious risk to child development. The Bank’s Social Integrating ECD into a Protection team is working closely with the Government on a cash transfer cash transfer program to program targeting mothers. The Income Support Program for the Poorest (ISSP) reach poor mothers project targets the poorest 40% of households with pregnant women and/or mothers of children below 5 years of age in rural areas. FOCUS: Integrating ECD into a ELP funds are being used to integrate ECD into this cash transfer platform, cash transfer program so that when mothers come to get quarterly cash transfers, they will also engage ELP INVESTMENT: $125,000 in information sessions and activities to promote child development, including: bonding with infants; and developing cognitive, social, language and motor LEVERAGE: $267 million in World Bank skills. ELP funds are also financing assessments to test mothers’ retention of financing plus government financing information and behavior change. for human resources and service Once proven effective, this approach will be scaled through the $267 million delivery ISSP project. In addition, the content will be integrated into the Government’s efforts to scale pre-primary education through learning centers across the country, thus leveraging substantial government and donor funding. MADAGASCAR In Madagascar, more than 50% of children are stunted and less than 10% have access to pre-school. Promoting an evidence- ELP funding is being used to promote ECD in Madagascar through health, based approach to nutrition, and education interventions. The majority of ELP funds are supporting multi-sectoral programming a community-based pilot that will identify cost-effective, integrated interventions to promote ECD to tackle chronic malnutrition and promote child development. ELP funds are also being used to finance a process evaluation, which complements an impact FOCUS: Designing and evaluating evaluation funded through other sources. Since ELP’s inception, we have learned cross-sectoral programming to the importance of process evaluations to tell us not just “if” an intervention has promote ECD an impact but also to make sure we understand the “how” and “why,” so that interventions can be implemented effectively as they scale. ELP funds are also ELP INVESTMENT: $215,000 supporting a diagnostic of the pre-primary education system and the quality of LEVERAGE: $45 million in World Bank pre-primary classrooms to support national ECD policy planning. financing