| In
1997 the Armenian Ministry of Education and Science established
a Textbook Revolving Fund to ensure a sustainable supply of high
quality textbooks to each pupil covering every subject for grades
1-10. The fund has been almost entirely financed by the payment
of rental fees by parents, based on a target four-year book life.
The government has promised to contribute 10% of the total population.
Although
Armenia is one of the poorest countries of the former Soviet Union
(FSU), the response from parents has been overwhelming. There is
almost US$ 1.50 million in the revolving fund account now and within
two years it is expected that the value of the account will rise
to around US$5.00 million.
The main achievements of the TRF , in the view of the lead technical
consultants to the project, are as follows:
- Every
child' in school from grades 1-10 has (or will soon have) their
own individual , copy of every required textbook. This is unique
in the present circumstances of the FSU where funding for all
aspects of education has declined alarmingly (20 times) and textbooks
are in critically short supply in every other country.
- The
rental fees are very widely considered by parents to be affordable
and reasonable. This explains why the collection rate from parents
is around 80%. The TRF NGO has encouraged self-help as an approach
to solving the basic problem of making good textbooks available
at affordable cost.
- There
is a very high level of consultation at grass roots level with
parents, teachers and marz officials in the management, administration
and policy making related to the TRF .The TRF is quite genuinely
seen to be a symbol of a new policy of community participation
in educational policy and decision making in Annenia.
- All
of the textbooks are of very high quality both in terms of physical
production specifications and in terms of content, design and
presentation. The textbooks are widely perceived to be among the
most attractive and up-to-date textbooks published anywhere in
the FSU .
- The
TRF NGO has supported the creation and publication of a new generation
of textbooks designed to support a reformed curriculum.
- All
the TRF NGO financial collections are maintained in bank accounts
under the control of each individual school. The collections are
held in US $ so that the value of collections is protected against
the devaluation. The funds are held in closed bank accounts and
no funds can be spent until March 31, 200 I. This allows the funds
to accumulate.
- When
the funds are fully accumulated, schools will decide themselves
which replacement books they wish to purchase. The TRF NGO has
therefore effectively decentralized critical decision making .down
to the level of each school.
- The
TRF has created a textbook market in Annenia which has enabled
the old state owned textbook industry to be transformed into a
competitive, market oriented publishing sector. New, private sector,
Armenian publishers have emerged and are now competing successfully
with foreign owned companies in bidding for textbook contracts.
- A
competitive and fully transparent bidding and textbook evaluation
system has been created based on objective criteria. All evaluation
results are published and made available to all bidders and to
the public. This system is now trusted by competing publishers
and by educational specialists. Nothing as transparent exists
anywhere else in FSU.
- The
establishment of this bidding and textbook evaluation system has
also created commercial opportunities for Armenian and foreign
publishers who are now able to benefit commercially from participation
in sustainably funded textbook publishing.
- The
textbook market created by the TRF NGO has also supported new
investment into the local printing industry, which was moribund
prior to the creation of the TRF NGO.
- Textbook
provision to schools is now on the verge of sustainability and
this has removed at least one significant cost burden of government.
The successes of the TRF NGO described above are real and tangible
but urgent additional support, although only on a relatively small
scale, is urgently needed if the gains achieved by the TRF NGO are
to be maintained and consolidated over the next few years. The two
areas of required additional support are as follows:
a)
There is a need now to support a small but professional full-time
administration for the TRF NGO. Currently the administration of
the Fund is done by two people on the volunteer basis, which is
not sustainable and can be terminated because of increased workload
as the titles of textbooks are increasing every year. Fourteen titles
of textbooks published first year have been extended to fifty-six
titles this year and this number will grow in coming two years.
At the same time textbook officers are needed to assist schools
in the marzes and a small staff is needed to manage the fund investments,
to calculate annual rental fees, to provide publicity and to maintain
the vital process of grass roots consultation. There are 120 schools
in each marz in average. Parents' contributions cannot be used to
support the administration because parental contributions are made
on the basis that all funding will be used to support textbook provision.
It is estimated that the management of the TRF NGO will require
an annual budget of around US$50,000 per year.
b)
The Government of Armenia has found it very difficult to maintain
its contributions to support free textbooks for the poorest children.
These include orphans, the disabled and the children of single parent
and unemployed families. In any case the budgeted contribution was
only 10% and the actual incidence of real poverty in Armenia is
far higher than this. The TRF NGO has a donation account and donations,
either one-off or repeated, are urgently required. All donations
will be used 100% for supporting book provision to the poorest.
The TRF NGO urgently needs a little financial support to maintain
the dramatically successful progress achieved so far in this vital
sector of educational provision. If you require more detail about
how the revolving fund works, please contact Karine Harutyunyan,
Director of the Center for Education Projects, by the following
address: Ministry of Education and Science
# 13 Khorenatsy str .,
tel.: (374) 1 57-56-90
fax: 151-651
e-mail: cep@arminco.com
If you can make a donation please chose
a category from those given below and send it to the corresponding
account number:
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