Bridge given top rating by Liberian Ministry of Education and awarded 38 more schools

The Liberian Ministry of Education has announced that Bridge is to be allocated an additional 38 schools in Liberia for year two of Partnership Schools for Liberia (PSL).

Bridge and two other PSL providers were acknowledged as demonstrating ‘significant quality of implementation and ability to scale’ by the Liberian Ministry of Education.Other school providers were awarded between 2 and 15 additional schools. Marcus Wleh, Head of Bridge in Liberia said: “This is good news for the children of Liberia, as we want as many as possible to benefit from the PSL program. We are proud that the Liberian government has recognised the significant impact that Bridge has made during the PSL pilot year.

“We are utterly focussed on delivering learning gains for children in our classroom and the A rating by the Liberian government acknowledges our success. We have measured clear acceleration of learning for pupils with Bridge so far and are confident this will continue. “Education reform is always challenging but the Liberian government has been determined to improve the education outcomes of its children and we are delighted to be a partner in that endeavour and look forward to the progress we can continue to make together.”

The announcement reveals that Bridge has been provisionally awarded over 100% more schools for year 2 of PSL, compared to the number of schools allocated to other major providers within the program.

The allocation will mean that hundreds of children in Liberia will be able to join high performing schools, for free, managed by Bridge. The Liberian Ministry of Education says PSL will expand and focus on the South East of Liberia, which has the worst enrolment rates for the country. Year two will see a total of 200 schools in the programme, an increase of over 90% from year one. Liberia has a total of approximately 2,800 primary schools.

The year two allocation of schools was based on the following criteria set by the Ministry of Education: 

● Improved teacher attendance
● Assessment of extent of intervention
● Capacity to scale as demonstrated by scale internationally
● Effective tracking of student assessment
● Learning gains
Bridge is confident that the significant learning gains achieved by pupils in Kenya will be replicated in Liberia.