Reading for Ethiopia's Achievement Developed (READ) II Activity

READ II’s overall objective is to contribute to USAID/Ethiopia’s goal of improving the reading proficiency of 15 million children. READ II also intends to achieve two cross-cutting and complementary objectives: demonstrate interventions that can meaningfully and measurably prepare a range of vulnerable students for learning and contribute to the implementation of a structured gender approach to increase boys’ and girls’ grade retention and grade progression at key grades in key regions or zones. READ II directly contributes to Ethiopia’s existing Country Development Cooperation Strategy (CDCS) Development Objective (DO) #3: Improved Learning Outcomes. READ II is intended to support grade 1-4 students, teachers, and communities as primary beneficiaries of this activity, while grade 5-8 students, teachers, and youth are secondary priorities. The Ministry of Education (MOE) will play a key guiding role, with the majority of capacity building activities and leadership training under IR 3 focused on staff from zones and woredas, as well as regional education bureaus (REBs). While the majority of READ II’s interventions support reading and writing improvement in the early grades, USAID/Ethiopia will not neglect working in a responsive and systematic manner with the MOE to improve services for the millions of students who are chronically or unexpectedly confronted by the effects dire poverty, conflict or emergency-related events.