Ethiopian Education Development Roadmap 
                            (2017-30) 
               An integrated Executive Summary 
                                                    
         
                                                    
         
         
                           Ministry of Education 
                        Education Strategy Center (ESC) 
         
        By 
        Tirussew Teferra, Amare Asgedom, Jeilu Oumer, Tassew W/hanna, Aklilu Dalelo & 
        Berhannu Assefa,  
        Addis Ababa 
        December, 2017 
         
         
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                Table of Contents                                                                   Pages  
                 
                    1.  Introduction                                                                3 
                    2.  Pre-primary and Primary Education                                           6 
                    3.  Secondary and Preparatory Education                                         22 
                    4.  Teacher Preparation and Development                                         36 
                    5.  Higher Education                                                            50 
                    6.  Policy, Governance and Leadership                                           64 
                    7.  Technical  and Vocational Education and Training (TVET)                     80 
                 
                 
                 
                                                
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       1.  Introduction 
       In January 2016 the Ministry of Education (Education Strategy Centre) developed a concept 
       note to reform the education sector in accordance with the national vision and development 
       goals.  Following  this,  work  immediately  started  with  a  series  of  activities  that  included 
       development of inception report, desk review, field study, international benchmarking visit, 
       and consultations. This report is therefore is the result of a variety of research activities and 
       consultations  that  led  to  development  of  fundamental  recommendations  to  transform  the 
       educational system to accord with the requirements of 21st century educational systems that 
       play  roles  of  transforming  the  socio-economic  systems,  particularly  the  industrialization 
       process. 
       Ethiopia is a country that is on a journey to its renaissance targeting at achieving peace, 
       unity- with-diversity, broad and rapid socio-economic growth, establishment of democratic 
       systems  and  good  governance.  The  Government  has  been  engaged  in  a  major  effort  to 
       transform Ethiopian society and place the country on a trajectory to become a lower middle-
       income economy by the year, 2030. Over the last several years, the economy grew by nearly 
       10 per cent per annum, one of the fastest growth rates registered in the world. During this 
       time, significant attention has been given to upgrading economic and social infrastructure and 
       promoting pro-poor spending on education, health, and other services to benefit the poor and 
       the marginalized. 
       Understanding  this  crucial  role,  the  education  sector  has  passed  through  a  series  of 
       successive,  rolling  Education  Sector  Development  Programs  (ESDP  I-V).  Since  the 
       formulation  of  the  1st  Growth  and  Transformation  Plan  (GTP  I),  education  was  given  a 
       special attention in the transformation of the economy from agriculture-led to industry-led 
       activity  and  thereby  supporting  the  manufacturing  sector  by  providing  the  required 
       professionals and problem solving technological innovations.  
       To  achieve  its  vision  of  becoming  a  lower  middle  income  by  2030,  Ethiopia  has  also 
       developed  the  2nd  Growth  and  Transformation  Plan  (GTP  II)  built  on  sector  policies, 
       strategies and programs and the UN sustainable development goals. GTP II aims to achieve 
       an annual average real GDP growth rate of 11 per cent pursing aggressive measures towards 
       rapid  industrialization  and  structural  transformation  such  as  increasing  the  productive 
       capacity  and  efficiency  of  the  economy  by  rapidly  improving  quality,  productivity,  and 
       competitiveness of agriculture and manufacturing industries, and accelerate Human capital 
       development and technological capacity building and ensure its sustainability. Education is 
       instrumental to attaining these development goals through application of science, technology 
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       and  innovations.  The  latter  are  major  instruments  to  create  wealth  and  bring  about 
       development. 
       According to GTP II, greater shares of economic production will come from industry and 
       manufacturing with the consequent demands for middle- and higher-level skilled manpower 
       to be supplied by the educational system. Achieving these visions require further expansion 
       of access to high-quality basic, general and tertiary education, and special efforts to improve 
       the overall literacy and numeracy level of the population and producing capable university 
       graduates that serve the industry.  
       This report integrates three research findings; (1) the desk review report; (2) the field report 
       and; (3) the benchmarking visit report; (4) consultation inputs. The international benchmark 
       visit took place between October 7 and October 22, 2017 to two Asian countries, Vietnam 
       and Malaysia. The two countries are known for having a high performing educational system 
       as gauged by PISA results (e.g. Vietnam ranked 12th compared to USA which stood 28th in 
       the 2016 PISA results of children who are 15 years old).  
       In the desk review, national and international relevant documents were assessed. The field 
       work employed both quantitative and qualitative approaches, and covered all relevant state 
       actors and non-state actors including the federal government, nine regional states, the two 
       city  administrations,  civil  societies  and  the  general  public.  In  this  exercise,  opinions  and 
       views were captured from top political leaders such ministers, parliamentarians, regional 
       presidents, and bureau heads. On the other hand, professionals (university presidents, deans, 
       directors and experts), professional association leaders, school principals, teachers, students 
       as well as parents have participated in the study. During, this extensive data gathering  field 
       work,  in  addition  to  the  36  education  road-map  development  research  team,  over  100 
       research associates  from different universities, and 11 focal persons from the regional and 
       city administration education bureaus were mobilized and deployed across the project sites in 
       the country. 
       While the focus of need assessment (desk review and field study) was to understand the 
       performance  and  challenges  of  the  Ethiopian  educational  system,  the  focus  of  the 
       benchmarking visit was to learn from well-functioning educational systems in Asia. The main 
       question here was to explore how the educational systems of the two countries succeeded and 
       why  they  succeeded  in  attaining  internationally  competitive  learning  outcomes.  The 
       Ethiopian delegation to these two countries observed firsthand, sensed and understood how 
       the entire system of accountability-coherence in governance operates; how they structured 
       their curriculum; and why the learning outcomes of the two countries are high. 
        
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