Press Release

OFID extends grant to support education scheme in Tajikistan

41/2006 May 11, 2006, Vienna, Austria
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The OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) has approved a grant of US$50,000 to co-finance a scheme aimed at improving the quality of education in the Gorno Badakshan Autonomous Oblast (GBAO) in Tajikistan. Created by the Aga Khan Foundation (AKF), the project will benefit some 52,000 students and 7,000 teachers and school administrators.

Established by His Highness the Aga Khan in 1967 as part of the Aga Khan Development Network, the Foundation helps develop and promote creative solutions to problems that hinder education and other types of social development, particularly in Asia and East Africa. The non-profit organization has branches and affiliates in 15 developing countries, and has been operating in Tajikistan for more than a decade.

AKF’s project activities, which will be carried out over a six-year period, will cover 320 schools in eight regions of the GBAO. Some 200-250 school-based trainers, or “Key Teachers” will be mobilized to implement the project and will evaluate various aspects relating to each school’s educational system, such as teaching methods, parent and community involvement. Skills development activities such as motivation, responsibility, problem solving, decision-making, initiative and creativity, will be observed and measured from parent, teacher and student perception data. Then, various measures will be put into place to strengthen any shortfalls within the educational system.