USAID’s 2011-2015 education strategy, issued in February 2011, includes three goals: improved reading skills for 100 million children in primary grades by 2015 (Goal 1), improved ability of tertiary and workforce development programs to produce a workforce with relevant skills to support country development goals by 2015 (Goal 2), and increased equitable access to education in crisis and conflict environments for 15 million learners by 2015 (Goal 3). Goal 1 represents a shift from an earlier broader focus on achieving universal enrollment of children in primary school as well as improving the quality of education. In August 2011, USAID issued guidance for implementing the education strategy, directing missions with basic education programs in non-crisis and conflict environments to narrow the focus of their interventions to achieving the goal of improving early grade reading by the end of fiscal year 2012. According to the guidance, missions that were not in conflict or crisis-affected environments were to focus resources on primary grade reading and discontinue programming in such areas as early childhood education, secondary education, or adult literacy. In addition, missions’ programming was to be based on evidence of what works to improve reading outcomes. The guidance stated that the timing of missions’ alignment of education programs with the education strategy was critical because programs required at least 3 years of implementation to contribute to the strategy’s numerical target. USAID requires that missions’ primary grade reading programs adhere to the agency’s performance monitoring and evaluation framework requirements in order to track progress annually against the full set of expected results. Performance monitoring periodically tracks changes to determine whether desired results are occurring and whether projects are implemented as designed. USAID missions and implementing partners monitor programs by using performance management plans or equivalent documents that define what is to be measured, the unit of measurement, and the level of data disaggregation, among other information. USAID guidance for implementing the education strategy requires that these plans include, at a minimum, either of two standard outcome indicators related to primary grade reading, if relevant: The proportion of students who demonstrate by the end of two grades of primary schooling that they can read and understand the meaning of grade-level text. The proportion of students who by the end of the primary school years are able to read and demonstrate understanding as defined by a country curriculum or standards or as agreed to by national experts. While performance monitoring is required for all programs, USAID’s evaluation policy requires performance or impact evaluations of all large projects. The policy states that performance evaluations should focus on questions such as what a project or program has achieved, how it is being implemented, and how it is perceived and valued. Impact evaluations measure the change in a development outcome that is attributable to the project or program, based on models of cause and effect. In addition, USAID’s guidance for implementing the education strategy instructs missions to integrate plans for performance or impact evaluation into program design during the planning stages and to derive data for evaluations from reading assessments. The guidance also states that performance and impact evaluations should be provided by an external, separately contracted team. A comparison of baseline assessment data (i.e., data collected before a reading program starts) and endline assessment data (i.e., data collected at or near the end of the program or before the end of fiscal year 2015) can be used by missions to report on the standard outcome indicators for performance monitoring and by the agency’s contractors to estimate progress toward the goal of 100 million students with improved reading skills by December 2015. USAID officials noted that the need to assess learners toward the end of a school year, which often ends in May or June, may result in some missions assessing learning outcomes later than December 2015. See U.S. Agency for International Development, 2011 USAID Education Strategy Technical Notes (Washington, D.C.: revised April 2012). least two phases of assessment are necessary to measure reading improvement.the Philippines. In fiscal year 2013—the first year in which missions’ education programs were expected to be fully aligned with the goals of the education strategy—USAID allocated about $790 million for basic education assistance divided between programs supporting the education strategy’s Goal 1—improving primary grade reading—and programs supporting Goal 3—increasing equitable access to education in crisis and conflict environments. USAID provided basic education funding to 41 countries for primary grade reading programs in fiscal year 2013. Table 1 shows USAID’s allocations for basic education for fiscal years 2010 through 2014 by appropriation account. More than half of the 2013 funding was allocated for basic education activities in countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, where baseline reading scores were among the lowest globally, according to USAID. Appendix II shows the fiscal year 2013 allocations for basic education by country. USAID’s basic education programs are planned and implemented primarily by USAID’s overseas missions. In Washington, D.C., the Office of Education in USAID’s Bureau for Economic Growth, Education and Environment provides technical leadership, research, and field support. The office also assists in the development, implementation, and evaluation of the USAID education strategy and resource allocation priorities. In addition, USAID’s geographic bureaus advise missions on their education programs. In the five countries where we conducted fieldwork, the USAID missions had implemented primary grade reading programs that included intervention elements recommended in USAID’s guidance related to its education strategy. In several of the countries, the need to develop new reading materials in mother-tongue languages and train classroom teachers in the use of these materials (see fig. 3) resulted in long lead times before fully reaching the targeted population of students. (Table 2 shows information about the programs in the five countries.) As a result, portions of targeted student populations in four countries are not expected to benefit from the programs in time to contribute to USAID’s strategic goal of 100 million students with improved reading skills by December 2015. The programs’ monitoring efforts produced data showing very low baseline reading skills among targeted students. In addition, the programs in the five countries all included plans for external performance or impact evaluations. Our fieldwork at the USAID missions in Ethiopia, Malawi, the Philippines, Peru, and Uganda showed that each mission had implemented primary grade reading programs with elements recommended in USAID’s technical notes to the education strategy (see text box for key recommendations from the technical notes).countries, the programs included teacher training and coaching in reading instruction; outreach to encourage community and parental support for reading during and after school (see fig. 4); and emphasis on five key components of reading—phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. Moreover, in four of the countries— Ethiopia, the Philippines, Malawi, and Uganda—the development of new reading instruction materials in mother-tongue languages as well as training and coaching teachers in the use of these materials were central to the reading programs, according to mission officials. The programs in these countries also included improving reading instruction in English. Instruction in a language that students speak and understand, particularly in the early years of school. Instruction focused on five key component skills of reading alphabetic languages—phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. Teacher training and coaching in reading instruction. Development of instructional material, including textbooks, decodable readers, teaching manuals, and lesson plans. Regular classroom-based, teacher-led assessment of students’ progress. Periodic formal assessment to measure impact over time. Increasing community and parental support for reading, such as support for parent-teacher associations, teacher’s aides, and after-school tutoring. Improving host-country education policy, such as increasing instruction time and adopting mother-tongue curriculum. Capacity building, such as helping host countries conduct early-grade reading assessments. Performance monitoring efforts in the five countries where we conducted fieldwork reveal very low reading skills among targeted student populations. Consistent with USAID’s guidance for performance monitoring, all five programs included in their performance monitoring plans the following standard outcome indicator: “Proportion of students who, by the end of two grades of primary schooling, demonstrate that they can read and understand the meaning of grade level text.” To develop this outcome indicator, program implementers in each country, after reaching consensus with host governments, set benchmarks for reading grade-level text with fluency and comprehension. Program implementers in each country also conducted standardized reading assessments to establish baselines for the proportion of students meeting the benchmarks. Because they are tied to unique circumstances and linguistic differences, the benchmarks may vary by country or language. For example, Ethiopia’s second-grade benchmark for oral reading fluency ranges from 55 words read correctly per minute for Tigrignia to 40 for Hadiyyisa. In Malawi and Uganda, the benchmark for reading fluently is 40 words read correctly per minute. With the exception of Peru, where the host government has well-established benchmarks for grade-level reading, the benchmarks used are not final and may be adjusted as reading assessment data become available for further analysis by program implementers and local stakeholders, such as ministries of education. A USAID official in one of the missions we visited noted that some countries may decide to set more aspirational targets than others to try to motivate regions and partners. Uganda’s benchmark for reading with comprehension is 80 percent of comprehension questions (i.e., 4 out of 5) answered correctly. shows, the program in Ethiopia set similar targets for improving reading despite students’ very low baseline skills. Reflecting the emphasis on program evaluation in the education strategy and other guidance, all five missions where we conducted fieldwork planned for performance or impact evaluations of their reading programs, to be performed under separate contracts with external teams. The missions planned to conduct impact evaluations, using experimental designs that include both treatment and control groups, in accordance with USAID’s evaluation policy, and integrated the evaluation plans in their program designs.