Ready for school: improved pre-school education for children living in poverty

Project background

Families in Soacha who were displaced and marginalised by the internal conflict in Colombia live in precarious conditions. The children show early developmental delays due to lack of stimulation and affection, as well as malnutrition. Although they are supervised by lay care givers during the day in state-funded neighbourhood day-care centres, their care rooms are not child-friendly and their care givers are poorly trained and unable to support the children in a loving and holistic manner. Many children start school late or with significantly delayed development. This leads to having to repeat a year or dropping out of school early.

Our approach

By providing the lay care givers of 75 neighbourhood day-care centres with training in early childhood care and education, we offer age-appropriate support to 1,200 children affected by poverty. The project team coaches the care givers in their daily routine at work and improves the infrastructure of the day-care centres together with them. Parents become aware of the importance of pre-school care and education. The project team works closely with the state office for children and youth affairs, ICBF. Consequently, we enable the children to develop in a stimulating environment and ensure the continued existence of pre-school facilities.

Project goals

• Of the 1,200 children supported in 75 day-care centres, 90% reach an age-appropriate level of development and are prepared for school enrolment.
• 75 care givers offer professional and qualitatively appropriate care.
• 780 parents and 75 care givers understand the importance of pre-school care and education and a non-violent upbringing and are committed to the needs of children.
• Through lobbying with the relevant authorities, our partner organisation ensures the preservation of the quality-improved neighbourhood day-care centres and develops a new institutional early-stage support strategy.

Impact

A scientific study by the University of Lausanne, which was awarded a prize by the SDC (Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation) and ETH-Nadel (Center for Development and Cooperation at ETH Zurich), proved the lasting effect of our approach: young children from our project showed significantly better cognitive, psychosocial and psychomotor skills on starting school compared to children without project intervention and caught up with the national average. The positive effect was still significantly measurable four and a half years after the end of the intervention, the children achieved better grades and repeated the year less often.

This study and further information on the impact of our project work can be found here.