Basic Education Funding: In the fiscal year 2019 State and Foreign Operations Appropriations (SFOPS) Bill, the House of Representatives level funded the basic education account at $800 million, with $90 million designated for GPE. The Senate SFOPS bill includes $515 million for the basic education account and $90 million for GPE. The House and Senate have both passed their respective bills out of committee, but neither has passed the bill in the full chamber. BEC will continue to advocate to Congress to include the higher funding level from the House bill in any final agreement that will be made in bicameral conference negotiations.
We’re also glad to see that this year’s House of Representatives’ SFOPS report contains several of our community’s recommendations, including an increased focus on early childhood education, school-based integrating programing, and local engagement and ownership of development programs.
Community Letter Supporting House Appropriations Funding Level and Report Language: BEC is joining the Global Campaign for Education, RESULTS, and others in a letter to senior appropriators that expresses support for the House of Representatives funding level and report language on international basic education in the final fiscal year 2019 appropriations bill. If your organization is interested in joining this effort, please let Kirby (khenslee@basiced.org) know by close of business on Thursday, July 19th.
USAID Self-Reliance Metrics: USAID has released metrics for self-reliance which will be used to assess countries’ overall development progress. The metric for education is a World Bank indicator which measures student achievement in reading through comparative cross-country international tests by examining the percentage of students attaining a minimum proficiency in reading at the end of primary school.
2018 USAID Progress Report: In June, USAID published a new progress report which provides an updated assessment of the progress made under the 2011-2018 education strategy.