Case Study: A Communication Approach to El Salvador’s EDUCO Education Reform Efforts

This paper, published by the Communication for Governance and Accountability Programme (CommGAP), studies education reform (known as Education with Community Participation Programme – EDUCO) in post-civil war El Salvador and looks specifically at the communication plan that accompanied reform in order to win public support for changes in the educational system. The paper asserts that a "special emphasis on communication strategies can build consensus, inform communities, and improve public support for complex reforms."

In response to a number of communication challenges, the Ministry of Education developed a campaign consisting of integrated media and outreach with programming in print, radio and television. The six thousand newly hired EDUCO teachers served as the primary spokespersons. The Ministry also developed campaigns to promote community participation, and a series of pedagogical conferences aimed at teachers and other education stakeholders. At the same time, the World Bank also placed a particular emphasis on actively engaging critical stakeholders who opposed the reform (former guerrilla group and affiliated unions who had long run their own schools during the war), an effort that "finally succeeded in persuading these groups that most parties shared the same goal – providing education to the poorest communities."

Key challenges to communication included:

• Resistance from opposition groups, including the guerrilla movements and teachers unions;
• Lack of widespread public awareness of basic education reforms; and
• Lack of widespread participation among community members.

Lessons learned from consensus building efforts and the communication campaign included:

• Engage stakeholders early in the process;
• Enable strong ownership of reforms (community and government);
• Ensure negotiation and dialogue as key elements of consensus building efforts;
• Establish key messengers who can work as spokespersons for a campaign; and
• Strategically highlight key aspects of a programme into succinct messages.

The Communication for Governance and Accountability Programme (CommGAP) of the World Bank is dedicated to exploring and documenting the role of communication tools and approaches to improving governance and, as a result, development effectiveness. See Related Summaries below for further publication by CommGAP.