Graduate Certificate - Early Grade Reading in Developing Countries

Under the Education for All initiative in the past decade, many developing countries made huge gains in increasing access to schooling for children at the primary level. However, subsequent assessments have shown that many of these children are not actually learning to read and write in school.
 
The Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2015 noted that:

•  
  Very poor levels of learning in lower primary grades are resulting in millions of children leaving education before acquiring basic skills.
  
  Children who do not learn to read a text or do basic calculations in the lower grades are likely to struggle throughout their school careers.
  
  Their commitment to education is likely to diminish and they are more likely to drop out.

According to the Global Partnership for Education, 250 million children who attend primary school in developing countries are struggling to read even basic words.
 
The global education and international development community is now focused on improving early grade reading in schools in developing countries. However, many development and funding agency staff are not adequately prepared or trained in the specialized knowledge and skills needed to administer and implement effective, research-based early grade reading programs around the world.   
 
The Early Grade Reading Graduate Certificate at UMass Amherst consists of 5 fully-online courses designed specifically for practitioners and policy makers working on early grade reading reform projects. The intended outcome of the certificate program is to:

• Increase the capacity of government and non-governmental personnel to develop, monitor and improve early grade reading programs in developing countries
  
  Provide accessible training to practitioners and policy makers who work in early grade reading but cannot attend university classes in the U.S.
  
  Serve as a stepping stone to a Master’s degree for those who finish the certificate (15 credits) and want to apply to the International Education concentration at UMass Amherst (36 credits needed for a Master’s program).