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Support to the Ministry of Education in the Implementation of the Catch Up Programme in Luapula Province
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Challenge
In recent years, Zambia has made strong progress in increasing access to education for marginalised learner groups. However, the country is facing a learning crisis. Children are attending school but do not achieving basic literacy and numeracy. In Luapula Province, specific challenges persist: school attendance for children aged 7 to 13 is well below the national average (LCMS 2015); the pupil-teacher ratio is by far the highest in the country (MoGE 2023, Education Statistics Bulletin 2020); and it has the highest dropout rate for primary level, reaching 2.7% for male students and 3.2% for female students, compared to national averages of 1,6 and 2,0% for male and female students respectively (MoGE 2023, Educational Statistical Bulletin 2016).
Although the learning crisis is multidimensional, one of the root causes is that primary school teachers are not properly equipped to teach foundational skills. Remedial teaching methodologies can support teachers to help their learners catch up and ensure effective learning throughout primary education.
Goals
Primary school learners in grades 3 to 5 in Luapula Province have acquired foundational literacy and numeracy skills.
Project Partners
Approach
Teaching at the Right Level (TaRL) is a highly effective, evidence-based remedial teaching methodology. Teachers start with a short, individual assessment of each learner on literacy and numeracy, which is then used to group learners based on their level of performance rather than their age. For one hour each day, before or after regular lessons, teachers alternately teach literacy and numeracy skills through playful activities, tailored to the level of the learners.
In Zambia, TaRL has been known as Catch Up since its pilot in 2016. VVOB has been a partner of the Ministry of Education in piloting, implementing and evaluating Catch Up, since this initial pilot. Through partnerships with financial, research and technical partners, the scale of Catch Up has increased, and the programme is currently implemented in 8 provinces and around 5,000 primary schools.
To widen Catch Up’s scope while also ensuring sustainability and relevance, this project is built around two pillars:
- System strengthening: VVOB supports the capacity of the Ministry of Education staff at all levels and through all phases to embed Catch Up-related activities in their work and become “master trainers” of TaRL to train, support and mentor teachers on Catch Up.
- Low-cost innovations: considering the challenging circumstances in Luapula specifically, VVOB is exploring low-cost innovations aiming to improve mentoring and monitoring, and enhance data management and use at the school, zone and district level.
As a cross-cutting theme, newly developed teaching materials that focus on gender and address the topic of sexual exploitation and abuse have been incorporated into Catch Up trainings.
By the end of the programme
- Key government staff (at all levels) and school staff:
- Effective and innovative Catch Up teaching and learning methodologies were delivered in all 682 schools across the 12 districts in Luapula Province using standard Catch Up materials in the iciBemba language as well as newly developed, piloted and revised reading materials. 2,050 teachers, 56 Master Trainers, 758 mentors, and 796 school administrators were trained to deliver the methodology, exceeding the original target of 1,896 teachers and 632 mentors.
- Gender-focused teaching materials addressing sexual exploitation and abuse were incorporated into Catch Up trainings as a cross-cutting theme across all districts.
- Best practices on learning platforms for continuous capacity development and peer-to-peer learning were shared and documented. Provincial teams reviewed capability plans and developed detailed action plans to close identified capacity gaps. The Catch Up coordinating committee conducted learning visits to the province to bridge national and provincial levels, and in 2025, 36 National Master Trainers (4 from Luapula) were identified and trained to sustain this peer-learning structure.
- The Ministry of Education, UNICEF and VVOB:
- worked with the Ministry of Education staff in Luapula Province to identify, test, evaluate and share the results of two potentially cost-effective innovations to improve school support systems for Catch Up. The Catch Up online portal was piloted and tested in all 12 districts to improve data accessibility and management, and piloted the Raspberry Pi innovation in three districts (36 provincial and district staff oriented) to improve teacher capacity building.
- These innovations were incorporated into the scale-up plan for Catch Up. Two Catch Up Coordinating Committee members were assigned as liaisons between the National Master Trainers and the committee, laying the groundwork for these innovations to feed into the national scale-up plan.
- Learner outcomes
- The programme reached 104,537 learners in Grades 3–5, 31% above the original target of 80,000. Learners able to read at least a simple paragraph rose from 40% to 67%, a 27 percentage-point increase. Those able to do double-digit subtraction rose from 30% to 63%, a 33 percentage-point increase. And the share of learners unable to recognise 2-digit numbers fell from 13% to 3%, a 77% relative reduction.