Cambodia has shown remarkable progress in expanding access to basic education by reducing the number of out-of-school children of primary and lower-secondary age from 164,633 in 2000 to 28,581 in 2012 (Source: UIS).

Cambodia has also made great strides in increasing access to early childhood education services in recent years, from just 125 state preschools in 1995 to over 3,400 currently. However, government figures show that 64.7% of Cambodia’s five-year-olds do not have access to early education due to a severe lack of available facilities and resources. Many of these children live in rural areas or come from disadvantaged backgrounds.

International experiences indicate that early education has far reaching positive effects such as better school readiness, lower repetition and drop-out rates and better learning outcomes in primary education.

In order to get the highest return from its investments in basic education, Cambodia knows it needs to urgently invest in early education. As a result, Cambodia’s “Education Strategic Plan 2014-2018” has a strong focus on early childhood education. Cambodia has allocated over 60% of the new $38.5 million grant from the Global Partnership for Education to expand access to early childhood care and development through several different mechanisms.

Exciting programs for preschool education

During a recent mission to Cambodia as part of a Joint Sector Review, we joined members of the Education Sector Working Group which includes government, development partners and civil society partners in several school and preschool visits. With support from the Global Partnership, the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports (MoYES) has plans to build 100 formal preschool buildings or classrooms and introduce 1,000 community-based early childhood education programs and 500 home-based parental education programs. By 2017, the Ministry aims to reach 32,600 children aged 3-5 through the programs reaching 56% enrollment.

The early education component of the grant will also provide intensive pre-service training for early education trainers, teacher training and “core-mother” training for parental education. There will also be support to the country’s 24 national early childhood education resource centers. New and existing community-based and home-based programs will receive learning materials. A communications awareness campaign across the country will help to increase preschool attendance.

Through visits to these different early education programs, we saw first-hand how the Ministry of Education plans to expand what’s working and improve areas where more support is needed.

Join us on a photo journey to see some of Cambodia’s successes and ways you might be able to apply these early education strategies in other countries. 

Formal preschools

Through its education sector plan, Cambodia analyzed the supply and demand for preschool education. It then decided to construct about 100 new formal preschool buildings or classrooms on the premises of existing schools. Preference was given to schools with large numbers of prospective preschool students, with sufficient teachers and with suitable land for construction.  The formal preschool classrooms will welcome 25 to 35 children each.

Preschool resource centers

Cambodia has 24 national preschool resource centers enabling them to provide support to the surrounding schools. Preschool resource centers are designed to be a central location for each district to train teachers and facilitate their experience sharing, store learning materials, and have administrative meetings. ​

Community preschools

The new GPE grant of $38.5 million will provide for 1,000 community pre-schools to be constructed within public areas or utilizing existing community space in selected rural/remote villages.

Home-based education programs

The previous GPE grant supported the launch of 450 new home-based education programs in 10 provinces between 2008 and 2012. The programs work through a volunteer network of mothers led by a volunteer Core Mother. Core Mothers facilitate groups of mothers in local communities to disseminate good practices in caring for preschool children.  During this time, 450 Core Mothers were trained on early childhood development and care focusing on daily activities at home. The new GPE grant will establish an additional 500 home-based preschools.