British Council – English Connects

British Council - English Connects

Sub-Saharan Africa

2019 - 2021

Countries

Lead M&E Consultant(s)

Nicky Hockly, Gavin Dudeney & Guillem Bonilla, Michael Watts and a team of six additional TCE consultants

Project Overview

Funded by the FCDO and managed by the British Council, the English Connects programme aims to connect the UK to young people and future leaders in francophone and lusaphone Africa through English; to improve the employability, resilience, and networks of young people; and to support senior policy makers in this endeavour. TCE carried out summative evaluations of the multi-strand English Connects programme in 12 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) for two programme phases (2019-2020; 2020-2021).

Approaches & Outputs

TCE used a mixed methods approach to collect, triangulate, and analyse data from the 10 ‘sub-programmes’ included in this programme. Outputs included: 12 literature reviews, a theory of change and a large logframe with 100+indicators, an evaluation plan, a range of qualitative and quantitative evaluation instruments, progress and final evaluation reports.

Impact On

Big data analyses on Telegram and WhatsApp groups members impacted 5,000+ English language teachers and trainers, and 300+ English language learners.

Challenges

Changes included a move from f2f, in-country teacher training in the first phase, to fully online provision in the second phase due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the subsequent integration of WhatsApp and Telegram groups for learning and support. These large online groups generated thousands of interactions, posing a challenge for analysis. This was addressed by utilising big data analysis techniques, to provide statistically relevant and meaningful findings.

British Council – English Connects