A LITERACY CAMPAIGN TO TRIGGER EDUCATION REFORM:

Ecuador’s National Literacy Campaign "Monseñor Leonidas Proaño"

and "El Ecuador Estudia" Program

By Rosa María Torres

Ex-Pedagogical Director of the Campaign

Quito-Ecuador, 1994

Ecuador's National Literacy Campaign "Monsignor Leonidas Proaño" (1988-1990) took place
during the 1988-1992 presidential period of the Izquierda Democrática political party (a social
democratic party), headed by President Rodrigo Borja.

Objectives of the campaign

We defined the following objectives for the campaign:

• Teaching to read and write to the largest possible number of illiterate and semi-literate
youth and adults in the country - those willing to join the campaign.

• Educating secondary-school students in Ecuador's social problems and providing

them with an opportunity to be socially useful, by involving them as literacy educators,
facilitators and supporters.

• Promoting national information and awareness on human rights, including the right to
education for all. (The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was the main content of
the campaign and of the instructional materials for both learners and educators).

• Influencing the regular school system through the active involvement of students, their
teachers and parents in the campaign, and through the development and
dissemination of a new educational philosophy, particularly regarding literacy methods
and approaches.

• Triggering a national discussion on the country's educational problems and

encouraging the building of a social movement in favor of educational reform.

The campaign (its cost was US$ 3 million, financed entirely by the government) included
three phases: planning (1988), literacy education (1989) and final systematization, evaluation
and dissemination of results (1990). An internal and an external evaluation were conducted,
and both merged into one final evaluation report widely distributed throughout the country at
no cost.

Some salient features and lessons learned

Some of the salient features of the campaign were:

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The campaign never aimed at "eradicating" illiteracy in the country. We always said we
aimed at reaching and motivating as many people as possible in order to teach them to read
and write, and to ensure a level of literacy that would enable them to continue learning on
their own if they wished to. Strong emphasis was therefore placed on the pedagogical issues
involved in literacy instruction. Learning achievement results revealed that over 80% of the
learners who completed the campaign were able to read comprehensively a short text on
human rights, and to write creatively about their own experience in the campaign.

Around 350,000 literacy learners (“alfabetizandos”), including children, youth and adults,
were enrolled in rural and urban areas. We established 12 years – not 15 - as the minimum
age. However, as expected, many children under that age enrolled (children with no school
experience or early school dropouts), and many learned together with their parents. Literacy
educators were oriented to organize separate groups for children, youth and adults whenever
possible.

The campaign aimed at addressing the needs of both the illiterate and the semi-literate
(people with some school experience, but with weak reading and writing skills). Thus, among
others, pedagogical instructions for literacy educators included peer tutoring and peer
learning, with those with some school experience helping their less advanced classmates.
Learning results of the campaign, however, showed no significant differences between those
enrolled with some previous school experience and those with none.

Around 75,000 secondary-school students participated as literacy educators. Special

attention was given to their education and training vis a vis their multiple tasks during the
campaign. A two-pronged training program was designed for them. The program lasted 8
months and started 5 months before the actual literacy instruction period. Training included
both (a) distance education (a Literacy Educators' Library consisting of 32 booklets on
different topics that were published weekly and distributed on a massive scale throughout the
country prior to and throughout the campaign) and (b) face-to-face education (one-week
workshops organized with the assistance of educational videos especially prepared for the
campaign).

In order to enhance adult enrolment and learning, every secondary-school involved in the
campaign was instructed to organize two types of brigades: (a) brigades dedicated to literacy
instruction, and (b) brigades aimed at providing support to learners, such as taking care of
young children while their parents -especially mothers- attended classes. Students engaged
in both types of brigades obtained a formal recognition for their contribution to the campaign
and to the country.

Human Rights were adopted as the overall framework and content of the campaign. The
twelve lessons of the literacy primer "Nuestros Derechos" ("Our Rights") were organized
around the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (each lesson refers to one or to a group of
related human rights). The training of literacy educators also focused on Human Rights and
their relationship to Ecuador's realities in the fields of health, nutrition, education, gender
equality, freedom of expression, etc.

Approaches, methodologies and techniques proposed for literacy teaching incorporated

updated trends in literacy instruction and benefited from updated research in this field. The
preparation of literacy materials was based on an analysis of a large sample of literacy

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materials previously produced and used in Ecuador as well as in other Latin American
countries.

The campaign was not conceived as an isolated effort for adult education, but rather as a
strategy to change and revitalize the formal school system. Thus, the campaign was linked to
the formal system in a number of ways:

it was conducted by the Ministry of Education, and involved Universities and

NGOs dedicated to education throughout the country;

the literacy educators were secondary-school students for whom the campaign
was a requisite for graduation, and whose technical advisers and brigades
coordinators were their own secondary-school teachers;

all materials prepared for the campaign -including the 32 booklets of the Literacy
Educators' Library- were distributed to all primary schools and primary school
teachers;

specific training plans were designed for each of the groups involved in the
campaign: secondary-school students, secondary-school teachers, and Ministry of
Education staff at the central, intermediate and local level;

a radio program with pedagogical orientations was broadcast nationally on

Saturdays and Sundays, addressing all these sectors of the teaching profession.

In 1989, the campaign received the Latin American Human Rights Award granted by the
Latin American Association for Human Rights (ALDHU). In 1990, UNESCO-Paris selected it
as one of five adult literacy experiences – the only one from Latin America - to be presented
at a special panel during the "World Conference on Education for All" held in Jomtien,
Thailand (5-9, March 1990). In 1993 UNICEF-New York included this experience in a dossier
of inspiring practices in literacy efforts worldwide.

The campaign was not meant as a one-shot action and as end in itself, but rather as a
starting point of an educational process addressing not only the newly literate but also the
entire society. Therefore, the campaign was followed by the National Program "El Ecuador
Estudia" (Ecuador Studies), which included Adult Basic Education (EBA) as one of its
components. The program aimed at creating a foundation for a wide educational movement
in support of education and educational reform. Within this framework, the Ministry of
Education organized in 1992 the National Consultation "Education 21st Century".

Among others, the national literacy campaign “Monsignor Leonidas Proaño” demonstrated
that:

(a) massive literacy campaigns with wide social participation are possible not only in
revolutionary contexts (such as in Cuba, Nicaragua, China, Tanzania, etc) but also in non-
revolutionary contexts;

(b) effective literacy learning results can be achieved, if pedagogical and technical issues are
placed at the center, subordinating ideological and political interests, and if learning and
quality are also placed at the center, much more than concerns around statistics of coverage,
figures and literacy rates;

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(c) young students can make excellent literacy educators and community organizers if
provided with adequate training and support, empowered and reinforced in their self-
confidence and self-esteem;

(d) public opinion and social participation in education can be achieved through a process
that shows "things happening" and positive results on the ground;

(e) a literacy campaign can be an effective means to build momentum and social commitment
towards a long-term education and pedagogical reform movement.

Skepticism on literacy campaigns is based on a particular stereotype of literacy campaigns.

Effective adult literacy campaigns and programs are possible, when technical aspects
predominate over political ones, when holistic and strategic dominate the scenario, when
learning and learners are placed at the center, and when actions are explicitly articulated to
the school system and its reform as well as to the overall education, social and human rights
policies.

Source: Rosa María Torres, Alfabetización, Derechos Humanos y Reforma Educativa: La

Campaña "Monseñor Leonidas Proaño" del Ecuador, UNESCO-OREALC, Santiago, 1994 (draft,
unpublished).