Session: Improving Education Quality and Equity through Strengthening Inclusive Education and Local Accountabilities In Pakistan and Afghanistan: Major Findings (Society for Social Work and Research 31st Annual Conference)

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have intensified the global focus on improving education quality and equity, particularly in Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs), where many children complete schooling without foundational literacy and numeracy skills. Despite expanded access to education, meaningful learning remains unevenly distributed, especially among disadvantaged groups facing intersecting vulnerabilities related to poverty, gender, disability, and ethnicity. Addressing these disparities requires stronger accountability systems grounded in social justice, human development, and the capabilities approach, emphasizing both the intrinsic and instrumental value of education. Our symposium presents four contributions from a large-scale study that uses an interdisciplinary framework to enhance educational quality and equity for all children through strengthened local ownership of a locally defined intervention in rural schools of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The intervention uses Community-Based System Dynamics (CBSD) and child-centered pedagogy, and it sought to (i) improve social accountability mechanisms and learning processes through stakeholders’ engagement, and (ii) evaluate the impact of the combination of inclusive education training for teachers and community-driven action plans on children’s learning experiences. Teachers received training in inclusive and effective pedagogical practices, while community members and students were actively engaged in identifying barriers to inclusion and co-developing context-specific solutions.

The study pursued five objectives: (1) to assess existing learning processes and accountability mechanisms; (2) to strengthen community participation through CBSD workshops; (3) to design and implement an intervention informed by CBSD workshops; (4) to evaluate its impact on children’s learning outcomes using a randomized control field experiment; and (5) to foster national stakeholder engagement in advancing education equity. Across 102 schools, approximately 1400 group model building workshops were conducted in three waves with children, teachers, parents, and school committees. Participants collaboratively developed causal loop diagrams to analyze systemic barriers to inclusion and formulated actionable plans. Supported by NGO partners, schools implemented multiple rounds of interventions, including infrastructure improvements, recruitment of female teachers, provision of learning materials, and enhanced parent–teacher engagement.

The first two papers analyze (i) recordings from CBSD workshops to explore parental perspectives on child inclusion in quality education (first contribution); and (ii) causal loop diagrams to investigate stakeholder understandings of child mental wellbeing and happiness, highlighting variation across gender, socioeconomic status, stakeholder role (students, parents, teachers, school management committees), and geographic context (second contribution). The third paper analyzes the intervention’s impact in Pakistan, where it significantly improved psychosocial outcomes despite major contextual disruptions, including COVID-19-related school closures, political instability, and regime change (third contribution). The fourth paper presents complementary analyses examining impacts on cognitive and non-cognitive learning outcomes and perceived stigma and school discrimination for children with disabilities in Pakistan and Afghanistan (fourth contribution).

Overall, findings underscore the effectiveness of participatory, bottom-up approaches in transforming educational processes and outcomes. By actively involving community stakeholders in diagnosing problems and designing solutions, CBSD fosters locally relevant, sustainable interventions that enhance student inclusion, wellbeing, and academic performance. The symposium demonstrates that strengthening social accountability through community engagement is a critical pathway to achieving equitable and high-quality education in fragile and resource-constrained settings.