Pearson to develop new standards for English language teaching in Saudi Arabia

The English Partnership Management Project is a flagship programme of the Tatweer Company for Educational Services (T4EDU) in implementing King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz’s Project for Development of Public Education, and forms part of Saudi Arabia’s broader education reform agenda to improve the quality of teaching and learning across the Kingdom.

The project aims to improve the English language proficiency of teachers in order to enhance the quality of English language teaching throughout the Kingdom. Under the contract, Pearson has been tasked with ensuring that the quality of English language instruction delivered to teachers meets stringent, international standards. Throughout this project, Pearson will monitor the performance of third party English language training providers who work with the Kingdom’s English language teachers.

The programme will feature a number of initiatives affecting Saudi Arabia’s English language training providers, including:

• creating a new qualification framework
  
• evaluating and certifying English language providers
  
• monitoring providers through a Quality Assurance and Performance Framework that includes performance indicators, benchmarks and data collection methods
  
• conducting quality assurance audits of English language training providers and providing regular reports to T4EDU
• conducting language testing to monitor teacher proficiency before, during and after the period of consultancy
  
• building capacity within T4EDU to continue a programme of certification, evaluation and quality assurance of English language training providers.

Mohammed Asiri, Pearson’s Country Manager in Saudi Arabia, says:

  “Pearson is honoured and delighted to have the opportunity to further establish ourselves as a leading provider of high quality educational solutions in the region and to contribute to Saudi Arabia’s educational development. The signing of this contract follows an announcement earlier in 2013 that Pearson will provide teacher training for the country’s mathematics and science teachers.

"Pearson will draw on its access to leading international education experts to ensure the English Partnership Management Project meets international standards and best practice in educational quality assurance, all the while tailoring the delivery of the rollout to the needs of the Saudi Arabian market."

Pearson has recently announced a public, global commitment to ensure the efficacy of all its products and services and to measurably improve the learning outcomes of those that use them. Mr Asiri says that Pearson’s ‘efficacy promise’ will apply to all of Pearson’s work in the Arab world, particularly the T4EDU project:

“Like all large-scale Pearson projects, the English Partnership Management Programme will be scrutinised to ensure it leads to positive, demonstrable benefits for learners. Pearson is committed to helping learners everywhere progress their lives through learning. We are backing up this promise through our new global education strategy, which includes an Efficacy Framework – Pearson’s approach for ensuring its products and services enable students to learn what they need to make progress. We look forward to reviewing the results of the English Partnership Management Programme following its implementation, and we are confident it will lead to a significant improvement in the quality of English language teaching and learning in Saudi Arabia.”

The English Partnership Management Programme begins early in 2014.