Facilitating Evidence-Based Educational Management through ICT

ITU Asia-Pacific Regional Development Forum16 May 2012, Bangkok, Thailand

Jonghwi ParkProgramme Specialist, ICT in Education

UNESCO Asia and Pacific Regional Bureau for Education

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Transparent & Effective Governance for Education

• Think about our own country context- A teacher who wants to develop lesson plans aligned with national

curriculum- A headmaster who wants to monitor dropout rates of his/her school

with national/provincial/district averages- A government committee who needs to decide on a new line of

investment on procuring computers for schools

Management and operation of an EMIS

Source: Powell, M. (2006). Rethinking Education Management Information Systems: Lessons from and Options for Less Developed Countries. InfoDev, p.11.

• EMIS is a way to provide the foundation for decision making at every level of the education system.

UNESCO’s Initiatives: OpenEMIS

• Why OpenEMIS?– Deficiency and weakness of EMIS in many countries (lack of robust

information system)– Need for database with basic features common to most countries

• OpenEMIS Main Characteristics:– A generic tool, designed by UNESCO: Adaptable to various country

contexts (administrative & education structure, customized indicators…)– Available to member countries without any restriction (open source

code)– Strong database engine to handle multi-year large datasets (nationwide)– Facilitate the building of an EMIS fitting users needs at various levels

(central, regional, local)– User friendly interface

http://openemis.codeplex.com

For more info, please contact: Mr Pierre Chapelet

(p.chapelet@unesco.org)

MySQL Database

Data replication through LAN or

Internet

EMIS User WORKSTATIONS

Country Level

Regional Level

Local Level(Educational Institutions or Centres)

Setup usingEMIS Builder

OpenEMIS Deployment in Mongolia

Challenges in EMIS

• Evolutionary, not revolutionary• Captures both quantitative and qualitative

information• Customized, responsive, and sustainable • Backed by strong commitment among stakeholders• Includes institutional building and capacity

development for proper collection, dissemination, and use of information

Thank You

j.park@unesco.orgwww.unescobkk.org/ict