Free and universal public education is provided to all children, including children with special needs, from age 6 through age 15 (or completion of Grade 8), which corresponds to the FSM Compulsory Education Age. The education system of the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) has four levels: Early Childhood Education (ECE) for ages 3–5, elementary education for ages 6–13 (Grades 1–8), secondary education for ages 14–18 (Grades 9–12) and post-secondary education. Currently, ECE is not compulsory in FSM; however, ECE has been publicly provided since 2005, building on the US federally funded Head Start Program, which was implemented in the early 2000s.

The FSM education governance system comprises the national department of education (NDoE) and the four state departments of education (SDoE). NDoE is responsible for setting national standards, including school accreditation, teacher certification, school curriculum standards, benchmarks, and student assessments. NDoE is responsible for reports on the status of education across the country, provision of technical assistance as appropriate, and coordination of external funding aid for education. The SDoEs in each of the four states is responsible for providing direct educational instructions, including their curriculum development based on the national framework and in-school assessments.

To support the broader goal of compulsory ECE for all 5-year-old children in FSM, the Government has successfully secured 2.5 million USD from Global Partnership for Education (GPE) through the Education Sector Plan Implementation Grant (ESPIG). The National Department of Education (NDoE), supported by UNICEF Pacific, conducted many consultations with relevant national and state-level stakeholders in 2020 to develop an ECE Program Document to achieve 1-year compulsory ECE for the 5-year-old children in FSM. FSM National and state-level operational plans and budgets have been developed and endorsed by NDOE and SDOEs to support the implementation of compulsory ECE starting in August 2023. A series of activities are outlined to be implemented by NDOE at the national level and SDOEs in each of the four states to ensure FSM is fully ready to roll out compulsory ECE from August 2023.

Systematic and coherent coordination, communication, monitoring, and reporting of the operational plans and budgets are critical to ensure the scheduled activities under the operational plans are significantly advanced to support quality and equity-focused implementation of the compulsory ECE in 2023. Technical support is also needed to build NDOE and SDOE’s capacity to roll out the operational plans effectively. The purpose of the national consultancy is to support NDOE in effective and efficient coordination, communication, monitoring, and reporting to implement the operational plan and budgets successfully.    

Reports