In Zambia’s rural communities, accessing quality education can be a struggle. Poor infrastructure, inconsistent teacher attendance, and a lack of dialogue between community members and authorities all contribute to students not getting the education they deserve.
“Absenteeism was prominent,” one district education official said. “Most children preferred looking after animals than going to school.”’
Problems persisted because parents and other community leaders were often unaware of how to hold the government accountable in improving education services. Civil Society for Poverty Reduction (CSPR) and Partnership for Transparency (PTF) aimed to change that with the Voice and Accountability: Community Empowerment for Improved Local Service Delivery Project.
The results of the four-year project are impressive. Implemented in 45 schools in the Eastern and Western provinces of Zambia, 98% of trained community members reported enhanced knowledge of their rights around education service delivery. The proportion of education issues resolved by authorities increased from 23% to 64.2%, well above the 50% target.
Here’s how they did it. With funding from the Japanese Social Development Fund (JSDF) and administered by the World Bank, CSPR trained community members on their rights as well as the responsibilities of the government. In addition, CSPR worked with communities to support them to oversee various aspects of education services, including school renovation, administering textbooks, and budget management.
Alex Bwalya, a provincial local government officer, appreciated how community members could support the government in monitoring teacher attendance, and that they had a better understanding of school finances. “They’re able to participate to ensure that they know how much money is coming and they know how much money is used and for what purpose,” Bwalya said. “We find that the results have been very good.”
The project also facilitated conversations among stakeholders to ensure productive engagement, and worked with local civil society organizations to enhance social accountability practices.
“A mother early on mentioned before the V and A project they didn’t know they could actually hold their duty bearers accountable,” Brian Mwiinga, Social Policy Lead for CSPR, said. “They didn’t know that they could walk into the [government education] office and ask for answers. But with capacity building we’ve seen an enlightened citizenry and widened participation from community members.”
The project encouraged participation from women, people with disabilities, and young adults, who are often underrepresented in decision-making. While more work needs to be done to include people with disabilities, women’s participation often surpassed the goals set in the project. Nearly half the participants in social accountability committees were women.
“As a woman, I felt recognized,” a parent-teacher committee member from Western Province said. “In the past, these meetings would mostly be for men, but this time, we were part of every stage—even planning. We contributed ideas on how to support girls to stay in school, especially those from poor households.”
In March 2026, representatives from CSPR, PTF, Zambian government, education leaders and community members attended a legacy event to celebrate the successes and challenges of the project, as well as to discuss how it can be scaled to other areas of the country. At the start of the event, CSPR Executive Director Isabel M. Mukaelabai said that the discussion needed to go beyond the project achievements, and also find ways to encourage the Zambian government to look at this model in terms of scale.
“We want to see children going to school to learn and achieve better outcomes, not to go to school simply for the numbers,” Mukaelabai said. “We want to see improvements in early childhood education and not just in recording the number of centers that have been established. To be clear, that is the learning that is happening–improving key barriers to education in terms of access and delivering on aspects of inclusion.”
