Albania

Albania has made improvements in access to education and in raising learning outcomes over the last two decades, moving from one of the lowest performers in the Western Balkans to one of the fastest improvers. Recent reforms include the development of a competency‑based curriculum framework, teacher standards and a school evaluation indicator framework. Most recently, Albania has restructured key agencies responsible for school support and external evaluation, in an effort to further deconcentrate central functions and improve service delivery. However, disparities in opportunity and outcomes persist across population groups. Albania has one of the highest rates of dropout in the Western Balkans, and a large share of students in Albania continue to leave school without mastering basic competencies needed for work and life. Addressing these educational challenges is crucial for improving Albania’s economic development and competitiveness as it looks toward joining the European Union (EU).

This chapter looks at how Albania can make better use of school evaluation to improve teaching and learning practices. Albania has central procedures for conducting external school evaluations, but very few have been undertaken in recent years. A recent re-organisation of the country’s school evaluation system aims to increase capacity to conduct evaluations and also provide more support to schools. However, some changes may compromise the quality of evaluations. These include the spreading of responsibility for external school evaluations across multiple bodies. In addition, ongoing systemic challenges in Albania limit schools’ ability to meaningfully respond to external evaluations and their annual self‑evaluations. In particular, schools are underfunded and have minimal to no autonomy to make budgetary decisions. Schools are also hindered by a lack of strong school leadership. Albania is addressing this challenge through the establishment of a new School of Directors to train and certify principals. Albania also needs to consolidate responsibility for external school evaluation and provide greater technical and financial support to schools to act upon external and internal evaluation findings.

This review was undertaken in partnership by the OECD and UNICEF in close collaboration with the Ministry of Education, Sports and Youth in Albania. It builds on the collaboration between the OECD Directorate for Education and Skills and UNICEF, benefitting from our organisations’ complementary experience and expertise. The review provides an analysis that is grounded in the context of educational evaluation and assessment in Albania, while drawing on international research and best practice from around the world.

Albania has made improvements in access to education and in raising learning outcomes over the last two decades, moving from one of the lowest performers in the Western Balkans to one of the fastest improvers. Recent reforms include the development of a competency‑based curriculum framework, teacher standards and a school evaluation indicator framework. Most recently, Albania has restructured key agencies responsible for school support and external evaluation, in an effort to further deconcentrate central functions and improve service delivery. However, disparities in opportunity and outcomes persist across population groups. Albania has one of the highest rates of dropout in the Western Balkans, and a large share of students in Albania continue to leave school without mastering basic competencies needed for work and life. Addressing these educational challenges is crucial for improving Albania’s economic development and competitiveness as it looks toward joining the European Union.

This chapter looks at how the assessment system in Albania measures and shapes student learning. A key challenge is how to bring practices into line with an ambitious new competency‑based curriculum. While policy promotes modern, formative approaches, many teachers lack the skills and support to apply such methods in the classroom. Summative testing continues to dominate, with teachers requiring more help on how to provide feedback and use assessment data to help students advance. The national assessment and examination system could also be strengthened in order to provide more reliable information on the extent to which students are meeting national learning expectations. This chapter suggests ways to do this, including by making fuller use of digital technologies.

This chapter explores how Albania’s appraisal processes and related teaching standards, career structure and professional learning policies could better develop teachers’ competencies. While Albania has a range of appraisal processes, they are not designed to support teachers’ professional growth. In addition, teachers’ professional development remains underfunded, which contributes to a lack of effective job‑embedded learning opportunities. Albania needs to revise its appraisal processes and teacher career structure and further invest in professional learning to help its existing teacher workforce develop more complex knowledge and skills. Albania also needs to address factors that may dissuade the best candidates from entering the teaching profession, including onerous procedures for certification. Finally, Albania needs to ensure that initial teacher education programmes are equipping future entrants with the student‑centred approaches and other competencies they will need for the classroom.

Since the 2000s, Albania has improved access to education and raised learning outcomes. However, educational attainment and performance continue to be strongly influenced by students’ background characteristics. Learning levels remain among the lowest in Europe. This reflects systemic challenges of low funding, unstable governance and limited capacity. Placing student learning at the centre of Albania’s evaluation and assessment processes can help to focus the system onto raising standards for all.

Albania has been proactive in strengthening its institutional, regulatory and operational environment for SME development since the 2012 SBA Assessment. The Business Investment and Development Strategy for 2014-2020 frames the country’s policy for promoting the SME sector. Albania has introduced a new e-government portal which eases business operations and launched a new tax filing system which allows for the online filing of all taxes. The National Business Centre acts as central one-stop shop for businesses. In addition, Albania has improved its policy framework for entrepreneurial learning. Going forward, the government should pay particular attention to formalising its regulatory impact analysis and developing a proportional approach to its use. It should strengthen the institutional support mechanisms for bankruptcy by developing an early warning system and second chance programmes. The Albanian government authorities should ensure that actions outlined in its strategies are systematically implemented, monitored and evaluated. Developing the necessary infrastructure and financial instruments will be necessary to promote innovation within SMEs. Targeted support services would help SMEs acquire the skills to move into knowledge-intensive sectors. Non-banking sources of finance remain limited and should be broadened.

A team of examiners and the OECD Secretariat visited Albania in October 2013 as part of the peer review of Italy. The team met Italian development co-operation professionals, partner country civil servants, other bilateral and multilateral partners, and representatives of Italian and partner country civil society organisations, the private sector, and local and regional authorities as well as parliamentarians.

Albania has experienced strong economic growth in recent years. This occurred alongside a shift in national output from agriculture and industry to services and construction. Despite being one of the poorest SEE economies, the country has weathered the global financial crisis quite well. It is the only South-East Europe (SEE) economy where real GDP growth is expected to remain positive in 2009. Real GDP had increased at an average rate of 6.2% between 2005 and 2008, one of the highest rates in the region. The International Monetary Fund and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) both forecast positive real GDP growth in 2009 of 1.8% and 3% respectively (IMF, 2009; EBRD, 2009).

The Albanian Constitution states that all individuals are equal before the law and that “no person will be unjustly discriminated against due to his or her sex”. Legislation makes provisions for treaties to supersede national law and the parliament has ratified CEDAW. Despite these signs of progress, however, much of Albanian society remains highly patriarchal.

An initiative launched by UNDP in Albania seeks to mobilise people to promote their development through their own resources and to participate in the decision-making process actively. The project is based on the fact that a participatory approach to community development requires responsible, well-informed and pro-active people. The results show that mobilisation works best if it is institutionalised within local government, and if the latter has developed a role of catalyst, providing guidance to the community, creating an enabling environment, facilitating fund raising and institutional support. Local government officials can usually play this role effectively provided that their capacities are enhanced to the required level. Training should be targeted towards the staff involved in planning and decision making on local development initiatives, and should include advice on accounting procedures.