SPC launches new Pacific-specific literacy interventions tools

Suva, Fiji – The Pacific Community (SPC), together with its regional education stakeholders, launched two literacy resources during this year’s International Literacy Day (ILD) celebrations. These resources can now be used by Pacific’s educators to strengthen the region’s literacy standards at all levels of education.

SPC launched the regional poetry booklet titled: Voices of the Pacific Youth: A Literacy Learning Tool which provides support to teachers in an effort to improve the literacy standards of the Blue Pacific through the reading of poetry.

Ruci Qele, SPC’s Educational Assessment Specialist – Literacy, explained that “A key point to note about this booklet is that although it was derived from the findings of the Pacific Islands Literacy and Numeracy Assessment (PILNA) 2021 cycle, which has a target group of Year 4 and Year 6 students, this booklet can be used by teachers, educators and even parents to instil the foundations of literacy within our Pacific students, regardless of their year of study”.

The booklet contains poems, illustrations, learning tips and activities linked to the poems to help teachers to teach the different elements of reading skills to their students.

“One other aspect that sets this poetry booklet apart, is that all poems in this collection are written by Pacific poets and the environments established through the poems are very familiar to the intended readers,” Qele added.

Focussing on strengthening post-secondary literacy, SPC also launched the Pacific’s own Education Research Bank. This research bank is a Pacific-developed digital infrastructure that houses education related research information from across the region.

The research bank provides a web-based platform allowing Pacific Island countries as well as existing and emerging development partners to be aware of the research already available in the region.

The research bank is hosted in the Pacific-owned, SPC-coordinated Pacific Data Hub, which serves as a single entry point to Pacific datasets, publications, dashboards and other tools, with financial support from New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

Speaking at the ILD celebrations, Dr Michelle Belisle, Director of SPC’s Educational Quality and Assessment Programme, said that “the Education Research Bank responds to the region’s information management challenges. The bank serves as an open-source platform allowing for the sharing of knowledge from the Pacific, by the Pacific and for the Pacific”.

The bank currently houses 25 research papers received from 8 Pacific Island countries.

This year’s literacy day event also celebrated the 20th anniversary of the region’s own Year 13 programme: the South Pacific Form Seven Certificate (SPFSC). This regional programme, which has been offered in English and as well in French in the recent past, is an outcomes-based qualification provided by SPC. For successful students, the qualification paves the way to enter into tertiary education or employment in the job market.

Ana Raivoce, Director of the former South Pacific Board for Educational Assessment (SPBEA) and the Chief Guest of the event, explained that “The practical application of Literacy requires a medium, and that medium is language. Here in the Pacific, twenty-seven countries, all members of SPC, each has its National Language. In most cases these languages differ from each other. But in all cases, the function of the language is the same – communication between people”.

Through this event, SPC has celebrated the interventions that were developed by keeping the Pacific people’s education at the heart. For this reason, SPC has localised the theme for this year’s literacy day to “Enhancing literacy through multilingualism: Promoting peace across the Blue Pacific Continent”.

Following the event, SPC will be working to distribute the newly launched literacy intervention tools with Ministries of Education across its 15 member countries.

Read more about ILD 2024 here.