Partnering with government for scaling education innovations

What’s the difference among government permission, support, engagement, and co-creation?    

 Many promising programs and innovations meant to improve public education start outside government. They’re designed elsewhere and introduced into schools or other public education system levels as pilots or short-term projects that last a couple of years. The ultimate scaling goal for these innovations varies by context and situation, but often there’s an expectation that eventually government will become convinced of its value and will adopt, adapt, and embed the innovation into the education system so it becomes the new-and-improved normal.   

Yet fostering government buy-in is neither easy nor well-understood. Part of the challenge is that it’s not always clear to scaling teams exactly what kind of government buy-in they are seeking and how it will change over time as scaling progresses. 

Clearly distinguishing among different types of government engagement is essential to scaling success. Drawing on Millions Learning’s many years examining education scaling efforts throughout low-and-middle-income countries (LMICs), we identified four different types of government engagement related to education innovations: permission, engagement, support, and ownership. With increased clarity, practitioners, funders, and others working to scale impactful innovations can more carefully target the right kinds of government relationship at the right time for the right purposes—as well as be reciprocal and thoughtful in flexibly maintaining or adapting government engagement as the scaling proceeds. This commentary discusses the four types and highlights examples from two teams from the current KIX-ROSIE project.  

Four types of government engagement  

Permission is when government, typically at the local level, allows an outside team to pilot, implement, or scale the team’s innovation or project in some schools or other location. This work is usually externally funded; staffed by the innovation organization, philanthropy, or international aid; and follows a short-term project cycle. While permission to test out and refine an innovation is essential for long-term sustainability, it does not mean that the government has decided (or even is willing) to adopt, implement, and support the program themselves now or in the future. However, it can be a good way for innovation teams to refine their efforts, demonstrate effectiveness of the innovation, and catalyze interest. In fact, this is a step best not avoided because teams that begin scaling work without securing permission may run into problems later when they choose to seek deeper engagement with government.  

Support is when one or more government actors or offices actively champion or endorse the innovation. This kind of buy-in typically does not include government funding. If well chosen, individuals or offices (we previously identified six types of champions), can play useful roles in encouraging the scaling. Supporters can foster community demand, identify policy windows that outsiders might miss, and connect the innovation team with others inside and outside government. However, one must not mistake support from a few individual actors or a single office with formal or widespread public-sector support. And one must be realistic about who has decision-making authority in the system (hint: it might not be your champions). Finally, it’s crucial to consider how to manage government turnover because supporters may leave or change priorities along the way.  

Engagement is when some government actors (including public teachers, school heads, inspectors, and policymakers) participate in planning, research, or internal decision-making for the innovation as well as its in implementation and scaling. This involvement might be funded through in-kind resources from the government, or by external philanthropy or aid. The feedback and collaboration from this engagement can be instrumental for understanding which aspects of the innovation can easily scale within the existing education system, which will need to be adapted or removed for scaling success, and who’s going to drum up additional long-term support. However, once again, engagement does not necessarily mean there’s long-term support. Engaging government should be focused on what is feasible as much as it is on what’s ideal.    

Co-creation is when education innovation project teams and governments work together to design, implement, revise, and embed an innovation in the current education system. Co-creation often begins with identifying the problem to address, and then government actors authentically contributing to the design, testing, and adaptation of an innovation that addresses the chosen problem. Co-creation often means the government is expected to be responsible for some combination of implementation, financing, monitoring, maintenance, and more. However, co-creation can be challenging for education innovation teams because it typically requires releasing control; relinquishing fidelity; and sacrificing some of the recognition, branding, and even funding the team once had. It’s also a long and difficult process for a government to pay for, deliver, and maintain the innovation and ensure its impact. 

Two examples of education actors pursuing government buy-in: Sydani and Educate!  

Early-stage research and development   

The Sydani group in Nigeria leads an applied research project through GPE KIX on pre-service teacher training in Nigeria. This work started in 2024, putting it currently in the early stages of research and development. However, even at this early stage, the Sydani team had already considered how to bring in government and foster long-term buy-in from the outset. Even before the project began, Sydani worked with the National Commission for Colleges of Education (the principal entity that regulates activities of colleges of education in Nigeria) to select its project sites and identify relevant gaps in policy and policy implementation. This consultation contributed to the development of the innovative multi-dimensional teacher training model that Sydani is now piloting.   

One of the first things the project team did was obtain relevant permissions from the Ministry of Education and Ethical Committees. This process of obtaining permissions gave credibility to the project and made the government aware of the project’s work and goals. After government permissions were obtained, the team sought the support of stakeholders such as the National Teachers Institute, the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria, and the Nigerian Education Research and Development Council. These stakeholders helped to review and refine the teacher training modules and materials. This engagement allows their perspectives to contribute to the work early as well as lay a foundation for future support for scale-up and sustainability.  

One lesson learned is that it’s not enough to simply get permissions or support on paper: it’s the personal relationships that can initiate long-term buy-in. During the kickoff and assessment phases of the project, Sydani engaged provosts and key officers of all six participating colleges of education in person and visited the colleges as a team. These visits built trust which will lead to more effective interactions at the implementation sites later.  

Existing scaling research has shown that innovation teams often engage government engagement too late—after they have results from their work and have established ways of operating. While waiting may seem efficient, it risks creating unsustainable innovations because government input was not incorporated in the design, and government actors were not engaged in the development of materials or review of pilot evidence. When government officials and practitioners engage with scaling efforts from the beginning, there’s increased understanding, broader support, and deeper commitment to the project’s success. 

Another example, this one from Rwanda, illustrates how co-creation and engagement can operate in the later stages of scaling.   

Later-stage or ongoing co-creation for scaling   

In Rwanda, a youth employment organization called Educate! has been working with partners and government decision-makers for years to develop a tech-enabled national database for evidence-based decision-making in schools, districts, and the central education office around the country’s competence-based curriculum. Government buy-in has been present from the beginning.   

First, the project team met with policymakers to understand their data needs and map how, when, and where government officials used data in policymaking. Next, the government, Educate!, and other partners established a national “Core Panel” that jointly designed learning projects and assessment rubrics aligned with the national curriculum and the project goals. Together, the core panel partners piloted the work of embedding the assessments in the database. This provided an opportunity for government and Educate! to view and predict issues around implementation and build a solution that would adequately address the logistical challenges as well as promote a culture of evidence-based decision-making in Rwanda’s education system.  

For the next stage, the Educate! research team is brainstorming how to work with government not just to design the data systems, assessments, and dashboards—but also to encourage and support government (and teachers!) to use and take ownership of the platform and make it useful for their work. As Paul Carlile (2004) has written, until local users take up an innovation as their own, true system transformation cannot occur.  

Educate!’s example highlights that government buy-in is not a single activity but rather an ongoing relationship in which partners continuously work together to learn, discuss, troubleshoot, and strengthen the systems to which they’re committed. Co-creation is a process of moving from understanding the problem together to collaboratively designing and testing a solution into building capacity for sustainable and productive use of that solution.  

Promoting the mindset shift  

Moving away from viewing government buy-in as simply a broad goal or project output toward, instead, seeing it as a complex, dynamic process woven into the entire scaling journey is crucial. Understanding the four different dimensions of government buy-in can help. And finally, the examples here demonstrate the truism that moving beyond simple government permission to messier but ultimately more beneficial aspects of seeking government support, engagement, and co-creation positions a project team toward increased likelihood of sustained impact of their innovation at scale. For more scaling principles and examples, please see Millions Learning.