The Sahel is the geographical transition zone lying between the Sahara Desert and Africa’s tropical regions. Five countries lie in this huge region—Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauretania, and Niger—which often share development projects. The technical and financial partners, such as the European Union, UNESCO, the World Bank, and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), support the Sahel Initiative, which is an essential component of international aid in Africa.

This region is confronted with numerous challenges, particularly security and terrorist threats, but also with a demographic crisis. Indeed, the region is witnessing one of the most rapid demographic growth rates in the world. According to the World Bank (2021), “On average, the fertility rate in Sahel countries is 6.4 children per woman compared to the [sub-Saharan Africa] average of 4.7, with Niger having the world’s highest rate and all five countries in the top 25 globally” (p. 40). The development indicators for the Sahel are amongst the lowest in the world, with more than 40% of the inhabitants living below the level of extreme poverty and with only 21% of the population having access to quality health care (World Bank, 2018). As a result, the region is faced with almost a million more school-age children each year, which places a heavy burden on its already fragile education systems and educational infrastructures. According to the World Bank’s White Paper on Education in the Sahel (2021), in Mauretania only one primary education pupil in six benefits from a school textbook. In Niger, this figure falls to one pupil in eleven. The Sahel region also has one of the highest teacher/pupil ratios in the world (1:41); that is to say, three times the average ratio in higher-revenue countries. In these circumstances, it is problematic for the pupils to receive adequate attention and instruction (World Bank, 2021).

The five countries of the Sahel region, therefore, represent an area where the quality of education is inadequate and does not allow these countries to sustain economic and social development strategies by 2030. Among the recommendations to improve teaching quality, the most obvious is the transformation of the learning environment in the schools. However, this is not possible without a thorough revision of educational policies and, particularly, those focusing on the teaching staff. The first part of this article proposes to conduct an analysis of the fragility and insecurity of education systems in these five countries. The second part sets out to conduct a more precise diagnosis of present educational policies. We will analyze pre-service and in-service training, recruitment, and the status and distribution of the teaching force. The third part presents a series of suggestions that may, if applied, improve educational policies in the Sahel between the present day and the year 2030.

We drew the data employed to support the discussion in this article from several different sources: first, the most recent sectoral plans and national and international reports on the teaching corps; next, we have employed the UIS data base (http://uis.unesco.org/fr) in order to amass comparable indicators for the five countries; finally, we used data from PASEC (Programme d’analyse des systèmes éducatifs de la CONFEMEN—Analytical Programme of CONFEMEN’s Education Systems) 2014 and 2019 (http://pasec.confemen.org) to illustrate the present situation of the teaching personnel and their professional competences.

The present situation: The main indicators of the sustainable development goals 4 (SDG4) are unattainable

Even if the main indicators of SDG4 are subject to numerous reproaches (Akkari, 2018), they remain a good yardstick of common international markers used to estimate the quality of education in a given country. These indicators provide access to information on the teaching personnel, who should be considered as a key element in any educational ecosystem; in this way, teachers are absolved from being uniquely responsible for the difficulties encountered in various educational situations. These indicators also allow an analysis of educational infrastructures, their financing, and the political stability or economic growth in the conditions studied. For our analysis, the selected indicators (educational expenditure, completion rate, learning outcomes) concern primary education and the first cycle of secondary education, representing the foundation of basic education.

Educational expenditure

Table 1, further above, and Figure 1, immediately above, present the evolution of public expenditure for primary education as a percentage of GDP in the Sahel region between 2010 and 2020.

Table 1 Public expenditure on primary education as a percentage of GDP.
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Figure 1
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Source: UIS (2023)

Public expenditure on primary education as a percentage of GDP.

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We can observe that the progression in each of these five countries is rarely without ambiguity and displays modest changes. Three countries have shown a declining trend over the analyzed period (Burkina Faso, Mauritania, and Niger). Nevertheless, the figures show that, despite a decrease in the educational budget, there have been isolated improvements (for example, Burkina Faso in 2013 or Niger in 2015). One of the explanations—proposed for Niger but theoretically applicable to the other countries—is connected with the distribution of national expenditure: it is probable that the increase in expenditure devoted to security measures undermines any further national effort, however necessary, to finance basic education (République du Niger, 2019). Even so, Chad and Mali have—over the same period—increased their educational expenditure.

One must, nonetheless, observe that the last two countries were already experiencing poor financing for public education in 2010. It is, therefore, a case more of catching up rather than a true increase. According to the World Bank (2023), public expenditures on education as a percentage of the governmental budget were 21.6% in Burkina Faso, 16% in Mali, 15.1% in Chad, 12% in Niger, and 10.5% in Mauretania. The average for sub-Saharan Africa is 14.3%.

Table 2, below, provides an overview of the evolution of public expenditure for the first cycle of secondary education as a percentage of GDP in the countries of the Sahel region between 2010 and 2018. The trend is toward a general decline or stagnation.

Table 2 Public expenditure on the first cycle of secondary education as a percentage of GDP.
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Overall, educational investments and the financial commitment by the countries of the Sahel region have declined over the last ten years. However much the international community contributes, it cannot overcome the shortfall in national financing. Our understanding of this situation is that this financial decline is probably linked to two limitations: the international economic crisis worsened by the Covid-19 pandemic; and, particularly, expenditure on security, which has been increasing due to the persistent Jihadist threat in these five countries.

The completion rates for primary education and the first cycle of secondary education

Among the multiple indicators enabling us to observe the progress of an education system toward a target of quality is the completion rate for primary and the lower cycle of secondary education. Figure 2, below, indicates a modest advance in the completion rate for primary education in the Sahel region over the last decade. Mauritania and Mali report a completion rate of 40‒50%. Niger and Burkina Faso, between 30 and 40%. Chad remains stable at around 30%. Despite some progress, however, the rates remain particularly poor for girls and may be an indication of inadequate infrastructures or the need to promote greater gender equity.

Figure 2
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Source: UIS (2023)

Completion rate for primary education (%).

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What is very clear from these figures is that the goal of achieving a completion rate of 100% by the year 2030 will be difficult and probably impossible to reach. However, this must remain the primary and most important objective of educational policies. Indeed, the presence of children and young people at the school is vital for the literacy of the population, even though it is not a sufficient condition.

Figure 3, further below, shows the evolution of the completion rate for the first cycle of secondary education. Mauretania and Mali confirm their good position for primary education, with a completion rate of between 25 and 30% for this level of education. The three other countries have completion rates below 20%, with Niger achieving not even a 10% rate of completion for the first cycle of secondary education. It is interesting to compare the differences between countries in the net enrolment rate for schooling during the first cycle of secondary education and their completion rate.

Figure 3
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Source: UIS (2023)

The completion rate for lower secondary education (%).

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Despite limited access, some education systems are better at retaining their pupils to the end of the cycle (Mauritania, Mali). The social and economic development of a country requires a population educated to the end of the first cycle of secondary education. In fact, this period in the life of a young person equates to entry into vocational education, continuation with the second cycle of secondary education, or the beginning of active working life. These three routes contribute to a country’s economic and social development and to the population’s self-sufficiency, but all three of them require the young people to have a higher level of literacy skills—and that means a better completion rate. It also seems probable that the completion of the first cycle of secondary education is a useful guarantee preventing the return to illiteracy that may happen to children who do not go beyond primary education.

Learning acquisition and access to school textbooks

Measuring the learning acquisition of pupils who have completed primary school is a useful indicator in estimating the quality of education in the countries of the Sahel region. Figure 4, below, provides some interesting results. In general, a minority of pupils manage to acquire the minimum reading level. Burkina Faso is the best placed of the three countries for which we possess data. Chad has the lowest percentage of pupils who have acquired the minimum level required for reading, and Niger occupies an intermediate position. There is one hopeful sign in this troubling scenario: it appears that the pupils’ skill levels improved between 2014 and 2019, particularly in Niger and, above all, in Burkina Faso. These two countries recently underwent curricular reforms and have introduced bilingual education on a large scale.

Figure 4
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Source: PASEC

Proportion of pupils who achieved at least a minimum level of literacy at the end of primary education (%).

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While the availability of school textbooks forms a key element in improving the quality of learning, Figure 5, further below, draws attention to the faltering and at times decline in expenditure for school textbooks and other teaching materials. On this point, as we have already emphasized regarding the global expenditure on primary education as a percentage of GDP, international cooperation cannot compensate for the State’s lack of commitment in the provision of school textbooks essential for learning. It is probably necessary to redesign the entire process for the production and distribution of school textbooks. Moreover, the lack of access to educational materials (textbooks, reading books, etc.) should be compensated among pre-service and in-service teachers by training that takes account of this shortcoming. The future teaching staff, as well as those currently employed, should be shown how to produce their own teaching materials as a way of achieving universal access to school textbooks. The digitalization and on-line open resources developed during the pandemic may be interesting tools in the process of local production of teaching materials.

Figure 5
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Source: UIS (2023)

Expenditure on school textbooks and other teaching materials as a percentage of the total expenditure in public primary education establishments.

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The first part of this article has drawn attention to the uncertainty of the conditions for teaching and learning in the Sahel countries. The benchmarks that the international community have introduced for education in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development will not be reached without the rapid introduction of an ambitious educational policy in the coming years. In the second part of this article, below, we discuss current data concerning teachers in this region.

Data on the teaching profession

We have available a certain amount of interesting data on the teaching profession in the countries of the Sahel region. These data provide us with a macro-analysis of the true nature of the profession. It would, nevertheless, be appropriate to moderate our words concerning the reliability of these data since some anomalies have at times been observed between those provided by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics, the World Bank, and national sources.

First, we can see that the salaries of teaching staff in all the Sahel countries represent between 60 and 90% of all the expenditure on primary education (Figure 6, below). As a result, the recruitment of new teaching staff represents the keystone of educational policies and spending in the region. Particularly interesting and contradictory from a comparative point of view is that the country that spends the most on teachers’ salaries (Chad) achieves the lowest outcomes with regard to learning acquisition at the primary level. Without doubt, in that country the unbalanced territorial distribution of teachers and the omnipresence of unqualified and uncertified teachers (called “community teachers”) undermine improvements in learning acquisition.

Figure 6
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Source: UIS (2023)

The salaries of teaching staff as a percentage of total expenditure on public primary establishments (%).

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Second, it is useful to examine the situation of teachers. Figure 7, below, shows that for 2020, the most recent year studied, the ratio of the number of pupils per teacher in primary education varies from 40.6/1 in Mauretania to 86.6/1 in Chad. In the latter country, the general decline in this ratio observable in the other countries has not taken place.

Figure 7
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Source: UIS (2023)

The teacher/pupil ratio in primary education (based on the number of staff).

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In third place, teachers’ qualifications seem to be improving since, in 2020, all five countries reported that more than 80% of teachers were trained, as shown below, in Figure 8. Nevertheless, it is necessary to interpret with caution the positive result for this indicator given that qualification is measured on the national scale by the diploma or the current legislation governing access to the teaching profession. Moreover, the quality of training has an important bearing on the teaching skills acquired: the authorization to teach is therefore an important but not sufficient indicator to measure the quality of an education system.

Figure 8
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Source: UIS (2023)

The percentage of qualified teachers in primary education between 2012 and 2021.

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As far as in-service education is concerned, Figure 9, below, shows that the vast majority of teachers had received in-service training over the previous twelve months. However, it seems reasonable to doubt the effectiveness of this high percentage to the extent that it has not resulted in an observable improvement in the completion rate nor in the pupils’ learning. According to the World Bank (2018), a considerable number of teaching staff are employed without a certificate of professional competence: 39% in Burkina Faso; 46.7% in Chad; 41% in Mali; and 90% in Niger.

Figure 9
figure 9

Source: UIS (2023)

The percentage of primary teachers who have undergone in-service training over the previous twelve months.

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In this section of the article, indicators about the teaching profession have shown particularly that, to understand the difficulties facing an education system, we must analyze data in an eco-systemic manner. Referring to the figures presented in the two preceding sections, it would seem that financial investment in the teaching corps has not reduced the identified problems in the education system. In fact, teachers should benefit from high-quality training and adequate educational resources, and the conditions for teaching should be taken into account in analyzing the causes and solutions to these problems. Indeed, the level of class supervision for the pupils’ learning remains particularly weak in the region.

Understanding—as well as reaching—the sustainable development goals established by the Agenda would seem to depend on global activity across the education system. After having provided a few comprehensive and comparative indicators on teachers in the countries of the Sahel region, as well as on their working conditions, it would be useful to put forward some elements for a diagnosis. We organize the following discussion on the basis of some key questions.

Who wants to be and can become a teacher in the Sahel?

To answer this question, an initial observation typically ignored is that of the present social origin and school career of candidates for the teaching profession in the Sahel. Despite the fact that during the period following independence, the teaching profession attracted the children of eminent persons and the first generations of educated Africans, today the profession has become a choice by default. In other words, candidates do not choose it as a vocation or by commitment but are attracted by the stability of employment, as well as by the possibility of entering the civil service, the most important provider of official employment in Africa.

Teaching in the Sahel is therefore a “profession by default”, through the lack of other professional opportunities. Furthermore, it seems essential to say that the quality of young people who wish to become teachers depends upon the quality of the primary and secondary education that they themselves received; however, regarding those levels of schooling, all studies have shown the poor quality of pupils’ knowledge and learning. The massive and systematic use of contract teachers and the decline in the status of civil servants have also affected the profession and its working conditions. The majority of teachers have taken second jobs and may therefore be preoccupied with other concerns when teaching. It is a paradox that the entry requirements in terms of a diploma have been raised without resulting in a higher quality of teachers.

How are teachers in the Sahel trained?

Given the shortcomings concerning the lack of vocation and motivation to teach and the poor level of knowledge among student-teachers, it is essential to provide pre-service training of quality. Unfortunately, despite numerous reforms and attempts at improvement, one can state that, in these five countries, training is poor, with little accommodation reserved for professional practice. The competences of the teacher-trainers are rarely questioned. The weak competences of the teacher-trainers are rarely addressed and are far from international standards.

The multiplication of access paths to the teaching profession (civil-servant teachers, contract teachers, community teachers, volunteer teachers, etc.) and the poor quality of pre-service training from one institution to another have contributed to the decline in pre-service training. Furthermore, the qualifications of the pre-service teacher-trainers should be questioned, improved, and supervised. It is essential to examine the length of training, the time devoted to professional practice, the management of the training courses, the methods used in pre-service training that do not respect the curriculum, and the lack of educational follow-up and correspondence with the curriculum.

How is recruitment for the teaching profession conducted, with what resources, and on what basis?

We have seen the enormous challenges that the Ministries of Education in the countries of the Sahel region are facing in having a sufficient number of qualified teachers, as well as sufficient internal and external revenue to pay them. In the Sahel region, the level of teachers’ salaries remains a taboo subject. It is important to remind ourselves that, if we employ as a comparative indicator the relationship of teachers’ salaries to GDP per inhabitant, civil-service teachers in the region are among the best paid in the world. The level of remuneration of civil servants, out of proportion to the wealth of the country, prevents governments from recruiting a sufficient number of civil service–trained teachers able to satisfy the needs of countries troubled by a demographic explosion and the necessity of reducing the teacher/pupil ratio. It is essential to take advantage of teacher retirement by adopting a teacher salary scale that national public finances can support and sustain.

To satisfy the needs of schools, the countries of the Sahel region have launched a massive recruitment drive in recent decades for contract and community teachers. This recruitment of teachers, who have an increasingly fragile status and salaries in line with what the national education budget can support, has resulted in a heterogeneity of levels of status, salaries, and pre-service training for the profession of teacher. This sometimes leads to absurd situations, such as that in Chad where the education system functions essentially with community teachers that the State continues to recruit, despite the difficulties in absorbing recently qualified teachers (Djy Djimoko Jeth, 2021).

How are the teachers deployed?

This fourth question is connected with the deployment of teachers at the national level. This concerns the distribution within these ministries between “chalk-and-talk teachers in the classroom” and “teachers with administrative responsibilities”, as well as their geographical distribution in the different parts of the countries of this region. The balance between urban and outlying districts should be a priority measure in teacher policies. While the countries of the Sahel region more than ever need teachers in the classroom, we note an excessive growth in the number of teachers assigned to administrative tasks. This is a key problem for the management of the education system, where 5–10% of teachers with administrative responsibilities enable the education system to function smoothly under good management. On the other hand, to have 20, 30, or 40% of trained teachers occupied with administrative tasks equates to an immense waste of educational resources, without taking into consideration that it contributes to a major increase in the pupil-to-teacher ratio and therefore a decline in the quality of education that students receive.

As far as the territorial distribution of teachers is concerned, we can note a concentration of teachers in the towns and in some regions that are essentially urban. The rural or remote regions suffer the ill effects of this unequal distribution. These areas, therefore, suffer classes without teachers or overcrowded classes, which affects learning.

In the final analysis, our examination of teacher policies reveals the immense challenges to be addressed if teachers are to make a substantial contribution to the improvement in the quality of education in the countries of the Sahel region between now and the year 2030. Table 3, below, summarizes main findings and challenges for teacher policies in the Sahel.

Table 3 Findings and challenges for teacher policies in the Sahel
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Realistic and applicable propositions

For many years, stakeholders have agreed upon numerous reforms to improve educational and teaching policies in the countries of the Sahel region. However, if we want these countries to approach some of the targets of SDG4 for 2030, it is imperative to establish some programming ideas that could change the game if they are followed resolutely. At the level of pre-service and in-service training, it is urgent to thoroughly reorganize pre-service training by:

  • Promoting practical and vocational training, educational and teaching competences, the control and mastery of curricula, the respect of curricula by future teachers, and the recruitment of competent and qualified teacher-trainers;

  • Organizing complementary professional in-service training for community teachers who have received neither pre-service training nor the diploma required for teaching and yet continue to be recruited, particularly for remote and rural regions;

  • Introducing a system of grants for the most deserving candidates for pre-service training, at the same time as implementing a policy of positive discrimination (with the obligation for the participants to spend a minimum period in public service) for certain categories (such as women, ethnic minorities, rural students) and for those regions experiencing difficulties in recruiting teachers locally;

  • Organizing pre-service professional training alternating with continuous in-service training rooted/accountable within the schools and reflecting the teachers’ and the schools’ actual needs. This signifies a proper scheme of life-long training for the teachers.

Concerning the recruitment and deployment of teachers, the long-term solution consists of abandoning the model of the teacher as a national civil servant in favour of the teacher recruited by local/regional authorities and accountable to the local community (Serpell, 2013). This paradigm shift, which requires the decentralization of education, will take time but is necessary for an appropriate distribution of teachers. To regionalize the distribution and the management of teachers is an alternative that will rapidly come to fruition if it is accompanied by the regulations and controls required for its implementation. Transparency in recruitment, the harmonization of statuses and salaries, and the employment of resources generated by raw materials to finance education and particularly the teachers’ salaries, will all be welcome measures.

Finally, it is important to introduce, separate from the pre-service training institutions, an evaluation and support mechanism for teachers when they take up their duties. This mechanism can be employed at different moments in the teacher’s career:

  • Upon entering training: to evaluate the basic knowledge of future teachers and their suitability for the profession as well as to introduce any necessary remedial measures;

  • Upon entering service: to evaluate the educational and teaching competences of the certified teachers as well as their thorough familiarity with curricula;

  • At regular intervals during their career (at least every three or four years): to evaluate teachers’ educational and teaching competences as well as their ability to follow the curricula and to reflect on their evolution. One may also evaluate their participation in in-service training programmes and the updating of their knowledge. It is possible to imagine that this evaluation would take place at the local/regional level according to a standardized approach; for example, in the context of the studies developed by PASEC.

Conclusion

Over the past decade, there have been a considerable number of studies and analyses of educational policies and teachers in the countries of the Sahel region. Nevertheless, this article has shown that there is a long way to go to reach the SDG4 goals for 2030. It seems to us that the discrepancy between “the present situation” and the “speed of change” arises from a lack of prioritization in the choice of educational and teaching policies. To declare that everything is a priority is likely to end up in accepting the status quo. It is absolutely essential to to have regional discussion and enforce agreed-upon policies on these matters in order to harmonize the solutions to the common issues in the Sahel.

The alternative that we propose is to choose a maximum of four or five realistic objectives and to provide the means to implement them effectively in the field. As far as the conditions of teaching and teachers are concerned, these realistic objectives could be:

  1. (1)

    To limit the number of pupils per class to 50, each one provided with a seat and a desk in all-weather classrooms protecting the pupils and the teacher from the elements and creating a favourable learning environment, while reflecting the local and cultural environment (this means avoiding thatched and corrugated iron roofs!).

  2. (2)

    To provide all primary pupils with a minimum of two schoolbooks (reading and maths) in the classroom and at least two textbooks (reading and maths) for the home. It is also necessary, when taking the decision to introduce them, to provide these books in the national languages. For all schoolbooks, in whatever language, it is essential that the lessons should be culturally embedded.

  3. (3)

    To ensure that 100% of the pupils at the end of primary education know how to read and write, and have achieved the minimum skill level in reading and in mathematics.

  4. (4)

    To ensure that 100% of primary teachers enter the profession with an educational level equivalent to the end of the second cycle of secondary education and have undergone pre-service educational and professional training (pre-service, complementary, or in-service) lasting a minimum of three years and organized according to a national certification scheme for competence aligned with the curriculum foreseen for primary pupils

Achieving these realistic objectives will require both the necessary resources and the highest political leadership at the national and international levels. Greater involvement of all the educational stakeholders—in the forefront of which should figure the teachers and their representatives—should provide an indisputable contribution.