Inauguration of a training center in Abidjan, PROPARCO is supporting the development of the Mission Laïque Française

published on 01 February 2021
Côte d'Ivoire
  • logo linkedin
  • logo email
Inauguration Centre MLF Abdjan
The historical operator for French education abroad has inaugurated its training center which will contribute to the development of innovative education in West Africa. It has been set up with financing allocated to the Mission Laïque Française in February 2020 by AFD Group via its subsidiary PROPARCO

While there has been a sharp increase in school enrolment in recent years, Côte d’Ivoire is maintaining its commitment to improve the quality of teaching. In this context, private education widens education provision and offers complementary high-quality services.

This training center is for Mlf teachers and is open to other private institutions in Côte d’Ivoire. It will contribute to establishing a recognized quality of teaching and a strong local base by allowing over 3,000 teachers to benefit from 5 years of skills and/or diploma training based on pedagogical methods.

Through this center, MLF wants to “build a homogeneous and academically certified teaching and administrative staff adapted to the contexts of the establishment of institutions, ensuring that French education is also a source of inspiration for national education when this is required on the ground.”

By financing the training center through a €1.7 million grant from the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs (MEAE), PROPARCO is giving teachers the opportunity to access high-quality training with more affordable fees.

“France is extremely pleased to be participating in this major common challenge of building quality education. Teacher training is the cornerstone of this. With a grant from the State, we are proud to be contributing, through this project led by our partner MLF, to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal N° 4: Access to quality education”, said Fatoumata Sissoko, PROPARCO’s regional director for West Africa.

“The Mission Laïque Française firstly devises training as an element of a common culture to motivate staff and, secondly, as the product of a network of expertise based on initiative, sharing and a dynamic of curiosity for establishment projects. The basic idea of professional development is to involve the stakeholders by supporting exchanges, pooling and a sharing of questioning and reflective analysis”, said Jean-Christophe Deberre, Honorary President of the Mission Laïque Côte d’Ivoire. 

The Mission Laïque Française (MLF) is a non-profit association set up in 1902. It operates and supports a network of 133 French educational establishments abroad. It has a total enrolment of over 60,000 students in 39 countries, including 30,000 in its own schools. 

PROPARCO is also financing the modernization and extension of the MLF network. This financing includes a grant from MEAE which has contributed to financing the development of two regional training centers for teachers, in Morocco and Côte d’Ivoire, as well as an energy efficiency and sustainable development program to assist MLF with certain construction projects financed by PROPARCO.