Thursday, April 2nd, 2026
Building on a multi-year continental effort to map and strengthen school leadership systems across Africa, the African Centre for School Leadership (ACSL) recently completed a critical two-part engagement in Liberia — conducting a national school leadership mapping exercise and convening a national validation workshop in Monrovia on 31 March and 1 April 2026.
The mapping exercise engaged a wide range of national stakeholders, including the Ministry of Education, the University of Liberia, the Liberia University Commission, district and regional education officers, and school leaders and practitioners from across the system. The goal was to deepen understanding of what works in strengthening school leadership and to identify how best to support policy and practice in Liberia. Working in close collaboration with EDC — the in-country implementing partner for the Leaders in Teaching (LIT) initiative — the ACSL team gathered evidence grounded in the lived realities of Liberian school leaders and stakeholders.
While opening the validation workshop Assistant Minister for Teacher Education, Honorable Clifford Konah, Jr., powerfully framed the stakes of the exercise. He affirmed that visionary and accountable school leaders are indispensable in shaping schools that deliver meaningful learning outcomes, and described the mapping initiative as a critical and commendable step — one that ensures reforms are rooted in the life realities of Liberian schools.
“Central to this mission is the recognition that effective school leadership is the cornerstone of a functional, inclusive, and high-performing education system. Visionary and accountable leaders are indispensable in shaping schools that deliver meaningful learning outcomes. In the face of this goal, the initiative to map and analyze the current landscape of school leadership in Liberia represents a critical and commendable step. By emphasizing evidence-based decision-making, this process ensures that reforms are rooted in the life realities of our schools.”
The two-day validation workshop that followed brought together approximately 30 participants drawn from across Liberia’s education stakeholder community. The workshop was designed as an active, participatory process in which stakeholders led the proceedings and qualitatively shaped the outcomes — not merely as an audience to findings, but as co-owners of the evidence and its implications. Participants confirmed what aligned with their experiences, challenged what did not, and surfaced critical gaps not yet captured in the initial findings. Together, they built consensus around three to five strategic actions to meaningfully strengthen school leadership in Liberia.
On its second and final day, the workshop turned toward concrete action. Participants co-developed a context-driven action plan specifying key activities, roles, responsibilities, expected results, and means of verification for the immediate steps needed to advance school leadership development in the country. These priorities were deliberately anchored to current and future Education Sector Plan dispositions, ensuring the long-term sustainability and institutionalisation of the work.
The Liberia engagement forms part of a broader programme of national school leadership mapping exercises being conducted by ACSL across LIT countries, following similar engagements in Sierra Leone, Malawi, Tanzania, and Uganda, as well as a parallel continental mapping effort. The validated findings and agreed strategic priorities will directly inform the next phase of ACSL’s LEAD pillar support in Liberia, contributing to a stronger and more coherent school leadership ecosystem both nationally and across the continent.
