Beyond the Workshop: Building an Evidence Ecosystem in the MENA Region

Rawan Awwad, Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Manager at Queen Rania Foundation, reflects on her work supporting evidence-informed education projects in Jordan through the GEE project.

Over the past year, I have found myself at the centre of an ambitious effort, co-funded by the Queen Rania Foundation (QRF) and the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF). This effort, called the Athar project, aims to build a stronger evidence ecosystem for the education sector in Jordan and the wider MENA region.

The Athar project brought together hands-on implementation, capacity building, and partnership to create genuine buy-in from diverse stakeholders — from university faculty to ministry leaders. But looking back, the most profound lessons weren’t in the technical details; they were in the cultural shifts we began to witness. These are my personal reflections on that journey.

1. Turning ​“Evidence” from a Technical Term into a Shared Language

When I first started working on evidence generation, the terminology felt like a fortress. Concepts such as impact evaluation, counterfactuals, or quasi-experimental methods were viewed as academic abstractions, not practical tools for decision-makers.

However, through our partnership with global evaluation leaders — delivering the Impact Evaluation: Methods, Advocacy, and Scalability course — I watched a shift occur. By co-developing technical materials with both local and international experts, we moved away from jargon and toward application.

A key step in this journey was the impact evaluation course delivered in Amman in January 2025, which brought together major education stakeholders for a hands-on introduction to evaluation design. The course was led by Professor Howard White and focused on practical decision-making — how to choose the right evaluation approach, interpret findings, and apply evidence in real policy contexts. The content is now available as a self-paced Arabic massive open online course (MOOC), making these tools accessible to a much wider audience across the region.

We learned that for evidence to be used, it must first be understood. Creating accessible, context-appropriate resources in Arabic was the key to turning ​“evidence” from a specialist’s tool into a shared language.

2. Democratizing Access: The Power of an Arabic-First MOOC

One of my biggest realizations was that in-person workshops, while deep, are inherently limited. You can only fit so many people in a room. To truly build an ecosystem, we needed to democratize access to this knowledge. Developing public goods to support evidence-informed decision making should constitute a part of the movement. Democratizing this knowledge will have the added benefit of supporting the international research community to develop shared standards for primary research, as well as support intermediaries, researchers, and decision makers alike to access important information such as the cost of delivery and factors that influence implementation.

We took a leap of faith and filmed our January 2025’s in-person training, adapting it into a MOOC on the Edraak platform. The response was humbling and far exceeded our expectations.

In just the first quarter (July – September 2025), we saw 3,471 enrollments.

What struck me most wasn’t just the volume, but the diverse identities of the learners:

Beyond Borders: While we started in Jordan, the hunger for this knowledge spans the region. Learners joined from Saudi Arabia (38%), Egypt (21%), and Jordan (8%), proving that the demand for evidence-based skills is a regional phenomenon.

Empowering Women:59% of our learners were female. While data science remains a male-dominated field globally—our experience tells a different story. Seeing such high engagement from women professionals suggests that digital platforms are uniquely positioned to bridge gender gaps in professional development.

Diverse Academic Backgrounds: While many held Bachelor’s degrees (51%), we also saw engagement from those with high school education (21%), showing that interest in ​“what works” in education isn’t limited to Ph.D. holders
 

3. The Ripple Effect: How Capacity Building Translates Into Change

This experience taught me that the barrier to generating new evidence and use wasn’t a lack of interest — it was a lack of accessible, Arabic-language content. When you remove that barrier, the community shows up.

Perhaps the most rewarding part of this journey has been listening to the practitioners and researchers who participated in our training. Their reflections showed that the skills they gained are already rippling out into their institutions in numerous ways, including:

Policy Influence: Trainees reported using their new skills to influence decisions in ministries and national centres, analysing data for international studies like PISA and TIMSS with greater confidence.

Practical Application: From designing new diagnostic assessments to updating teacher performance evaluations, participants are applying rigorous methods to real-world problems.

Knowledge Sharing: Almost all respondents said they shared what they learned with colleagues. This is how an ecosystem grows — organically, person by person.

4. Measuring What Matters: A Window into the Student Experience

Working on the development of the Reading Motivation and Support Scale as a part of the project gave me a new appreciation for the power of measurement. The Scale is a survey tool that measures students’ motivation, attitudes, and environmental supports that influence their reading habits.

It reminded me that some of the most important factors influencing education cannot fit in a standardised test. Creating tools to measure motivation and enjoyment required us to ground the instrument in international literature while ensuring it reflected the cultural reality of Jordan. Developing such measures is not just a technical exercise; it is an act of advocacy for recognizing the broader, human dimensions of learning.

5. Stakeholder Engagement: Creating Buy-In, Not Just Agreement

A recurring challenge was moving stakeholders from polite agreement to active ownership. I learned that technical rigor is not enough; relevance matters just as much.

Trust is the currency of evidence. Stakeholders support evidence when they see themselves in it — when it addresses their priorities or reduces uncertainty in their decision-making. Evidence becomes powerful only when stakeholders feel it was generated with them, not for them.

Looking Ahead

Building an evidence ecosystem is not a single project; it is a long-term cultural shift. My reflections so far show that the journey is just beginning. If the past year has taught me anything, it is that people in the region are eager for evidence when it feels practical, respectful, and relevant. When that happens, evidence becomes a tool not only for accountability but for collective learning and better futures for our students.