Côte D’Ivoire Education Minister, Kandia Camara, is the first winner of the Harvard Ministerial Medal of Achievement. When Minister Camara was invited to participate in the annual Harvard Ministerial Leadership Forum in June 2018, she had been in office for seven years already, but she faced an uphill struggle. She because Minister in the wake of a devastatingly destructive 10-year civil war. Despite significant resources allocated to rebuilding the education system in the years after the civil war, enrollment rates and outcomes remained well below national targets and international standards.
Minister Camara came to Harvard with a 10-year sector plan that included a strategic focus on “accelerating the development of human capital and the promotion of social wellbeing” as well as a target education budget of 6% of GDP. What the Minister needed was a roadmap for how to achieve this broad goal. A core element of the Ministerial Forum curriculum is focus on legacy, as the defining strategic objective of Ministers’ tenure in office. Legacy must focus on a clearly defined national priority, with measurable targets and achievable within set timelines. At the end of an intensive week at Harvard, Minister Camara had a clear and motivating legacy goal: Achieve a school enrollment rate of 100% by 2025 and improve the quality of education to ensure a literate population with the necessary skills for the development of our country.