Lao People's Democratic Republic : Secondary Education Sector Development Program (formerly Basic Education Sector Development Program II)

The Secondary Education Sector Development Program (SESDP) is a sector-wide initiative composed of a program loan and a project grant. The program loan supports key policy reforms aimed at strengthening the secondary education subsector across the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, including both lower and upper secondary levels. The project grant finances investments that help put these policy actions into practice and ensure they are effectively implemented. Together, the program and project components address major priorities related to equitable access, education quality and relevance, and stronger subsector management. Although the initiative is national in scope, the project’s access-expansion investments focus on 30 districts identified by the government as both the poorest and the most educationally disadvantaged.

The program directly supports the Ministry of Education in implementing the government’s education reform agenda, with a particular focus on secondary education and on meeting the targets outlined in the Education Sector Development Framework. In line with the country’s ongoing reform priorities and the framework’s three pillars, the combined policy and investment interventions are designed to expand access to secondary education, improve the delivery of the new secondary curriculum, and strengthen management of the secondary education subsector.