Lao PDR has demonstrated high political commitment to reform its teaching workforce. The Ministry of Education and Sports (MoES), in its Annual Education Meeting in 2019, confirmed the high priority it accorded to teacher education and development. The Department of Teacher Education has been instructed to lead development of a teacher policy and form a working group to move forward. The International Task Force on Teachers for Education 2030 (TTF) along with the UNESCO Bangkok Asia and Pacific Regional Bureau for Education is supporting this process.

The Teacher Task Force is providing financial support for the process, while the UNESCO Bangkok office is committed to coordinating and monitoring the policy development processes on its behalf, ensuring articulation with on-going sector reforms and local education groups (LEGs) activities. UNESCO Bangkok has developed synergies with national level development partners and is providing support to the MoES in development of a national comprehensive teacher policy. Further, the summary version of the Teacher Policy Development Guide (translated into the Lao language) and the full Guide were shared with the Department of Teacher Education, to provide support to the unfolding national level process.

The Teacher Task Force in coordination with UNESCO Bangkok is supporting the following specific planned activities;(a) finalization of the MoES teacher education sub-sector plan 2021-2025; (b) developing synergies with existing programmes (like CapED) and development partners (UNICEF); and (c) conducting a situation analysis of the teacher-related policies. Follow-up activities have also been planned such as the organization of: (a) a consultation to discuss findings from the situational analysis; and (b) a workshop to establish an action plan to guide development and drafting a comprehensive teacher policy.