A Conversation with Constance Kwaa Ababio, Policy & Advocacy Manager, IDP Foundation
In this edition of PurposePhil Pulse, I’m honored to share a conversation with Constance Kwaa Ababio, Policy & Advocacy Manager at the IDP Foundation, Inc.. From her beginnings in a rural Ghanaian village near the Côte d’Ivoire border to shaping national education policy conversations, Constance’s journey is a powerful reflection of what systems change truly means when it’s rooted in lived experience. At the IDP Foundation, she leads efforts to elevate low-fee private schools, often overlooked in policy discourse, into the national education agenda, all while advocating for more inclusive, equitable approaches to serving all learners. In our exchange, she reflects on the personal and professional paths that brought her full circle, from being a student in one of the very schools she now supports, to becoming a trusted voice in education advocacy. Her story is a compelling testament to leadership grounded in empathy, persistence, and the power of remembering where we come from.
I will start by thanking you for the time and for your commitment. I’d love to hear a bit more about what you currently do, your role, who you work with, and what this involves.
Thank you very much, Nora.
I work at the IDP Foundation as the Policy and Advocacy Manager. The IDP Foundation is a private family foundation headquartered in Chicago, but we also have offices in the UK and in Ghana. Our operations are active in Ghana and Kenya, where we support both school-level work and systems-level engagement.
At the school level, we are an active funder and supporter of the affordable non-state schools, or, as we say in Ghana, low-fee private schools. These are schools that have developed organically. In many communities, there are no public schools, so entrepreneurs and individuals take it upon themselves to establish schools to ensure that children are not left out.
Because these schools start with little or no support, they often struggle. The infrastructure may not be the best, and school owners may lack the knowledge or expertise to manage sustainably. That is where IDP Foundation comes in. Through partnerships with local organizations, we provide school leadership training for proprietors and owners to help them understand the concept of running a school sustainably.
Beyond that, we work with financial institutions to improve their access to finance. This helps them organize their books, plan better, and generate resources to keep the school running. We also have interventions that focus on improving learning outcomes and supporting teachers.
We’ve been doing this since 2008 in Ghana and have now expanded to Kenya. I joined the foundation in 2020, this October marks five years. I came in at a time when the foundation wanted to strengthen its approach to advocacy. They had done a lot of work at the school level and was in the process of strengthening policy and advocacy work for system change.
I helped develop the advocacy strategy, which I now lead. My work involves building relationships with ministries, agencies, and supporting key actors in education, ensuring that the sector we support, especially low-fee private schools, is visible and included in national policy planning and implementation.
It’s been an amazing journey. Not always smooth, but we are progressing.
That’s wonderful. Before joining IDP, how did you enter the education field? Was there a moment or inspiration behind it?
Interestingly, growing up, if someone had told me that I’d end up working in education, I would have said no, that’s impossible!
In my extended family, most of my cousins and relatives were either teachers or nurses. Whenever we met during festive seasons or funerals, the teachers would share how difficult their work was, large class sizes, limited resources, low pay, and little recognition. They would say, “Don’t become a teacher. Maybe try something else.”
My mother is a retired nurse, and she wanted me to follow that path. After high school, she gave me money to buy nursing school forms. I went to the school, walked around, and immediately felt I didn’t belong there. I came back home and told her, “I can’t be a nurse. I’m going to the university.”
So, for a long time, education wasn’t even on my radar.
After my master’s degree, I joined a think tank in Accra that worked across social sectors, health, gender, and education, doing policy and budget analysis. I became familiar with the education system: how resources are distributed, what the main challenges are, and how government decisions are made. Over time, I developed a strong understanding of the system and started contributing to conversations about what needed to change.
Years later, I joined the IDP Foundation. What really intrigued me was their focus on private schools, more specifically, low-fee private schools. I thought, “Why private? Why not public?” And then I realized: I had attended a low-fee private school myself.
I grew up in a village close to the Ghana–Côte d’Ivoire border. There were no electricity and very limited infrastructure. Most of the professionals there were teachers, nurses, or immigration officers because of the border. We had public schools, but performance was poor.
Families who could afford sent their children to boarding schools in bigger towns because they knew the chances of progressing to secondary school were higher there. But others didn’t have that option. In my community, someone decided to start a low-fee private school, just a wooden structure, really, but it filled a need. Families enrolled their children there.
What I remember most is the level of accountability. Even though our teachers weren’t formally trained, they showed up and took responsibility for us. Compared to many public schools nearby, the difference in how we learned and expressed ourselves was clear.
So, when I joined IDP Foundation, I thought, “This is full circle.” The type of school that helped me get here is exactly the kind of school we are supporting. I often think, if IDP had existed then, how much more impact could my school have made?
That’s such a personal connection. And now you work at the systems level. “Systems change” has become a buzzword in education, how do you interpret it in your work?
It’s true, “systems change” can mean different things to different people.
For us, it starts with looking at the education system holistically. We ask: are all children learning? And by “all,” we mean both public and private school learners.
In Ghana, when people talk about education systems, they almost always mean public schools. Policies, programs, funding, everything revolves around them. But when you look at the data, close to 40 percent of Ghana’s learners, especially at the pre-tertiary level, are in private schools. If we only focus on the public side, we are leaving nearly half of the learners out of the conversation.
So, for us, systems change includes a mindset shift, understanding that the education landscape is dual, even multi-layered. Government, as the duty bearer, has a responsibility to serve all learners. That means fostering collaboration and partnerships that bring everyone into the process.
We do this by generating evidence, publishing reports, and participating in key policy discussions and supporting key actors to engage. We constantly draw attention to the fact that education doesn’t happen in silos, it’s one ecosystem.
That’s an important point. You mentioned partnerships before, what kinds of partnerships are you building, and what have you learned so far?
Partnerships happen at different levels.
At the community level, we see families enrolling their children in low-fee private schools because there are simply no public schools nearby. The government has the duty to provide education for all, but population growth is outpacing the rate of school construction. So we ask: can government meet families halfway?
Can we explore public–private partnerships where government provides subsidies for children attending low-fee private schools until more public schools are built? That could shorten the time it takes to achieve universal access.
At the policy level, IDP Foundation supports inclusive policymaking. For example, we fund new policies and programs that are implemented in both sectors. Even though we focus on non-state schools, we believe that policies should consider the entire education sector.
Now, in terms of what we’ve learned, patience. Everything in Ghana is influenced by political cycles. You might start a promising discussion with one government, and before implementation, there’s a new administration. You start over with new people, new priorities.
And another thing, I used to think money was everything. When I worked at the think tank, I believed that if you went to government with money for a project, they would jump on it. But over time, I realized that resources alone don’t drive change. Money can only catalyze progress.
You need connection. You need evidence. You need to constantly engage. You need to be close to the people who make decisions. Sometimes you even need beneficiaries in the room, to show why it matters.
Money is good, but it is not enough. You need all the pieces, trust, relationships, timing, alignment, to come together before you see real results.
That really captures the nuance of advocacy. Shifting gears a bit, how would you describe your leadership style? Has it evolved over time?
That’s a tough question. I’m still learning and evolving, but I’d say I thrive on collaboration.
When I work in a team, I want everyone to be on the same page. It takes longer to get things done, but it pays off because people feel part of the process. It also makes it easier to come back later, reflect, and make improvements together.
I’ve worked in fast-paced, competitive spaces before, where people wanted to shine individually. That experience taught me the balance between excellence and collaboration. I’ve learned to be both thorough and effective.
Working in advocacy requires patience and listening, traits I’ve developed over time. And at IDP, because we’re a small team, I work directly with leadership, including the CEO. That exposure shapes my approach. I’d describe my leadership as collaborative, reflective, and grounded in empathy. I don’t see myself as a bossy or overly competitive leader, I prefer to bring people along.
You mentioned empathy and being reflective. How has being a woman, and a woman from rural Ghana in particular, shaped your leadership journey?
In Ghana, especially in rural areas, the higher you go in education, the fewer women you see. It’s the same in the workplace. When I first started working full time, I often found myself as the only woman in a room of 200 or 300 people. It was intimidating.
Earlier in my career, I walked into meetings where my age and gender were immediately linked to inexperience. Before I even spoke, it was assumed I wasn’t qualified to lead the conversation. It was uncomfortable, but I learned important lessons about confidence and preparation. In that same moment, someone in the room spoke up in my defense and gave me the opportunity to contribute. These experiences showed me that allies exist, even in unexpected places.
At IDP Foundation, I’ve been fortunate. The culture here is inclusive and empowering. I’ve been given opportunities to represent the organization in high-level meetings, lead conversations, and continue learning, all while balancing family life. But outside that environment, bias still exists in some places.
There’s still a cultural mindset, often tied to tradition and religion, in extreme settings, that say women should be quiet while men lead. That’s changing, but slowly. We need more advocacy and more examples of women leading successfully to shift that narrative.
Women bring empathy, attention to detail, and a holistic perspective. The more we have in leadership, the stronger the sector becomes.
Looking ahead, what is your vision for education in Ghana over the next decade?
I’m ambitious. I would love to see a Ghana where every child has access to education, where government reaches all communities. It’s possible with the right systems, fiscal discipline, and efficient use of resources.
But if that’s not yet achievable, then we should focus on practical steps, what I call the “low-hanging fruits.” That includes leveraging public–private partnerships to reach the most underserved areas faster. Government for instance can post trained teachers to low-fee private schools or provide subsidies for learners in such schools until government schools are accessible.
And at the policy level, I want to see a day when IDP Foundation and our partners doesn’t need to be in the room for government officials and stakeholders to remember the non-state sector. It should be automatic. Whenever we talk about education, we should be thinking about all learners, public and private alike.
A Ghanaian child is a Ghanaian child, regardless of the school they attend.
A beautiful vision. Before we close, is there anything else you’d like to add, something we haven’t covered yet?
Yes. As part of our advocacy work, we’ve started to also focus on teacher licensing.
Most teachers in low-fee private schools are unqualified and don’t meet the government’s minimum qualifications, which now require a degree. But many are dedicated and doing incredible work. We’re exploring how to create a flexible system where such teachers can gradually meet those qualifications without being pushed out of classrooms.
With the global teacher shortage, we can’t afford to lose passionate educators. In some public schools, children go to class and find no teachers at all. So how do we empower people already teaching in their communities to gain accreditation and continue serving?
That’s the conversation we’re starting. Because until we recognize and support teachers, especially those in underserved schools, we won’t achieve real change.
Looking ahead, I want to see more young professionals, believe that they can shape education policy and advocacy conversations. If more of us bring our voices, evidence, and lived experiences to the table, the education system will reflect the realities.