Assessing the effect of a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on school water, sanitation, and hygiene improvements in the Philippines

Improving water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services in low-resources settings is a challenge. The Department of Education (DepEd) of the Philippines, supported by GIZ and UNICEF, runs the national WASH in Schools (WinS) program which promotes a stepwise approach to reach national WinS standards and foster the institutionalisation of WASH in the education sector. This includes national-level annual monitoring on WASH service levels in schools, information used to set targets and allocate resources. Since 2019, the programme has also included a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) for school staff. This platform provides uniform implementation guidance on WinS in schools across the country. In this analysis, we use annual WASH monitoring data from 2017/2018 (baseline) and 2021/2022 (endline) and compare this against school-level information on MOOC enrolment and completion. We used logistic regression models to assess the relationship between school staff participation in the MOOC and changes in select WinS indicators as well as composite measures used to define national progress. Complete baseline and endline data were available for 27,795 schools. Of those, 5,939 schools had at least 1 teacher enrolled in the MOOC. Overall, MOOC participation was associated with improvements in school infrastructure, maintenance of existing facilities, and promotion of hygiene programmes. The MOOC is a promising key component of the national WASH strategy complementing the annual monitoring process and warrants further investigation in the school management sector.