On March 11, 2024, sixty reform and development leaders from 23 selected countries celebrated their completion of a four-week Development Entrepreneurship Online Course (12 Keys to Successful Policy Reform). Development Entrepreneurship is a proven model that helps leaders identify and introduce policy reforms that foster positive developmental change.  It consists of 12 principles centered on the behavior of leaders, the process of identifying and introducing public policy reform, and the criteria of what makes a policy reform effective.

During the course, participants learned about  Adaptive Management, Adaptive Operations, the 12 Principles of Development Entrepreneurship, and its real-life applications to policy reform. They interacted via Zoom on the first three Fridays of the four-week course. They also answered pop quizzes and surveys. In their last assignment, they described their own reform ideas.

Congratulatory speeches from esteemed guests marked the commencement ceremony. Through a recorded message, Ambassador HK Yu of the Australian Embassy in the Philippines commended the learners who have now become part of a community of more than 300 Development Entrepreneurs. The Country Representative of The Asia Foundation, Mr. Sam Chittick, applauded the learners for their dedication. He emphasized the importance of passion and commitment in driving positive change.

Four learners shared their experience with the online course.

• Frances Michelle Nubla said she was not accepted on her first attempt to enroll in the online course. She hesitated to apply for a second time because she had no prior experience in reform work. But she decided to re-apply anyway.  She said the tools shared in the online course helped to clarify reform ideas. She also found the topics of adaptive management and binding constraints to be the most impactful.
• Arian Mark Lebuna is part of a volunteer group in Iloilo. He explained the importance of building networks, forming a team, and finding the right allies. He said doing things alone would be much more challenging than doing things with a group.
• Rejee-Lou Mejia, the founder of Mati Moms, addressed learners as “fellow dreamers”. She said dreams can be ascertained as a form of goal or objective, maybe a better future or circumstance in life. She found that the course helped dreamers make things happen in reality; it was a platform where dreamers could “just start”. Rejee-Lou said dreams can only happen when one takes the first step in achieving that goal.
• Sushant Rijal is from Nepal, but currently in Australia. He was looking for materials on policymaking when he found the online course. Initially, he thought that the learning process was too complex for him. However, as shown in the course, learning policy reform is also an iterative process, so he had to go through videos until he understood everything. Profoundly reflecting on the lessons helped concretize the reform idea. Some may work, and some may not, he said.

In his closing remarks, Mr. Rene Sanapo, the Leadership Development Manager, encouraged the DE online course graduates to continue applying the ideas they had learned and to “set the world on fire” with their passion for positive change. This batch is the 6^th iteration of the course and a culmination of all the learnings from the previous batches. It is part of a set of learning activities developed and offered by the Coalitions for Change partnership between The Asia Foundation and the Australian Government.