USAID/Egypt, Directorate of Procurement (D/PROC), 6th Floor, Unit 64902, APO AE 09839-4902

U -- TRAINING SERVICES SOL RFA 263-96-P-029 POC Contact Point: Cynthia Judge, Agreement Officer, USAID/Egypt, Tel: 011-20-2-357-3257/58, Fax: 011-20-2-356-2932. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) invites nonprofit, nongovernmental organizations to submit applications for a specific support cooperative agreement under the Integrated English Language II Program (IELP-II). The objective of this program is to provide Egypt with qualified current and future English language teachers. This $36.5m program seeks to focus on approaches and structures that will move the English language teaching profession to sustainability in Egypt by Egyptians. The program draws upon the knowledge and experience of institutions involved in designing, implementing and evaluating English language training programs for non-native English speakers. The program description of the agreement involves working with the USAID/Cairo Office of Education, Training and PVO support, the Ministry of Education, universities, primary preparatory and secondary schools as well as other USAID financed contractors working in the training field. The agreement offered through this Request for Applications (RFA) is expected to be structured as a ''results package'' according to USAID's new management systems. Applicants under this RFA will be required to develop a compelling strategy designed to achieve the result of an ''increased number of qualified English language providers,'' as well as three related sub-objectives, or intermediate results, defined in the strategic framework developed by USAID/Egypt. This strategy must also include a testing or other evaluative mechanism that can be used as a qualitative measure to verify skill acquisition of trainees under each of the various training programs. Target numbers of English language teachers and trainers have also been proposed under this framework as quantifiable indicators. Both the qualitative and quantitative indicators will be incorporated into the monitoring plan and the cooperative agreement as a means of tracking and verifying progress towards achieving the intended results. The total life of the IELP-II activity is expected to be six years. The agreement will be structured in phases. The recipient may continue performance under the agreement after successful completion of each phase. Services will be performed in Egypt and in the United States. U.S. organizations interested in submitting offers for this solicitation may request a copy of the Request for Applications (RFA) No. 263-96-A-029 by submitting a written request along with three self-addressed mailing labels. Do not send self-addressed envelopes. Requests for the RFA should be sent to Cynthia Judge, Agreement Officer, USAID/Cairo, Unit 64902, APO AE 09839-4902. Courier Service requests should be sent to: Cynthia Judge, Agreement Officer, U.S. Agency for International Development, 106 Kasr El Aini Street, Cairo Center Bldg., 6th Floor, Cairo, Egypt. The RFA will be issued on or after fifteen days from the date of publication of this notice. The deadline for receipt of applications will be 45 days after the date of the issuance of the RFA. ''This CBD notice can be viewed and downloaded using the Agency Gopher. The RFA, once issued, can be downloaded from the Agency Gopher. The Gopher address is GOPHER.INFO.USAID.GOV. Select USAID Procurement and Business Opportunities from the Gopher menu. The RFA text can be downloaded via Anonymous File Transfer Protocol (FTP). The FTP address is FTP.INFO.USAID.GOV. Logon using the user identification of ''anonymous'' and the password is your e-mail address. Look under the following directory for the RFA: pub/OP/RFA/26396029/26396029.rfa. Receipt of this RFA through INTERNET must be confirmed by written notification to the contact person noted above. It is the responsibility of the recipient of this solicitation document to ensure that it has been received from the INTERNET in its entirety and USAID bears no responsibility for data errors resulting from transmission or conversion processes.'' (0135)

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