A U.S. government effort to discourage students from dropping out of secondary and even primary school has been extended, giving a federal contractor two more years to achieve the Obama Administration's goals in this program. The initiative, however, focuses on students in the Middle East and Asia.
Creative Associates International since 2010 has carried out the School Dropout Prevention Pilot program (SDPP) in Cambodia, India, Tajikistan, and Timor Leste on behalf of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which awarded Creative a three-year task order with a $51.5 million maximum ceiling.
The contract balance is projected to remain around $25.5 million by September, necessitating no additional program costs, according to a Justification & Approval for Other Than Full & Open Competition (J&A) document that U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor located through routine database research.
The J&A claims that opening up the project to competitive bidding would have interfered with ongoing research, data collection, and program-implementation, subsequently resulting in unnecessary costs to the government.
FOR FURTHER COVERAGE OF THE U.S. AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, PLEASE VISIT THE MONITOR'S USAID PAGE.
ALSO SEE THE MONITOR'S EDUCATION PAGE.