About KAPE

Kampuchea Action to Promote Education (KAPE) is the largest local NGO in Cambodia's education sector, working across more than 15 provinces from preschools to a Master's programme in Mentoring.

Our Journey: From Humble Beginnings to Lasting Impact

Our roots trace back to 1996, when we first started as a project known as CAPE (Cambodian Assistance to Primary Education). Those early years were defined by a critical need to rebuild educational foundations. By 1999, recognising the need for a localised, sustainable approach to educational development, we officially localised to become KAPE — an independent Cambodian non-governmental organisation.

2012 – 2019: Scaling up and Systemic Reform

As KAPE built a reputation for transparency and rigorous research, its relationship with MoEYS deepened. Between 2011 and 2015, KAPE piloted the “Beacon Schools Initiative,” which eventually evolved into the national New Generation Schools (NGS) framework. This marked a massive shift in Cambodian educational history: for the first time, the Ministry of Education took the unprecedented step of providing state funding to a non-state actor to scale up an educational model nationwide.

To reflect its expanding footprint — which now stretched far beyond primary education into high schools, university scholarships, and teacher-training institutes — the organisation reached a milestone in 2019, when the Ministry of Interior approved an official name change to Kampuchea Action to Promote Education, retaining its widely trusted acronym, KAPE.

KAPE Today

Entering its third decade of operation, KAPE manages dozens of concurrent projects backed by international bilateral donors like the European Union, as well as private global foundations. Directly benefiting tens of thousands of students and thousands of educators across more than a dozen provinces, KAPE continues to serve as the blueprint for educational evolution in Cambodia.