In Suriname, a wide range of stakeholders has been involved in developing a new basic education curriculum, supported by the Netherlands Institute for Curriculum Development (SLO). Starting in 2010, a curriculum framework, learning strands for grades 1 to 11 and learning materials for the first 3 grades have been constructed. The chosen participatory approach was to work with heterogeneous development teams, in order to arrive at sustainable and widely accepted curriculum tools, while building stakeholders’ capacity. The process has been promising and challenging at times: The curriculum has hardly been changed since the seventies. As a result, the nation’s capacity to develop curriculum is limited. Local and organizational culture does not always favour collaboration between stakeholders. Furthermore, there is an intricate perspective regarding independence versus Dutch support due to historic ties between the two countries. An underlying research strand provided data on the development process. The case study methodology consists of semi-structured interviews with stakeholders, an expert appraisal, quantitative data analysis and a literature study in order to answer the research question to what extend a participatory approach with heterogeneous curriculum development groups could become more efficient and effective.