Publication: Long-Lived Consequences of Rapid Scale-Up?: The Case of Free Primary Education in Six Sub-Saharan African Countries
Loading...
Files
120 downloads
18 downloads
Published
2023-02
ISSN
Date
2023-02-20
2023-03-06
2023-03-06
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
Across six Sub-Saharan African countries, grade 4 students of teachers who were hired after a free primary education reform perform worse, on average, on language and math tests—statistically significantly so in language—than students of teachers who were hired before the reform. Teachers who were hired just after the reform also perform worse, on average, on tests of subject content knowledge than those hired before the reform. The results are sensitive to the time frames considered in the analysis, and aggregate results mask substantial variation across countries—gaps are large and significant in some countries but negligible in others. Analysis of teacher demographic and education characteristics—including education level or teacher certification—as well as teacher classroom-level behaviors reveals few systematic differences associated with being hired pre- or post-reform.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“Filmer, Deon. 2023. Long-Lived Consequences of Rapid Scale-Up?: The Case of Free Primary Education in Six Sub-Saharan African Countries. Policy Research Working Papers;10310. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/39454 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Digital Object Identifier
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Long-Lived Consequences of Rapid Scale-Up? The Case of Free Primary Education in Six Sub-Saharan African Countries(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-08-31)This study explores whether Free Primary Education reforms in 6 Sub-Saharan Africa countries affected the quality of teachers in a way that can be detected several years after the reform. It does so by analyzing student- and teacher-level data collected between 5 (Togo) and 16 (Uganda) years after FPE was implemented and comparing outcomes for teachers were hired just before versus just after the policy. Across the 6 countries in the study, grade 4 students of teachers who were hired after the FPE reform perform worse on language and math tests than students of teachers who were hired before the reform. The effects are statistically significant for the language test. Teachers who were hired just after the reform also perform worse on tests of subject content knowledge than those hired before the reform. These average effects mask substantial variation across countries: the gaps are large and significant in some countries but negligible in others. There are few systematic differences associated with being hired pre- or post-reform in teacher demographic characteristics, education and training, or teacher classroom-level behaviors.Publication Incentivizing Schooling for Learning : Evidence on the Impact of Alternative Targeting Approaches(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2013-07)This paper evaluates a primary school scholarship program in Cambodia with two different targeting mechanisms, one based on poverty level and the other on baseline test scores ("merit"). Both targeting mechanisms increased enrollment and attendance. However, only the merit-based targeting induced positive effects on test scores. The paper shows that the asymmetry of response is unlikely to have been driven by differences between recipients' characteristics. Higher student and family effort among beneficiaries of the merit-based scholarships suggest that the framing of the scholarship mattered for impact. The results suggest that in order to balance equity and efficiency, a two-step targeting approach might be preferable: first, target low-income individuals, and then, among them, target based on merit.Publication Autonomy, Participation, and Learning in Argentine Schools : Findings and Their Implications for Decentralization(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2002-01)According to a theoretical model, school autonomy and parental participation in schools, can increase student learning through separate channels. Greater school autonomy increases the rent that can be distributed among stakeholders in the school, while institutions for parental participation (such as school board) empower parents to command a larger share of this surplus - for example, through student learning. Using a rich cross-sectional data set from Argentine schools (sixth and seventh grades), the authors find that autonomy, and participation raise student test scores for a given level of inputs, in a multiplicative way, consistent with the model. Autonomy has a direct effect on learning (but not for very low levels of participation), while participation affects learning only through the mediation of the effect of autonomy. The results are robust to a variety of robustness checks, and for sub-samples of children from poor households, children of uneducated mothers, schools with low mean family wealth, and public schools. It is possible that autonomy, and participation are endogenously determined, and that this biases the results - the data available do not allow this to be ruled out with certainty. Plausible predicators of autonomy, and participation are also plausible predicators of test scores, and they fail tests for the over-identifying restrictions. Heuristically argued, however, the potential for correlation with unobserved variables may be limited: the data set is rich in observed variables, and autonomy and participation show very low correlation with observed variables. Subject to these caveats, the results may be relevant to decentralization in two ways. First, as decentralization moves responsibility from the central, toward the provincial or local government, the results should be directly relevant if the decentralization increases autonomy, and participation in schools. Second, if the results are interpreted as representing a more general effect of moving decision-making toward users, and the local community, the results are relevant even if little happens to autonomy, and participation in schools. More important, perhaps, the authors illustrate empirically the importance of knowing who is empowered when higher levels of government loosen control.Publication School Enrollment, Selection and Test Scores(2009-07-01)There is a strong association between schooling attained and test scores in many settings. If this association is causal, one might expect that programs that increase school enrollment and attainment would also improve test scores. However, if there is self-selection into school based on expected gains, marginal children brought into school by such programs may be drawn disproportionately from the left-hand side of the ability distribution, which could limit the extent to which additional schooling translates into more learning. To test this proposition, this paper uses data from Cambodia. The results show that a program that provides scholarships to poor students had a large effect on school enrollment and attendance, which increased by approximately 25 percentage points. However, there is no evidence that, 18 months after the scholarships were awarded, recipient children did any better on mathematics and vocabulary tests than they would have in the absence of the program. The paper discusses results that suggest that the self-selection of lower-ability students into school in response to the program is an important part of the explanation. The analysis also shows minimal program effects on other outcomes, including knowledge of health practices, expectations about the future, and adolescent mental health.Publication The Living Conditions of Children(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2007-06)This paper summarizes the socioeconomic conditions of children around the world. It explores solutions to the main problems, along with a summary of the costs and benefits of some of the solutions. Emphasis is on the results from rigorous studies, impact evaluations, and randomized experiments. Although the cost-evidence literature is scarce, a good case for early interventions and key quality-enhancing education interventions exists.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Digital Africa(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-03-13)All African countries need better and more jobs for their growing populations. "Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs" shows that broader use of productivity-enhancing, digital technologies by enterprises and households is imperative to generate such jobs, including for lower-skilled people. At the same time, it can support not only countries’ short-term objective of postpandemic economic recovery but also their vision of economic transformation with more inclusive growth. These outcomes are not automatic, however. Mobile internet availability has increased throughout the continent in recent years, but Africa’s uptake gap is the highest in the world. Areas with at least 3G mobile internet service now cover 84 percent of Africa’s population, but only 22 percent uses such services. And the average African business lags in the use of smartphones and computers as well as more sophisticated digital technologies that catalyze further productivity gains. Two issues explain the usage gap: affordability of these new technologies and willingness to use them. For the 40 percent of Africans below the extreme poverty line, mobile data plans alone would cost one-third of their incomes—in addition to the price of access devices, apps, and electricity. Data plans for small- and medium-size businesses are also more expensive than in other regions. Moreover, shortcomings in the quality of internet services—and in the supply of attractive, skills-appropriate apps that promote entrepreneurship and raise earnings—dampen people’s willingness to use them. For those countries already using these technologies, the development payoffs are significant. New empirical studies for this report add to the rapidly growing evidence that mobile internet availability directly raises enterprise productivity, increases jobs, and reduces poverty throughout Africa. To realize these and other benefits more widely, Africa’s countries must implement complementary and mutually reinforcing policies to strengthen both consumers’ ability to pay and willingness to use digital technologies. These interventions must prioritize productive use to generate large numbers of inclusive jobs in a region poised to benefit from a massive, youthful workforce—one projected to become the world’s largest by the end of this century.Publication Green Technologies: Decarbonizing Development in East Asia and Pacific(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-05-19)The East Asia and Pacific region is helping the world decarbonize and is encouraging the domestic adoption of renewables. But there is an imbalance: while the region’s innovation and investment improve global access to green technologies, its own emissions continue to grow because of the reluctance to penalize carbon-intensive practices. The disparity between domestic supply and demand spills over into international trade, provoking measures by other countries that limit access to markets and technologies. "Green Technologies: Decarbonizing Development in East Asia and Pacific" argues that deeper reform of the region’s own policies will encourage the domestic diffusion of cleaner technologies and may also foster greater international cooperation—on climate as well as on innovation and trade in green goods. The book proposes a framework to guide policy on green technology development and diffusion. It will be of interest to policy makers, businesses, and researchers working at the intersection of economics and environmental policy.Publication Global Economic Prospects, January 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-01-10)Global growth is projected to decelerate sharply, reflecting synchronous policy tightening aimed at containing very high inflation, worsening financial conditions, and continued disruptions from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Investment growth in emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs) is expected to remain below its average rate of the past two decades. Further adverse shocks could push the global economy into recession. Small states are especially vulnerable to such shocks because of the reliance on external trade and financing, limited economic diversification, elevated debt, and susceptibility to natural disasters. Against this backdrop, it is critical that EMDE policy makers ensure that any fiscal support is focused on vulnerable groups, that inflation expectations remain well anchored, and that financial systems continue to be resilient. Urgent global and national efforts are also needed to mitigate the risks of global recession and debt distress in EMDEs, and to support a major increase in EMDE investment.Publication Good Practice Note on Dam Safety(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-10)The objective of this good practice note (GPN) on dam safety is to provide additional guidance to World Bank staff on the application of relevant requirements under the environmental and social framework (ESF). This GPN provides guidance on using a risk management approach to the application of the dam safety requirements. The guidance contained in this note is designed to enhance the quality of practice without creating new requirements for the application of the ESF. The GPN provides guidance on compliance requirements, a risk management approach to dam safety, risk analysis tools, quality of information and capacity, application to World Bank operations, and procedural aspects. The GPN pertains to: (a) construction of new dams or dams under construction (DUC) under investment project financing (IPF); (b) rehabilitation of existing dams under IPF; and (c) existing dams or DUC that are not financed under IPF, on which the project relies or may rely.Publication Global Economic Prospects, June 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-06-06)Global growth is projected to slow significantly in the second half of this year, with weakness continuing in 2024. Inflation pressures persist, and tight monetary policy is expected to weigh substantially on activity. The possibility of more widespread bank turmoil and tighter monetary policy could result in even weaker global growth. Rising borrowing costs in advanced economies could lead to financial dislocations in the more vulnerable emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs). In low-income countries, in particular, fiscal positions are increasingly precarious. Comprehensive policy action is needed at the global and national levels to foster macroeconomic and financial stability. Among many EMDEs, and especially in low-income countries, bolstering fiscal sustainability will require generating higher revenues, making spending more efficient, and improving debt management practices. Continued international cooperation is also necessary to tackle climate change, support populations affected by crises and hunger, and provide debt relief where needed. In the longer term, reversing a projected decline in EMDE potential growth will require reforms to bolster physical and human capital and labor-supply growth.