Improving Education in the Developing World: What Have We Learned from Randomized Evaluations?

Abstract

Across a range of contexts, reductions in education costs and provision of subsidies can boost school participation, often dramatically. Decisions to attend school seem subject to peer effects and time-inconsistent preferences. Merit scholarships, school health programs, and information about returns to education can all cost-effectively spur school participation. However, distortions in education systems, such as weak teacher incentives and elite-oriented curricula, undermine learning in school and much of the impact of increasing existing educational spending. Pedagogical innovations designed to address these distortions (such as technology-assisted instruction, remedial education, and tracking by achievement) can raise test scores at a low cost. Merely informing parents about school conditions seems insufficient to improve teacher incentives, and evidence on merit pay is mixed, but hiring teachers locally on short-term contracts can save money and improve educational outcomes. School vouchers can cost-effectively increase both school participation and learning.

Improving Learning in Primary Schools of Developing Countries

“…Confronting similar issues, Kremer et al (2013) report auxiliary cost estimates for a subset of experiments (Abeberese, Kumler, & Linden, 2012;Banerjee et al, 2007;Duflo, Dupas, et al, 2012;Duflo et al, 2011;Duflo, Hanna, & Ryan, 2012;Glewwe et al, 2009;Glewwe et al, 2010;Kremer et al, 2009;Nguyen, 2008;Pradhan et al, 2011). In addition to gathering quantity and price data for consistent categories of resources, the authors applied consistent assumptions regarding the discount rate (10%), inflation, and exchange rates (see www.povertyactionlab.org/doc/cea-data-full-workbook).…”

School governance, teacher incentives, and pupil–teacher ratios: Experimental evidence from Kenyan primary schools

“…These results suggest that endogenous behavioral responses under weak governance institutions may help explain why increases in resources alone have generally had disappointing effects on test scores in developing countries (see Kremer and Holla, 2009, for a review). If some of the additional resources are diverted by teachers, as we observe, or by parents as observed in Das et al (2004Das et al ( , 2011, the overall effect of a change in resources will be dampened, compared to the direct effect the added resources would have on learning if everything else could be kept constant.…”

“…More generally, recent randomized evaluations of education find substantial similarity in consumer behavior across contexts but much more heterogeneity in program impacts on provider behavior (Kremer and Holla, 2009). Our results suggest that this may be due to interactions across different elements of the governance and provider incentive system.…”

Improving Access and Quality in the Indian Education System

“…As the time spent in the classroom has a direct impact on learning there is a significant need to lift attendance (Lavy, 2010). In emerging countries education participation at the school level can be extremely sensitive to even small changes in costs and targeted programmes that provide direct financial assistance or in-kind rewards have been shown to have a significant positive impact (Kremer and Holla, 2008). The elimination of tuition fees and the provision of subsidies for school uniforms, for example, have been shown to improve enrolment and attendance, and to reduce drop-outs (Evans et al, 2008).…”