Like Karthik, I thought this post was really fantastic and I learned quite a bit from it. I did have a couple of questions/comments after reading it:
How should we think about returns to schooling in light of these updated results? I’m not very familiar with the general literature in this area, so I don’t have a good sense of whether we should think this close-to-null finding is likely representative of returns to school expansions, or whether we have strong evidence from elsewhere that would suggest this finding is more of a fluke.
I had a lot of trouble interpreting the first table, probably because the colored box (which I interpreted as the column titles) wasn’t describing the thing that was different between the columns. You might consider reorganizing that table to make it more clear.
1. Is exactly the right question. My work is just one input to answering it. My coworkers are confronting it more directly, but I think nothing is public at this point. My gut is that the result is broadly representative and that expanding schooling supply alone is often pushing on a string. It is well documented that in many primary schools in poor countries, kids are learning pitifully little. Dig into the question of why, and it has do with lack of accountability of teachers and school systems for results, which in turn has to do with the distribution of power in society. That is not easily changed. But nor is it hopeless (this, this, this), so the problem is also potentially an opportunity.
2. Whoops! The table’s header row got chopped during editing. I fixed it.
Dig into the question of why, and it has do with lack of accountability of teachers and school systems for results, which in turn has to do with the distribution of power in society.
This sounds like a really interesting hypothesis to me. If it were true, I assume it would imply some specific solutions, similar to what you mentioned.
My guess is that the answer is no, but if there are other resources that explain or lay out this hypothesis further, I’d appreciate links to those.
Hi Ozzie. I’m out of my depth here, but what I had in mind was the Uwezo program at one of my “this” links, which I believe was inspired by Pratham in India. I think these organizations originally gained fame for conducting their own surveys of how much (or little) children were actually learning, in an attempt to hold the education system accountable for results.
But that’s surely just a small part of a large topic, how a citizenry holds a public bureaucracy more accountable. Specific solutions include “democracy”… You know, so just do that.
I should say that there is a strong and arguably opposing view, embodied by the evidence-based Teaching at the Right Level approach. The idea is to completely script what teachers do every day. It’s very top-down.
Like Karthik, I thought this post was really fantastic and I learned quite a bit from it. I did have a couple of questions/comments after reading it:
How should we think about returns to schooling in light of these updated results? I’m not very familiar with the general literature in this area, so I don’t have a good sense of whether we should think this close-to-null finding is likely representative of returns to school expansions, or whether we have strong evidence from elsewhere that would suggest this finding is more of a fluke.
I had a lot of trouble interpreting the first table, probably because the colored box (which I interpreted as the column titles) wasn’t describing the thing that was different between the columns. You might consider reorganizing that table to make it more clear.
Thanks @MHR.
1. Is exactly the right question. My work is just one input to answering it. My coworkers are confronting it more directly, but I think nothing is public at this point. My gut is that the result is broadly representative and that expanding schooling supply alone is often pushing on a string. It is well documented that in many primary schools in poor countries, kids are learning pitifully little. Dig into the question of why, and it has do with lack of accountability of teachers and school systems for results, which in turn has to do with the distribution of power in society. That is not easily changed. But nor is it hopeless (this, this, this), so the problem is also potentially an opportunity.
2. Whoops! The table’s header row got chopped during editing. I fixed it.
This sounds like a really interesting hypothesis to me. If it were true, I assume it would imply some specific solutions, similar to what you mentioned.
My guess is that the answer is no, but if there are other resources that explain or lay out this hypothesis further, I’d appreciate links to those.
Hi Ozzie. I’m out of my depth here, but what I had in mind was the Uwezo program at one of my “this” links, which I believe was inspired by Pratham in India. I think these organizations originally gained fame for conducting their own surveys of how much (or little) children were actually learning, in an attempt to hold the education system accountable for results.
But that’s surely just a small part of a large topic, how a citizenry holds a public bureaucracy more accountable. Specific solutions include “democracy”… You know, so just do that.
I should say that there is a strong and arguably opposing view, embodied by the evidence-based Teaching at the Right Level approach. The idea is to completely script what teachers do every day. It’s very top-down.
Thanks for your response!