Inter-regional educational discrepancies in Belgium. How to

combat them?

Third Re-Bel public event

Thursday 3 June 2010, 2-6pm

V. Vandenberghe

University Foundation-BrusselsUniversité Catholique de Louvain

Outline of presentation

Foreword: Why educational discrepancies matter?

Section 1: Statistical evidence (the long-term view)

Section 2: Determinants

Section 3: The plausible role of school governance

Main thesis The gap between the Belgian regions started to materialised probably as early as in the late 1950s. Closing the gap is likely to take time. And better (or at least more coherent) school governance in the French-Speaking Community could help

Foreword Good-quality education is crucial for individuals but

also for nations and communities.

Particularly those (like Belgium) with: Uniform/centralised wage-stetting mechanisms

Strong aversion to income inequality

Generous welfare transfers

Combating educational discrepancies across entities is crucial to long-term political stability

Section 1

Statistical evidence (the long-term view)

Average number of years of education. Adults

aged 25-29

Source : Belgian census 1961,1991, 2001

Relative scores in math :Belgian Communities vs other EU and OECD countries (1= one standard-deviation)

Source: IAE, OCDEFIMS: First International Mathematics Study SIMS: Second International Mathematics Study TIMSS: Third International Mathematics and Sciences Study PISA: Programme for International Student Assessment

Community Year of international survey 1965

FIMS

1980

SIMS

1995

TIMSS

2000

PISA

Flemish-Speaking - 0,388 0.899 1.140

French-Speaking 1.463 0.157 -0.029 -0.258

In short....

whereas the (relative) performance of the French-Speaking Community has steadily deteriorated since the mid-1960s,

that of the Flemish-Speaking Community has regularly improved.

Section 2

Determinants

The social context in which schools operate: Brussels, Liège and the Hainaut?

Lack of labour-market/financial incentives to stay on in education and succeed at school?

Lack of school resources?

Lower school performance conditional on socio-mix and resources?

Attainment in Math across schools (conditional on the socio-economic profile of pupils). PISA 2006

The gross score gap in math is 9.1% (French-Speaking community=ref).

Controlling for : i) socio-economic profile (parental profession &

material wealth),

ii) immigration background,

iii) attendance of a vocational track

iv) pupil/teacher ratio…

leads to a net gap of 10.8% (~=50 PISA points ~= a one-grade advance)

Section 3

The plausible role of school governance

Evidence that governance matter? The case of head of school autonomy . Math scores in PISA 2006

Public school governance in the textbook

Central planning: hierarchical or bureaucratic control

OR

Incentive contracts: school autonomy and external evaluation

OR

Quasi-market: per-pupil funding and school choice & school autonomy to respond to market pressure

Public School governance in the French-Speaking Community

A lot of central planning: hierarchical or bureaucratic control

AND

Some element of proper incentive contracts: school autonomy and external evaluation

AND

Quasi-market: per-pupil funding and school choice … in a very unarticulated/chaotic and

counterproductive way

Sempiternal divergences of view, echoing deeply rooted philosophical and political schisms, have

led to a situation where:

the top-down/bureaucratic control (the obligation to implement instructions coming from Brussels)

systematically cohabits with school-based autonomy

and market-driven school management (the necessity to attract pupils to secure resources and non-tenure jobs).

Why such an highy hybrid governance regime?

= >diverging political and philosophical “preferences” of the three main “réseaux/netwerken”

two equally powerful groups (public vs free catholic)

each representing about 50% of the total

advocates of public provision themselves split

(local public provision vs centralised model where public schools are under the sole jurisdiction of the central ministry)

The problem with “réseaux/netwerken” is not primairily cost-inefficiency.

The true cost of the “réseaux/netwerken” lies in the emergence of a very hybrid and ineffective governance regime

Networks also exist in Flanders.

But in Flanders, free catholic-affiliated schools are dominant (70%) , and benefit from strong political sponsors

This has probably contributed to limit the ravages of the hybrid governance disease French-Speaking pupils suffer from.

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