New Private Providers and the Changing Education Market for the Poor

Shailaja Fennell

Development Studies

RECOUP: Educational Outcomes and the Poor

Partner institutions in Africa (Ghana and Kenya) and Asia (Pakistan and India)

Three strands-human capital, labour market and skills, aid and partnerships

Six projects Combination of Quantitative and Qualitative

studies

Public Private Partnerships (PPPs)

What is the impact of PPPs on the terrain of education in poor communities?

Examining demand and supply side factors that emerge due to the introduction of new players in the educational market

Expanding the original Hirschman model of exit, voice and loyalty to understand the parental (household) choices and the provider responses in poor communities.

The context of PPP research

Public Private Partnerships study within RECOUP Qualitative Study Link the provision of education by public and private

providers to educational outcomes Hirschman (1970) - ‘Exit, voice and loyalty’ Model Impact of voice and exit mechanisms on aspects of

provision 4 countries – Ghana, Kenya; India, Pakistan

Pakistani educational context

Private school enrolment @ 35% Number of private school institutions went up from 32000 to 47000

between (2000-05) across the country and in rural and poor regions Learning outcomes better in private schools Type of school a significant determinant of difference in learning outcome Pursuit of partnerships with the private sector

Yet Significant socio-economic disparities in access and outcomes 40% children of schooling going age out of school Gender disparities in access – 82 girls for every 100 boys enrolled Low cost private sector schools largely unregulated

Fieldwork and data The communities – Sargodha, Punjab and Charsada, KP. Rural and urban communities Sample:

18 private schools; 19 public schools Parents and youth - 32 focus group discussions & 48

semi-structured interviews; Teachers and heads - 60 semi-structured interviews Local education officers

Insights from the RECOUP Household Survey 2006-07– 1094 Households , apprx 9000 individuals

Identifying Exit, Voice and Loyalty ‘Exit’ – economic response

E1 – moving jurisdictions in search of better quality school E2 ; -E2 – moving from public to private; private to public E3 - moving between same category of schools E4 - No Exit or Drop out

‘Voice’ – political response V1 – individual voice V2 – PTA V3 – School Management Committees V4 – No Voice

Loyalty L1 – Internally or socially generated loyalty L2 – Branding

Mapping Exit, Voice, Loyalty

Exit

Voice

Loyalty

Time in School

E1

E2

E3

E4

V1

V2

V4

L2

L1

??

?

- start of schooling; - loyalty; - voice; - exit

PPPs and community features

PPP do not have a well defined list of the types of actors who might/might not constitute the ‘private’ sector

‘private’ has become a generic category that can include a wide range of non-state actors: corporate entities, NGOs and faith-based organisations

a wide variance in individual objectives and motivation among types of partners-branding, social, economic emerging from historical evolution and different motivations

Gender norms and PPPs

local gender norms regards certain occupations, such as engineering, as inappropriate for girls these will not be offered as occupational aspirations for girls

In religious based schools, there might be a very strict imposition of gendered rules regarding free movement of boys and girls

PPPs and gender goals in Pakistan

No formal mechanism by which girls’ education, far less gender equality has been incorporated into Pakistan’s national plan for educational provision through the use of PPPs

evidence of activity on the ground at provincial and district level by NGOs and CBOs who work with municipal authorities to create partnerships

The current measures indicate that Pakistan was ranked at 135 out of 182 in 2005 and fell to 141 out of 182 in 2009-10 in the HDI ranking.

Primary gender parity is at 0.82 and secondary gender parity at 0.78, while primary enrolment rate for girls in 83 percent and the secondary  enrolment rate for girls in 28 percent

Parental perceptions

desire is present among the rich and poor alike and with regards to boys and girls by families in the poor community (Fennell, Agbley and Irfan 2010).

Fathers were reluctant to go to schools, that had all, or predominantly female teachers, to lodge complaints.

individual complaints regarding girls’ education was undertaken by motherswhere there was a majority of women teachers were primarily female.

Mothers were reluctant to lodge complaints given their low social position and the strong possibility of retaliation against their children within the uneven power equation in the community.

Youth Perceptions

both adolescent girls and boys emphasised the importance of regular teaching and the quality of teaching in achieving successful educational outcomes

they had a common sense of priorities with regard to what was regarded as key in the schooling process to achieve educational success yet they are affected by the gendered norms within which they operate

young women still struggling to get into secondary schooling system successfully

young men in the area where more caught up with the need for a satisfactory academic performance to complete their secondary education.

Multidimensional poverty and PPP research the poorest sections in a community are

unable to access private schools there is a complex process of strategising

about the school choice for each youth in the community (Irfan 2010)

greater enrolment of girls at rural schools in KP, Pakistan does not ensure a change in the attitudes of the community with regard to the educational outcomes for girls leaving the schooling system after completion of secondary school

Locating dimensions

violence inflicted on poor youth, both young men and women through corporal punishment, teacher neglect and manual labour

divergent views between fathers and mothers as to the best school choice that should be made for their children.

schooling outcomes spoken of by parents and youth did not overlap with any of the global agendas for increasing education through partnerships-terrorism concerns in the case of Pakistan

What is the state of play on PPPs in Pakistan little evidence of a conceptual clarity among national

government documents with regard to the relationship between new educational initiatives and the advancement of girls’ education

PPPs have been a small part of the decentralisation initiatives in Pakistan with little indication that girls’ education is regarded as part of this initiative

There are small, separate programmes for girls’ education, not integrated into a national policy for gender equality