Susan DurstonAssociate Director, Education Programmes UNICEF

Beyond financing-the Equity Gap and the Need for Innovation

NAR in the richest 20% of households

NAR in the poorest 20% of households

Figure 6: Disparity by wealth quintiles: Overall children in the poorest 20% of households have lower school attendance rates than those in the richest 20%. Greatest disparities in Nigeria and Eritrea. Country specific disparities between the poorest 20% and richest 20% of households for a subset of Sub-Saharan African countries. Primary school Net Attendance Ratio (%), by household wealth level

Data source: UNESCO Institute of Statistics. Sheena Bell and Friedrich Huebler. Montreal. 2010

Note: Estimates based on a subset of 23 sub-Saharan African countries with available data 2000-2008. Countries with more than 100,000 children out of school in 2007 with available background characteristic data. Average values are not weighted by each country’s population.

Urban

Rural

Figure 5: Disparities by urban-rural residence: Overall, primary school attendance rates are higher in urban than rural areas. Greatest disparities in Niger, Burkina Faso, Guinea and Ethiopia.Variation the urban-rural divide at the country level for a subset of Sub-Saharan African countries. Primary school Net Attendance Ratio (%), by residence

Data source: UNESCO Institute of Statistics. Sheena Bell and Friedrich Huebler. Montreal. 2010

Note: Estimates based on a subset of 23 sub-Saharan African countries with available data 2000-2008. Countries with more than 100,000 children out of school in 2007 with available background characteristic data. Average values are not weighted by each country’s population.

Getting left behind – drivers of marginalization-GMR 2010

What are the causes?• Educational marginalization driven by

interacting layers of disadvantage• Crosscut by poverty and gender.

Five key processes which drive marginalization:1. Poverty, vulnerability and child labour2. Group-based disadvantages3. Location and livelihoods4. Disability5. HIV and AIDs

Different strategies are needed to reach the last 10 or 15 percent of out-of-school children

• Disaggregate data-subnationally -• Target education interventions to low-performing regions, schools, and

individuals. • Money must be spent intelligently if it is to raise learning achievement: it

must address the binding constraints to learning achievement and do so in a cost-effective manner.

• Investments in school infrastructure need to be accompanied by adequate and consistent budget provision for teachers, teaching materials, and other key educational inputs

• The provision of water and sanitation, facilities perimeter walls to ensure security and privacy, can help raise school attendance—particularly by girls

• Deworming, school feeding• Invest in Open and distance learning-for equivalence• Scale up successful local interventions• Identify and address bottlenecks

Sub-national disparities

Mandalay

Rakhine

Ayeyarwady

Bago

Chin

Magway

Sagaing

Yangon

Kayin

Tanintharyi

Mon

Shan (South)

Shan (North)

Kachin

Kayah

Shan (East)

Gender Parity Index Girls significantly disadvantaged

Girls disadvantaged, but close to parity

Gender Parity Achieved

Boys disadvantaged, but close to parity

Boys significantly disadvantaged

Missing Data

Lao PDR

Myanmar

Thailand

Vietnam

Cambodia

Gender parity in net enrolment ratio, secondary education

Sources: EFA GMR 2008 and MMR_ DEPT and DBEs

What happens when bottlenecks are social-how does financing help?

Discrimination, perceptions and expectationsLabelling affects learning (e.g. Low castes in India Hoff and Pandey

2004)Children coming to school less clean and poor children suffer

discrimination and expectations of performance are lower (UNICEF ROSA 2009)

• Unequal allocation of tasks and privileges within the school• Stigma attached to group definition, often for benefits (e.g. dalit) or

association with disease e.g. HIV/AIDS, leprosy, arsenic (UNCEF ROSA 2009)

• Power structure of the school and system• Failure to acknowledge the needs of girls, for privacy, management of

feminine hygieneIdentities are a very powerful determinant

The need for innovation-an invitation to discuss

Financing –linked to innovationChannels-more varied and innovativeLearning-think broadly and multisectorallyStrengthen systems in new and context-specific waysScale up innovationsAdditional ways of measuring progressAccountability-locally as well as internationally

9+1:completion of schooling through multi-year funding

Problem: Children do not complete their basic cycle of education, therefore any benefits to individuals, society or the economy are limited, and the right to education not realised

• a strategy to re-package education for funding and for advocacy

• Emphasises the need for continuous multi-year funding at a certain level whether domestic or external

• emphasizes in strategic terms for policy and implementation, the need to support each child through a primary cycle (now often a basic cycle of 9 years which includes lower secondary ) with an additional year of pre-primary education/early learning, known to have a significant impact on primary school persistence.

• Innovation fund for equity-focussed strategies/practices 

 

The Education Parity Index(developed by Friedrich Huebler and Sdurston UNICEF ROSA 2008)

Features:Composite index which combines information on more

than one dimension of disparity Measures the depth of disparity i.e. the distance from the

ideal.It is an overall measure of disparity. To identify the

individual groups, it is necessary to study the underlying data

When calculated across life cycle variables, (primary NAR, secondary NAR, survival rate) the EPI can highlight the cumulative deprivation and be used to advocate for early intervention for the most disadvantaged groups

0.61 0.640.55 0.60

0.96 0.96

0.830.92 0.91 0.89

0.740.85

0.95 0.92

0.790.89

0.820.70

0.76

0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

Afghanistan 2003 Bangladesh 2004 India 2000

Nepal 2006 Pakistan 2000-01

Female/Male Rural/Urban Poorest/Richest Average

Prim

ary

NA

R p

arity

inde

x

Primary NAR parity index

Progress on disparity-South Asia

0.55

0.79 0.810.84

0.770.82 0.82

0.67

0.79

0.71

0.830.78

0.72

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1995 2000 2005 20101995 2000 2005 20101995 2000 2005 2010

1995 2000 2005 20101995 2000 2005 2010

Afghanistan Bangladesh India

Nepal Pakistan

Edu

catio

n pa

rity

inde

x

Girls education and Gender Empowerment

Girls education is not translating into gender equity and empowerment

• Bangladesh, GPI 1.06 GEM 0.264 • Madagascar GPI 0.95 GEM 0.398 • Brazil GPI 1.11 GEM 0.504