Cost, Financing and School Effectiveness of …

1 Africa Region Human Development Working Paper Series cost , Financing and School Effectiveness of Education in Malawi A future of limited choices and endless opportunities Development Research Group The World Bank Copyright August 2004. Human Development Sector Africa Region The World Bank The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or policies of the World Bank or any of its affiliated organizations Cover design by Word Express Typography by Word Design, Inc. Cover photo by Rae Galloway ii Contents Contents ..iii Foreword ..vii Acknowledgements ..x List of Abbreviations ..xi Executive Summary ..1. 1. Macroeconomic and Demographic Context.

2 12. Evolution in gross domestic product, per capita income and fiscal resources ..13. Evolution in inter-sectoral allocation of public expenditure, in education spending, and HIPC resource availability ..16. HIPC (Highly Indebted Poor Countries) resources situation ..18. 2. Enrollment Patterns ..21. Structure of Malawi's education system ..21. Enrollment trends ..22. Pre-primary education ..23. Basic or primary education ..23. Enrollment by age in primary ..24. Disparities in enrollment data and sources ..25. Pattern of student flow through the system, survival, repetition rates and efficiency ..26. Completion rates ..29. Primary School Leaving Certificate (PSLCE).

3 30. Junior primary schools and distance to schools ..30. Special education provisions ..31. Transition rates from primary into secondary School ..31. Secondary education ..31. Enrollment in secondary schools ..32. Secondary repetition rates ..33. Survival/completion in secondary and transition to tertiary ..33. Teacher training ..35. Primary teacher training ..36. Secondary teacher training ..36. Technical and vocational training ..37. iii 3. Education Expenditures and Financing ..41. The budgetary system in Malawi ..41. Overall budgetary expenditure trends in the education sector ..42. Sub-sectoral allocations ..44. Composition of recurrent expenditures.

4 45. Trends in unit public expenditures ..46. Decomposition of public unit costs in 2000/01 ..48. Trends in sub-sectoral emoluments ..49. Development expenditures ..50. Composition ..50. Donor Financing and extra budgetary grants ..50. Household Financing ..51. 4. Internal Efficiency and Management Effectiveness in Resource Utilization ..55. Efficiency in student flow in primary and secondary education ..55. Index of efficiency and schooling years to produce a graduate ..55. Teacher deployment ..57. Primary School level ..57. Deployment process in primary ..61. Secondary schools ..61. 5. School Effectiveness , Malnutrition and Learning Outcomes ..65. Level of learning.

5 65. The learning environment in primary schools ..67. School and home environment ..67. Other factors influencing School Effectiveness ..68. Curriculum ..69. Impact on pupils and teachers of HIV/AIDS ..70. Prevalence and consequences of malnutrition affecting education attendance and outcomes ..70. Correlation between schooling characteristics and learning outcomes ..73. 6. Equity ..78. Enrollment patterns by gender and geographic location ..78. An overall perspective ..79. Gender and geographical disparities in schooling profiles ..81. Completion rates in primary and secondary ..83. Public expenditure breakdown by quintiles and gender at different education levels.

6 84. 7. University Sector ..87. Access and equity ..88. Financing ..89. Efficiency ..92. Relevance ..93. iv 8. Critical Challenges and Policy Choices ..96. Macroeconomic context and education expenditures ..96. Enrollment, repetition and survival ..97. Equity ..97. Quality of education and externalities ..98. Management of the system ..99. Budget process, supporting systems and harmonization of procedures ..100. University education ..100. Realigning policy targets to resources ..101. Changes in repetition and dropout rates ..101. Secondary education and secondary teacher training ..102. Recurrent cost implications ..103. Possible priority areas of policy intervention.

7 103. Annexes ..109. Bibliography ..179. List of Tables Table 1: Comparative information on government recurrent education spending as a percentage of government current revenue, excluding grants, and as a percentage of GDP ..2. Table 2: Comparison of unit recurrent public spending per pupil ..3. Table 3: Fourth-graders' scores on Monitoring Learning Achievement (MLA), 1999. (percentage correct) ..4. Table 4: Students per textbook in primary, by standard ..5. Table 5: Pupil teacher ratios, standard 1 8, 2000 ..5. Table 6: Primary School gross and net enrollment ratios, by sex, according to background characteristics, 2002 ..6. Table 7: Enrollment by type of secondary School , Pupil Teacher Ratio and percentage of qualified teachers, 2000.

8 7. Table 8: Possible areas of policy intervention outcomes (objective) ..10. Table : Social and economic indicators (latest year available) ..14. Table : Evolution in population, GDP, and total government revenue and expenditures ..14. Table : Output and employment ..15. Table : Evolution in the dependency ratio, 1990 2000 ..16. Table : Trends in public spending on education, and comparison to total government spending, 1993/94 2001/02, in percentages ..18. Table : Comparative information on government recurrent spending on education as a percentage of government current revenue, excluding grants, and as a percentage of GDP ..19. Table : Distribution of enrollment, by level of schooling, 2000.

9 22. Table : Absolute enrollment numbers and gross enrollment ratios over time ..24. Table : Repetition and dropout rates, EMIS 2000 and DHS 2000 ..27. Table : PSLCE results and transition to different types of secondary schools ..30. Table : Students with disabilities integrated in primary schools ..31. v Table : Absolute enrollment and gross enrollment ratios in secondary18 ..32. Table : MSCE pass rates prior years ..34. Table : Secondary School transition rates ..35. Table : Primary teacher training graduates over time ..36. Table : Secondary education teacher graduates, Unima and Domasi ..37. Table : Share of personal emoluments in recurrent expenditures.

10 46. Table : Per pupil annual recurrent expenditure (in 1993/94 kwacha) ..47. Table : Unit costs for a year of education, by level of education, 2000/01 ..47. Table : Decomposition of public unit costs, 2000/01 ..48. Table : Average emoluments per staff (in 1993/94 kwacha) ..49. Table : Growth of teaching staff and pupil teacher ratios ..50. Table : Annual household expenditures on primary education, 2001 ..52. Table : Index of efficiency in the different cycles of study, 1999/00 ..56. Table : The relationship between the number of teachers and pupils in public or subvented primary schools, 1999/00 ..59. Table : Regression results with and without using district dummy variables within each of the division subsets.