Improving Learning Outcomes

 Improving Learning Outcomes | (News and Research 353)

Improving Learning in Low- and Lower-Middle-Income Countries | Angrist, Aurino, Patrinos, Psacharopoulos, Vegas, Nordjo, Wong | The current challenge of education systems is learning. Across low-income countries (LICs) and lower-middle-income countries (LMCs), 62 % of 10-year-olds could not read at a minimally sufficient level in 2015. This study provides an overview of recent spending on education and its correlation with learning outcomes. The relationship between education spending and learning is historically weak. From 2000 to 2015, LICs and LMCs increased spending on education in primary schools by ~$137 per student, an 80 % inflation-adjusted increase, with no corresponding change on the average learning outcomes. A benefit-cost analysis of candidate interventions that could increase learning at low cost shows that two interventions – structured pedagogy and, teaching at the right level, with and without a technology component – generate large benefit-cost ratios. If deployed uniformly to reach 90 % of the 467 million students in LICs and LMCs, these interventions would cost on average $18 per student per year or $7.6 billion annually, generating $65 in benefits for every $1 spent. The economic logic behind this finding is that the hard and costly work of getting children into primary schools has mostly been accomplished, leaving open the possibility of learning interventions that improve the efficiency of the existing education system at low cost. The results show that increasing education expenditure by just 6 % could increase learning by 120 % if directed toward these highly cost-effective interventions.

The Rising Trend in Private Education: Teeny, Tiny Schools | WSJ | In the USA, families reacting to an influx of voucher funds and post-pandemic woes are increasingly choosing so-called microschools.

How to make your degree worth the investment | The Economist Films Explainer |The price of higher education.

Colleges hide the truth about tuition | Will, WashPost |From sea to shining sea, the shining faces of young people are turning expectantly toward another year in the groves of academe. Heading for college, they leave behind parents who might understandably be bewildered about the price of higher education.

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Returns to Education Turns 50 |

Submit a Manuscript to the Journal Education Economics for a Special Issue on the 50th Anniversary of the Returns to Education: An International Comparison | Manuscript deadline: 31 October 2023 | Special Issue Editor: Harry Patrinos, World Bank | Submit An Article | This year is the 50th anniversary of the publication of the book, Returns to Education: An International Comparison, by George Psacharopoulos (assisted by Keith Hinchliffe). Education Economics is publishing a special issue to mark this occasion and the contributions of Professor Psacharopoulos. The focus of this special issue is research on the returns to education. Research on international comparisons and /or returns to education in less developed economies are especially welcome.