The World Bank is set to launch a hard-hitting report on education in Latin America that focuses on the standard of teachers and the quality of education. Unlike previous reports that have just looked at infrastructure and materials or graduation rates, this latest study also involved observations in more than 10,000 classrooms.
“The issue is no longer about quantity or access to schools, but the quality of schools,” said Hasan Tuluy, the World Bank’s retiring VP for Latin America. “The content of what is delivered needs improvement.”
One of the Bank’s recommendations is for countries to focus on teacher selection, evaluations and incentives. Tuluy said he recognized that there would be opposition in countries that followed this recommendation. “This is one of the big reforms, which is obviously politically contentious, but it has produced results where it has been implemented,” he said.
Peru and Chile are two countries that appear to be moving in the World Bank’s direction.
The Peruvian government, perhaps stung into action by the fact that its students came bottom of the latest standardized test, PISA, applied to more than 60 countries by the OECD, is set to present new education reform that will not only focus on traditional components, such as infrastructure, but also aims at improving the way teachers are hired and evaluated.
However, past moves regarding teacher evaluations sparked long and harmful strikes by the teachers’ union (SUTEP), the strongest labour organization in the country.
Economy and finance minister Luis Miguel Castilla said the government plans on moving ahead in the first half of the year with a new education reform that would consist of four pillars and build on a reform approved in the first year of President Ollanta Humala’s five year term, which began in July 2011.
“Education is going to be reformed and there is going to be more investment,” said Castilla. “Our commitment in drafting the budget for next year is to allocate a lot more resources. A reallocation in education, health and human capital will be a priority.”
The reform will include the traditional component of infrastructure, where Peru still lags behind. The infrastructure gap in education is estimated to be as high as 10% of GDP. No one will object to this, but the government will likely meet resistance from SUTEP and some political sectors over a second proposal, which is accelerating teacher evaluations.
The teachers’ union claims the Humala government wants to privatize education, something that Castilla flatly denies. He said there would be private-public partnership infrastructure construction and maintenance, but ruled out privatization.
“For us, teaching in the public sector is a responsibility of the state. We are not foreseeing privatization of schooling or calling to voucher-type systems,” he said.
Meanwhile, Chilean President Michelle Bachelet’s government has promised reforms that will make access to education free and universal. It starts with early childhood education and extends through university. The reforms will be presented on May 21 and will be preceded by tax reform, which goes to Congress on March 31 and is geared in many ways toward increasing revenue in order to pay for education.
Debate is already intense, with even members of Bachelet’s ruling coalition complaining that the reform could undermine positive components of earlier changes adopted in the past two decades.