ECCE and Attention to Transition
– the Route to Equality
Is Everybody Ready?
Caroline Arnold
Aga Khan Foundation
South Asian Regional Conference
August 27 – 29, 2012
Early Childhood Care and Education Policies and Practices:
Towards 2015 and Beyond
ECD Significant and sustained benefits
Key to addressing deep-rooted patterns
of discrimination and exclusion
Studies – India, Nepal,
Bangladesh, Pakistan,
Turkey,Egypt, Jamaica, Guinea,
South Africa, US, UK, Peru
Most dramatic gains for disadvantaged
Nepal
Initial Enrollment into Grade 1
ECD
All children
> 95%
75% (district)
Promotion from Grade 1 to 2
ECD
Non-ECD
84%
42%
Double
Results most dramatic for dalit children and girls
India
Retention rate in primary
National level ICDS evaluation (25 states)
ECD
No ECD
89%
68%
Chaturvedi Study
No impact on drop-out for high caste children but 46%
reduction for lowest castes
Gender Equity
• Brazil
Girls from low-income families who attend preschool
2 X as likely to reach Grade 5
3 X as likely to reach Grade 8
• Nepal: Boy/ Girl ratios
Grade 1:
Grade 2:
ECCE
50/50
Non-ECCE
61/39
ECCE
54/46
Non-ECCE
66/34
Pakistan RCC
Key Findings
(Transition Project)
Learning Achievement Test scores, Class 1
100%
80%
65%
50%
68%
68%
55%
Project
50%
Non-Project
0%
English
Urdu
Math
Benefits most pronounced for girls and government
schools serving the most disadvantaged
05-134
GDP & Grade 3 Language Scores
Language
Score
Country
GDP $
Chile
9.930
351
Mexico
6.769
247
Colombia
6.347
242
Brazil
5.928
240
Cuba
3.100
236
UNESCO 1998
BUT
Early Childhood Care and Education
AND
Early Primary
is
when
Education Systems fail children
(especially marginalized children)
the worst
Lack of ECCE Access
• Sub- Saharan Africa : 86% - NO access
• South & West Asia : 58% - NO access
For the vast majority of disadvantaged children
transition is still from home to school
Failure
to
provide adequate financial resources
(national governments and international donors)
Disparities within countries
• Globally - failure to reach most disadvantaged
(social, economic, geography, parental ed.)
EFA Goal 1
• Syria, Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan:
Children from wealthiest 20% > 5 X as likely to attend
pre-school as those from poorest 20%
• Bangladesh
Wealthiest 20% >2X as to have learning opportunities at
home
Have we done enough to make sure policy-makers
understand the connection between EFA’s 1st goal and
the attainment of other EFA goals and MDGs?
• Access and Completion of basic education
(goal 2)
• Gender Equity (goal 5)
• Quality (goal 6)
Attention Increasing – but slowly
• More data, better analysis
• Evidence of benefits of ECCE
• Devastating consequences of combination of
i)lack of supports for early childhood
ii)lack of attention to early primary
Children not ready for Schools
and
Schools not ready for Children
Limited Progress towards EFA goals
•
Massive increases in initial enrolments BUT
– Inadequate increases in completion in too
many places
– Poor learning achievement (ASER)
Where are Efforts breaking down?
Right at the beginning
SCHOOL
The Crisis in Grade 1
Grade 1 DROP-OUT*
Pakistan 16% India 15%
(>3 X Grade 4 drop-out)
Grade 1 REPETITION
Nepal 30%
Bihar,India 16% (MIS,SSA)
* Source: EFA GMR /11
Even if stay in school….millions become set in
persistent patterns of under-achievement
Early primary years - Key to systemic failures in education
COSTLY IN BOTH HUMAN AND FINANCIAL TERMS
3 Questions and Challenges:
1) Why do ECCE professionals and policy-makers
ignore the 6-8 year-olds when ECCE is defined as
covering 0-8?
2) Why are large scale education reform efforts not
giving focused attention to early primary?
3) How can we conceptualize and implement work so
that ECCE and early primary part of a whole?
Increase resources for and ensure access
to ECCE programmes
– ECCE for all and ESPECIALLY the marginalized.
Target
– Flexible approaches that enable reach to remote
areas and excluded groups
– Minimum targets for ECCE budgets (wellbalanced systems invest about 10% of
education budget in ECCE)
– Quality
– Links between ECD and primary
Increase resources for early primary as critical
to education reform addressing the equity and
learning crisis
– Invest the best in early primary (opposite of present)
• Experienced, capable teachers in lower primary; improved
knowledge, skills and status
– Focused attention to lower primary in training
– Welcoming, appreciative, inclusive, safe, healthy
environment for children and parents
– Focus on LEARNING – esp. language & literacy –
systematic teaching of reading
– Mother tongue - transition into additional language/s
– Learning materials in children’s hands
GENERATE AND USE EVIDENCE TO MOBILIZE
POLITICAL AND POPULAR SUPPORT
• Data demonstrating solid results from ECD and
early primary work vital
– Building commitment
– Influencing Policy
– Mobilizing Resources
• Decision-makers need local evidence
– Impact on education indicators
– Fit with priorities and commitments of target group
GENERATE AND USE LOCAL EVIDENCE
Afghan Badakshan:
2005: half as many girls in Grd.6 as in Grd.1
ECCE & Focussed attention to early primary introduced
2011: 17% fewer girls in Grd.6 as in Grd.1
Attention to
ECCE
including
early primary
Key
to
Countering discrimination and
Ensuring a good start
for
ALL CHILDREN
Thank you
Aga Khan Development Network
www.akdn.org