Educational Reform to Correct the Past: Namibian Evidence

Abstract

This paper used graduation statistics of the Namibian secondary higher education over two decades to determine linkages to human capital of the youth and its multiplication into economic development. The paper assessed the effect of regional differences to show historic educational discrimination and why the education reform was required to correct the skewed past. It was hypothesized that the educational reform would result into improvements of the academic levels within the disadvantaged regions and anticipated that the correction will partly have negative effects on the previously advantaged regions. By applying panel data, the paper attempts to simultaneously address the complex relationships of development, education, and the underlying causalities within the economic system of Namibia. Concepts in the testing of socio-economic components are done by looking at confounding logics, stochastics, and the use of latent variables to determine linkages by using the canonical correlation method. This approach could be extended in future as guide for decisions on education. Our study shows that the implementation of the Namibian education reform resulted into increased enrolment numbers, but unfortunately also into the declining of academic levels, combined with the narrowing of learners’ outputs. The reform response in the previously disadvantaged regions was slower than expected. Findings of the longitudinal data show that education levels in Namibia partly contributed towards human capital formation to multiply into economic development. The study shows that the method of analyzing linkages between cause and effect by means of causality provides advantages for analysis. The results confirm findings that human capital formation has a positive effect on the country's economic status, but for efficacy analysis of policy, we need regional information.