Regional inequalities and gender differences in academic achievement as a function of educational opportunities: Evidence from Ethiopia

Melaku Tesfa Tesema,Johan Braeken

doi:10.1016/j.ijedudev.2017.10.023

Abstract

This study investigated regional and gender differences in academic achievement in Ethiopia, and examined whether these differences can be explained in terms of unequal educational opportunities (EO). Educational opportunity was operationalized in a broad sense based on a regional differentiation in terms of socio-economic and school environment factors. The study results are based on a multilevel analysis of the 2014 and 2015 national standardized exam for grade 12 students (n=194503 and n=205719). Whereas the Central (high EO) regions outperformed the other regions (Cohen’s d=0.85) as expected, there were some inconsistencies in the comparison between Established (mid EO) regions and Emerging (low EO) regions. Coincidentally, the two Emerging regions that were unexpectedly performing at the level of the Established regions were also the two regions in which there was no evidence for a gender gap in achievement. For other regions, including the Central regions, evidence for a gender gap sometimes as large as the regional gap was identified, with boys having on average higher scores than girls (Cohen’s d=[0.02, 0.92] with an average of 0.50). Plausible explanations and further policy recommendations are discussed.

Highlights

Recent studies by UNESCO (2015a, 2015b) indicate that sub-Saharan Africa continues to show good progress in education, yet wide disparities within each country are still holding back full achievement of the universal Education-For-All goals
This study provides a differential perspective on academic achievement in one of the largest educational systems in a developing country, and explores the theoretically expected regional differences and gender gap as a function of regional educational opportunity using Ethiopian student data on the grade 12 national standardized examination
In order to provide an overall picture of the nature of the outcome measure in this study and as a first descriptive step in the analysis, we set up an unconditional null model for academic achievement by allowing the average exam score to vary across schools, i.e., a so-called random intercept model

Summary

Introduction

Recent studies by UNESCO (2015a, 2015b) indicate that sub-Saharan Africa continues to show good progress in education, yet wide disparities within each country are still holding back full achievement of the universal Education-For-All goals. The post-2015 education and development agenda stresses that the driving forces behind education and development frameworks should be ‘elimination of poverty and eradication of inequalities‘ within and across countries, as well as providing universal and equitable access to quality education (Sayed et al, 2013). Ethiopia has been focusing on improving students’ learning outcomes and educational opportunities at all levels of the education sector (World Bank, 2005). Since the education system is seen as a means to enhance overall nation-building and achieve the national goal of eradicating poverty, it is essential that the education system offers equal opportunities and quality educational experiences that promote learning achievement. The Ethiopian government has expressed interest in creating better educational opportunities, with the expectation that doing so will enhance learning outcomes.

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion