Non-state Schools Research Articles

Can public private partnerships help deliver universal secondary education? The case of Uganda

ABSTRACT Governments worldwide are facing pressure to increase access to secondary school. In Uganda, the government introduced a fee-free policy in 2007 to address this issue. In an effort to make it more affordable, the government partnered with non-state schools to form public-private partnerships (PPPs). PPPs are seen as a cost-effective way to increase school supply, but they have also been associated with negative equity implications. This paper uses a theory of change approach to examine how paying tuition fees for eligible students in PPP and state schools has helped extend access to secondary school in Uganda. Analysis of the Ark Secondary Schools Survey and Focus Group data reveals that the policy did not remove the financial and structural barriers for many students. Key informant interviews shed further light on the ways in which the policy has in fact reinforced existing patterns of exclusion.

Инклюзивное школьное образование в негосударственных школах: проблемы и перспективы реализации (на примере Санкт-Петербурга)

The article examines the implementation of inclusive school education in non-state schools on the example of St. Petersburg. Inclusive education involves teaching children with special educational needs in general educa-tion institutions together with their peers without any barriers. The article analyzes the problems faced by non-state educational institutions in the implementation of inclusive education in St. Petersburg, including: difficul-ties in integrating a “special” child into the communication space of peers, lack of opportunities for emotional relaxation of children, lack of specialized equipment, etc. A number of recommendations are offered to im-prove the situation by strengthening support from external organizations, improving the qualifications of teach-ers and creating specialized programs and methodological support. The result of the study is to identify the main problems and prospects for the development of inclusive education in non-state schools, taking into ac-count the specific situation in St. Petersburg.

Home-school distance among native and immigrant-origin lower secondary students in urban Northern Italy

ABSTRACT Residential proximity to schools is a relatively unexplored topic, especially as concerns its link to socially disadvantaged and immigrant-origin students. Such students may be more likely to attend the nearest school to their home, since their (families’) knowledge of school system is weak and school selection depends more on convenience than on evaluation of multiple schools’ pros and cons. This paper examines if, and to what extent, home-school distance differentiates native and immigrant-origin students’ educational experiences. Analyses – carried out in two Northern Italian cities (Milan and Bologna) and referring to students enrolled in the compulsory and comprehensive final year of lower secondary education in the 2014/15 school year – focus on minimum and actual home-school distances, the share of students engaging in ‘flight’ from the nearest school, and the appeal exerted by schools on culturally advantaged families. Results show that native and immigrant-origin students’ school proximity is almost the same. Nonetheless, natives are more likely to attend schools that are farther from home; noteworthy differences are detectable in some disadvantaged areas. Native families, especially in Milan, are more likely to ‘flee’ towards non-state schools, which display a particularly strong appeal towards native families featuring high parental education status.

La modernización educativa en España en un escenario de cambio social y de apertura democrática. Conversaciones con Pedro Caselles Beltrán, Director General de Educación Básica (1976-1982)

This text is an extract from several conversations held with Pedro Caselles Beltrán (1937), a primary school teacher with a degree in Philosophy and Humanities, specialising in Pedagogy, and an education inspector. Pedro Caselles occupied the provincial education offices in Lugo, Cádiz and A Coruña (1970-1976); later he was Deputy Director General of Non-State Schools and General Director of Basic Education (1977-1982). The text deals with his professional career, a summary of administrative management and political action, with particular emphasis on his time as a provincial delegate and later as a senior official in the Ministry of Education and Science (MEC). Under his mandate, several initiatives were carried out, including the promotion of the General Education and Financing of the Education Reform Act (LGE) of 4 August 1970 through the renewal of the Basic General Education Programmes.

Responses to COVID-19 From Non-State School Leaders in Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa and, India: A Call for Educational Equity

In early 2020, the rapid spread of the COVID-19 pandemic was an unprecedented shock to the global education system, resulting in most educational institutions closing their doors and turning to various forms of remote learning to ensure continuous education for their communities. Since the world has not experienced this scale of school closure before, the goal of this study was to explore what, if anything, non-state schools (NNSs) were doing to support remote learning that may help them to prepare for future events that curtail education. In May 2020, Edify, an international non-governmental organization (INGO) operating in eleven nations in Latin America (LATAM), Sub-Saharan Africa and India conducted a telephone survey with a stratified random sample of 388 school leaders. Since the extent learning had continued across contexts was relatively unknown, the survey aimed to inform the organization's current and future responses to the COVID-19 pandemic and potential future educational interruptions. In addition to identifying the various uses of technology and possible innovations as to how non-state schools can respond when a crisis impacts their operating status, this paper describes three areas of concern expressed by the school leaders: (1) the health and safety of children and adults in their schools; (2) the various challenges of maintaining financial sustainability; and (3) the learning loss of students from the lack of preparedness for such a massive interruption in their school's normal operations.

Non State Education in Uzbekistan Formation and Development Prospects

The author of the article investigated the innovative aspects of the formation of non-state education in a new stage of development of the Republic of Uzbekistan. The article emphasizes the role of non-state education in the successful implementation of democratic reforms and the development of civil society. The author of the article made an attempt to reveal the mission of non-state education in society, the tasks of preschool institutions, secondary schools, in the upbringing of the younger generation. The formation of private schools and an increase in the number of specialized schools where individual subjects are studied according to an in-depth program has become a form of an innovative approach in the process of improving non-state school education and teaching children. In the context of the development of civil society, highly qualified teaching staff working in private schools fulfill an important mission in the process of social policy, ensuring the improvement of the quality of the non-state educational process in schools, including increasing the number of students participating in international Olympiads. Graduates of non-state secondary schools carry out a social mission in the implementation of democratic reforms, in ensuring human rights. A modern graduate of a non-state secondary school is a powerful intellectual potential for the country, they make a worthy contribution to the future, the process of digitalization of society, the development of small business and private entrepreneurship. The paper investigates the role of non-state higher educational institutions and the importance of highly qualified personnel in the process of modernizing society. An integrated approach to work in the non-state education system shows that this work is closely related to the democratic reforms carried out in the country in the context of the deepening of the market mechanism in all spheres of socio-economic life. Improving the quality of the educational process in non-state educational institutions has a potential impact on attracting talented young people to study at universities, technical schools, academic lyceums and professional colleges. In the process of non-state school and higher education, pupils and students are introduced to the knowledge necessary for the whole life of every person, which is considered a reference point for determining the future. The country has created equal conditions for admission to higher educational institutions for graduates of non-state secondary schools.

The role of faith-based health professions schools in Cameroon’s health system

ABSTRACT Faith-based health professions schools contribute to the training of staff in many Sub-Saharan African countries. Yet little is known about these actors, their role in the health system, potential comparative advantages and challenges faced. This is a qualitative study drawing on 24 qualitative interviews and 3 focus group discussions. Participants included faith-based health professions schools, staff at faith-based health professions schools, Ministry of Health officials and donors. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data. The findings reveal that understanding of faith-based health professions schools held by donors and the Ministry of Health rest on a set of assumptions rather than evidence-backed knowledge and that knowledge on key aspects is missing (not least on the market share of such actors). This suggests that collaboration with and oversight of these non-state schools is limited, raising questions about the balance of state regulation and control in the public-private mix for training health workers. Linked to this weak oversight, the findings also raise concerns over a number of problematic activities at these schools, unaccredited training programmes and the presence of missionary volunteers whose presence and actions are rarely interrogated.

The Study Centre for Catholic Education (Rome): a review of its research projects and publications

The Study Centre for Catholic Education was established in 1996 by the Italian Bishops’ Conference to support the Italian Catholic schools. In these 20 years, it has published every year a Report about different aspects of the sector and has made a periodic quality monitoring of the Catholic schools. It has published also an annual data collection about the system of the Italian Catholic schools and has promoted many meetings, seminars and courses. The article presents all the activities of the Study Centre in the particular Italian context that does not promote the non-state schools.

What can international comparisons teach us about school choice and non-governmental schools in Europe?

All European states have a primary obligation to establish and maintain governmental schools everywhere, but as the result of political struggle and constitutional guarantees, they have also allowed and often financed non-state schools based on special pedagogical, religious or philosophical ideas. Depending on the level of state grants for non-state schools, states have more or less the right to supervise these non-governmental schools and seek to guarantee that the quality of organisation and teachers are not lower than those in governmental schools. Using comparable cross-national data for all member states of the European Union, we first describe four existing basic arrangements of non-governmental and governmental schools: integrated educational systems of public and non-state schools, denomination supportive educational systems, limited-support non-governmental schools and educational systems with segregated public and non-state schools. Using the same cross-national data for all member states of the European Union, we then explore three other topics: parental background and the choice of non-governmental schools, non-governmental schools and their cognitive outcomes, and non-governmental schools and their non-cognitive outcomes. There are important differences between non-governmental-independent (without state grants) and non-governmental-dependent schools (with state grants); that school choice of non-governmental-dependent schools is more related to socially mobile parents, whereas schools choice of non-governmental-independent schools is more related the reproduction of social classes; that in a majority of European countries, non-governmental-dependent schools are more effective cognitively than governmental schools, but that non-governmental-independent schools are more effective cognitively only in a few countries and more ineffective in a larger number of countries. Also non-governmental-dependent schools are not more effective non-cognitively than governmental schools.

Juicio moral y actitud ambiental de los alumnos de quinto grado de educación secundaria de Barranco

El objetivo principal de esta investigación es determinar si existe una relación significativa entre el juicio moral y la actitud ambiental, según el tipo de gestión educativa, el género y la edad. Se emplea el diseño correlacional. La muestra representativa está conformada por 238 alumnos de quinto grado de educación secundaria del distrito de Barranco de Lima. Se aplican los instrumentos: Cuestionario de Reflexión Socio Moral (SROM) y Escala de Actitud Ambiental (ESACAMB). El análisis de datos se desarrolla mediante el programa SPSS 15.0 y con los estadísticos de la r de Pearson, chi-cuadrado, t de Student y ANOVA. Se concluye que existe una correlación significativa entre el juicio moral y la actitud ambiental. Respecto al juicio moral, los alumnos se ubican en la tercera etapa de la teoría de Kohlberg; los alumnos de centros educativos no estatales evidencian mayor juicio moral que los alumnos de estatales; nose hallan diferencias significativas según el género ni la edad. En relación a la actitud ambiental, los estudiantes se ubican en un nivel alto; las mujeres superan significativamente a los varones; y no se encuentran diferencias significativas de acuerdo al tipo de gestión educativa ni a la edad.

South Africa: A Science Lesson

South Africa: A Science Lesson

Governance and school boards in non-state schools in Australia

The paper explores governance arrangements in non-state school in Australia, using 17 interviews in six schools. The focus is on board composition, structure and reporting. Useful contributions about innovative practice are identified. School boards may benefit from implementing more stakeholder engagement. Existing models of school boards from international state school literature, such as the democracy and trustee models, were useful for describing some aspects of non-state school governance, but a faith model is also suggested. Further research could operationalise governance elements to conduct a quantitative investigation with more schools and more informants. The paper adds to the expanding international literature on school governance by researching a country that has received little governance attention. The paper focuses on a significant area for school leadership: school boards in non-state schools.

THE EDUCATION SYSTEM OF EGYPT: CONTEXTS, FRAMES AND STRUCTURES

The research describes contemporary educational system existing in the Arab Republic of Egypt against a background of its history, economical, social and demographical situation, and its legislative foundations. Egypt’s educational traditions come from colonial times and Islamic sources. The contemporary Egyptian educational system consists of three levels: primary, sec-ondary and tertiary education. It is compatible with the European system of education and alt-hough it still needs some improvement, it is constantly developing. Apart from governmental educational institutions, there is a private sector of schooling as well. Besides state and non-state schools, there are other forms of supplementary education, e.g. adult or non-formal education directed at children remaining beyond any official schooling system etc. The data is also presented in the form of graphs included herewith. Key words: Egypt, educational system, schools.

The Importance Of Examining Teacher And Learners Attitudes And Understanding Learning Needs In The Twenty First Century

An indispensable part of any curriculum design in an educational setting is the analysis of the needs of the learners involved in the context. The needs can be addressed from different perspectives. Among them, the learners' needs in terms of their perceptions toward what constitute learning/teaching and testing processes are of prominent values. If there is a match between how they view these processes and what the course designers assume them to be, more achievement is likely to happen. In this regard, no one-to-one correspondence exists between what the learners think and what really should be; however, any modifications made to set the ideas closer to one another are of great value.An indispensable part of any curriculum design in an educational setting is the analysis of the needs of the learners involved in the context. The needs can be addressed from different perspectives. Among them, the learners' needs in terms of their perceptions toward what constitute learning/teaching and testing processes are of prominent values. If there is a match between how they view these processes and what the course designers assume them to be, more achievement is likely to happen. In this regard, no one-to-one correspondence exists between what the learners think and what really should be; however, any modifications made to set the ideas closer to one another are of great value. In this study, an attempt is made to study the learners' as well as their teachers' attitudes toward learning, teaching and testing processes in their own educational settings. 213 learners and 38 English language teachers who have been selected from state /non-state schools and two English language private institutes with different comparable curricula have been questioned. The items of the different questionnaires designed for the learners and the teachers constituted the measuring instruments of the study. The types of the questions included in the questionnaires can [m1] to form four patterns of the responses. These patterns can show the preference of learners/teachers over: 1- text based or fun task-based teaching materials 2- form-focused or meaning focused instruction 3- formative or summative testing procedures. The implications of the study can benefit both learners/teachers as well as course designers to reconsider the issues which are of great challenges to any educational curriculum in different educational settings. [m1]Can

Assessment of School Performance Through a Multilevel Latent Markov Rasch Model

An extension of the latent Markov Rasch model is described for the analysis of binary longitudinal data with covariates when subjects are collected in clusters, such as students clustered in classes. For each subject, a latent process is used to represent the characteristic of interest (e.g., ability) conditional on the effect of the cluster to which he or she belongs. The latter effect is modeled by a discrete latent variable associated to each cluster. For the maximum likelihood estimation of the model parameters, an Expectation-Maximization algorithm is outlined. Through the analysis of a data set collected in the Lombardy Region (Italy), it is shown how the proposed model may be used for assessing the development of cognitive achievement. The data set is based on test scores in mathematics observed over 3 years on middle school students attending public and non-state schools. Manuscript received March 20, 2009 Revision received July 2, 2010 Accepted July 10, 2010

Why are there proportionately more poor pupils enrolled in non-state schools in urban Kenya in spite of FPE policy?

Abstract One of the conundrums of free primary education (FPE) policy in several countries in Sub-Saharan Africa is the ‘mushrooming’ of fee-paying private schools. Several researchers have become interested in studying this phenomenon and have raised the question—does free primary education meet the needs of the poor? Emerging voices among this group of researchers suggest that the impact of FPE, particularly in meeting the educational needs of the poor may be over-stated in situations where the poor still utilize what is referred to as ‘private schools for the poor’. The concerns expressed by those voicing this point of view point to the question of why the poor choose fee-paying [low quality] private schools when there is, presumably a free state school? To respond to this question and to contribute to this debate, this paper adopts the excess demand and differentiated demand frameworks to analyse how slum (poor) and non-slum (non-poor) parents utilize education in Nairobi, Kenya following the implementation of free primary education policy in 2003. We conclude that the answer to the ‘mushrooming’ of private schools for the poor is ‘excess demand’. As to whether free primary education meets the needs of the poor, we argue that where supply does not match demand excess demand is likely to arise in the initial stages. We recommend that what is required is greater and possibly differentiated and better targeted investment in education whereby unequals are treated unequally in order for the Kenyan government not to under-invest in the education of the poor.

Is School Chaplaincy Being Secularised?

The recent Australian government initiative to provide funding for chaplains in both state and non-state schools raises a variety of issues. From a historical and legislative perspective, some question again the long established legislative support for various forms of religious instruction in government schools, as well as the essential meaning of the separation of Church and State in Australia. More contemporary concerns have to do with community involvements in schools and the extent to which chaplaincy intersects with the many issues in ‘values education’. This recent Commonwealth involvement in schooling raises questions concerning the exact nature of the initiative and its intended outcomes. Hill concludes his treatment by examining ethical issues for such chaplains in whatever school system.

Responses of Private and Public Schools to Voucher Funding: The Czech and Hungarian Experience

A state monopoly in schooling followed the collapse of communism in Central Europe. The centrally planned system was abandoned. Systems comparable with educational voucher scheme, also known as school choice system, were introduced in the Czech Republic and Hungary in the early 1990s. The newly established system of school financing allocates public funds according to the number of students enrolled in a school. Accredited non-state schools, private and religious, are also eligible for public subsidies. The scope and the form of these reforms represent a unique opportunity to test conflicting hypotheses of proponents and opponents of the voucher scheme.In this empirical analysis, we test fundamental theoretical predictions of the voucher model. Specifically, we test: i) whether non-state schools are established at locations where the supply of educational opportunities provided by state schools is low or of low quality, ii) whether state and non-state schools in such a system respond to changes in demand for education, and iii) whether state schools respond to competition from non-state schools. We use detailed school level data on the whole population of schools and data on regional conditions. In our econometric model we estimate education value added, instead of relying on absolute quality of school graduates.We find that non-state school emerge at locations with excess demand and lower quality state schools. We also find that greater competition from non-state schools creates incentives for state schools with the result that state schools slightly improve the quality of educational inputs used and significantly improve their output, quality of graduates. As concerns the technical schools, we find that non-state schools react to regional labor market conditions in terms of technical branch premium and unemployment rate. We do not find such reactions to market signals by state schools.We introduce this analysis with a review of non-state schools' development in the Czech Republic and Hungary during the 1990s.

Responses of Private and Public Schools to Voucher Funding: The Czech and Hungarian Experience

A state monopoly in schooling followed the collapse of communism in Central Europe. The centrally planned system was abandoned. Systems comparable with educational voucher scheme, also known as school choice system, were introduced in the Czech Republic and Hungary in the early 1990s. The newly established system of school financing allocates public funds according to the number of students enrolled in a school. Accredited non-state schools, private and religious, are also eligible for public subsidies. The scope and the form of these reforms represent a unique opportunity to test conflicting hypotheses of proponents and opponents of the voucher scheme. In this empirical analysis, we test fundamental theoretical predictions of the voucher model. Specifically, we test: i) whether non-state schools are established at locations where the supply of educational opportunities provided by state schools is low or of low quality, ii) whether state and non-state schools in such a system respond to changes in demand for education, and iii) whether state schools respond to competition from non-state schools. We use detailed school level data on the whole population of schools and data on regional conditions. In our econometric model we estimate education value added, instead of relying on absolute quality of school graduates. We find that non-state school emerge at locations with excess demand and lower quality state schools. We also find that greater competition from non-state schools creates incentives for state schools with the result that state schools slightly improve the quality of educational inputs used and significantly improve their output, quality of graduates. As concerns the technical schools, we find that non-state schools react to regional labor market conditions in terms of technical branch premium and unemployment rate. We do not find such reactions to market signals by state schools. We introduce this analysis with a review of non-state schools' development in the Czech Republic and Hungary during the 1990s.

Privatization of education in the Czech Republic

In order to better understand the process of privatisation of education as a new phenomenon in the Czech educational system the paper starts with a description of the pre-revolution characteristics of the system as a highly centralised administration based on the totalitarian Communist ideology and describes the main consequences of this system. The paper briefly shows the main changes in education after 1989: the de-politisation of education, the breaking up of the State monopoly, the recognition of the rights of pupils, the decentralisation in management and administration and the introduction of formula funding. It characterises non-state schools in the Czech Republic from various aspects: quantitative, qualitative, public and also the OECD experts' views.