Presentation by Barbara Ischinger, Director for Education, OECD, at the International Forum on Education ODA jointly organised by the Korean Ministry of Education, KEDI (Korean Education Development Institute), OECD, UNESCO and World Bank, 28 November, Busan, Korea.

1. Raising the Effectiveness
of Official Development
Assistance in Education
Barbara Ischinger
Director for Education
OECD

2. Outline
• The value of education
• How much aid has gone to education since
2005?
• Which kinds of education have received the
support of donors in these years and how has
this been provided?
• Has the aid to education been any use?
• What needs to change to make aid to education
more effective in the future?
• Education quality and the role of OECD
2

3. Value of education
Human
capital
development
Sustained
economic
Social rights growth
Education pays
off
for individuals and
states, socially
Political and and economically
Poverty
social
reduction
participation
Social
integration

4. How Much Aid to Education?
Total Bilateral ODA vs. Expenditures on Education
4
Source: Creditor Reporting System (CRS), OECD

5. Which kinds of education have
received the support of donors?
ODA to education by subsector 2005-2009
14000
12000
Post-Secondary Education
10000
Secondary Education
8000
Basic Education
6000 Education, Level
Unspecified
4000
2000
0
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
5

6. Top Ten Education Donors in 2008

7. Which kinds of education is aided?
Despite the international commitments: most education
aid goes to MICs and to post-basic education
100%
Proportion of Education ODA to MICs
80%
Japan France
60%
EC
(%)
Germany
United States
40%
Canada
Italy
IDA
20%
UK
0%
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Proportion of Education ODA to LICs (%)

8. What needs to change to make aid to
education more effective in the future?
• How much aid to education?
– Enough to bridge the financing gap for achieving
EFA.
• Which kinds of education should be aided?
– Prioritise basic and secondary education, particularly
for girls …emphasise policies aimed at improving
quality
• Through which channels?
– Harmonised and aligned ones: Sector budget
support, combined with policy dialogue and technical
co-operation
8

9. Education quality and economic growth
9

10. Wealth matters
- but effective policies matter more
560
Shanghai-China
540 Finland
Singapore Canada
New Zealand
520 Japan Australia
Netherlands
Poland Estonia Iceland Belgium
Mean reading performance in PISA 2009
500 Sweden United StatesDenmark
Hungary Portugal UK Germany France Chinese Taipei
Latvia Croatia Czech Rep Greece
480 Italy Macao-China Ireland
Lithuania Slovenia
Russian Federation Slovak Republic Israel Spain
460 Austria
Chile
Serbia
440 Bulgaria
Thailand Mexico Uruguay
420 Colombia Romania y = 0.001x + 435.4
Tunisia Brazil
Jordan Argentina Trinidad and Tobago
400 Indonesia R² = 0.243
Albania Kazakhstan
380 Peru Panama
360 Azerbaijan
340
320
Kyrgyzstan
300
0 10000 20000 30000 40000 50000 60000
GDP per capita (current USD) 10

11. Participation of ODA recipients
in OECD activities
National capacities International support
• Participation will depend • International support is
on national capacities provided for ODA
and adjustment of survey recipients to enable
techniques participation and
analysis, and could be
further expanded
11

12. Prospects for PISA as a global-initiative
• PISA is the largest and most rigorous survey
on students’ performance
• Tool to compare the efficiency and equity of
countries’ education systems in an
international perspective
• Many of the countries and economies
covered in PISA are non-OECD members
and are at various stages of development

13. A map of PISA countries and economies
13

14. ODA recipients in PISA
14

15. Performance and spending in ODA countries
PISA reading performance
Public spending on education, total (% of government expenditure)
500 25
Public spending on education (% of government
Mean reading performance in PISA 2009
480 OECD average
460 20
440
420 15
expenditure)
400
OECD average
380 10
360
340 5
320
300 0
Source: OECD PISA 2009 Database; 15
Education at a Glance (2011); World Bank Indicators 2011 (Data from 2008 or last year for which data is available)

16. What makes PISA attractive for ODA recipients?
• PISA participation can be supported by other
international organisations or be covered by a
International country without direct donor involvement
support
• High flexibility due to options of including
additional test batteries/questionnaires, e.g. test
Flexibility questions aimed at assessing performance at
very low levels of proficiency (e.g. Colombia
2009)
• International benchmarks
• OECD provides additional policy support through
Data analysis secondary PISA analysis (e.g. Kyrgyzstan 2010)

17. Challenges of PISA for ODA recipients
• Low levels of enrolment at age 15 in ODA
countries
Relevance • Large share of students perform at lowest
levels of proficiency
• Reliability of measurement is much lower at the
bottom of the performance distribution
Reliability
• Background questionnaires (student, school
Policy principal, parents) would have to be adjusted to
reflect different policy realities in ODA countries
priorities
• Value added gained from participation: very
Value costly and capacity intensive
added

18. New education indicators
The Millennium Development Goals uses three education
indicators:
• Enrolment rates in primary education
• Completion rates in primary education
• Literacy rates
Use of new indicators to assess country’s progress towards
development, which can be implemented in surveys already
conducted by national statistical offices

19. New education indicators
Educational inputs
• Proportion of schools with less than 45 students per class or average classroom
size or teacher student ratio
• Average teacher salary (as a percentage of GDP per capita)
• Proportion of schools meeting minimum infrastructure and material resource
standards
Educational outcomes
• Educational attainment (how far students go in the educational system)
• Enrolment and completion rates by educational level
• Tertiary enrolment in relation to the market relevance and strategic
development needs
• School-to-work transition, e.g. unemployment by educational level
• Educational achievement (how much students know)
• International student assessments (PISA, TIMMS, PIRLS)
Relevance and lost potential of education
• Measuring equity in the distribution of literacy and educational achievement by
gender and background characteristics
• The migration of highly educated students out of ODA receiving countries (brain
drain) should be monitored
Structure of national school systems
• Promoting the dialogue and collaboration of school systems with similar
characteristics

20. Skills Strategy
Mismatch between educational supply and employment
demand in many ODA receiving countries
• Misallocation and waste of resources
• Need for new strategies and approaches  Focus on the link
between investments in skills development, employment and
productivity
Seoul Summit 2010, G20 Action Plan envisages
• To create internationally comparable skills indicators
• OECD, ILO, UNESCO and World Bank are collaborating on
the development of a set of internationally comparable
indicators of skills for ODA recipients
• To enhance national employable skills strategies
• OECD Pilot Policy Reviews of emerging economies are
planned for 2012/2013
20

21. Challenges for ODA recipients
(some common to all, others more country-specific)
• Absorption challenges of large cohort
effects
• Weaknesses in basic education
• Rural-urban divides, the informal economy
and entrepreneurship climate
• Weak infrastructure and institutions for
bridging education and the labour market
21

22. OER (Open Educational Resources)
“OER are teaching, learning, and research
materials in any medium that reside in the public
domain or have been released under an open
license that permits their free use and re-
purposing by others. An open license is one that
allows anyone to access, reuse, modify and
share the OER.” (Hewlett Foundation)
22

23. Reviews of National Policies for Education
Since 1992 more than 70 OECD Reviews of National
Policies for Education, some in collaboration with
the World Bank
Large geographical coverage: Southeast Europe, CIS
region, Asia, Latin America and the MENA region
Principles of ownership and tailored policy analysis:
methodology is set-up around a joint effort of national
authorities and the OECD
Findings and recommendations can be used for planning
development aid
23

24. Integrity of Education Systems (INTES)
Assesses the integrity of education systems and can
provide forecasts of corruption incidence
Delivers sector level policy recommendations for
eliminating and preventing corruption, strengthening
integrity, and linking national anti-corruption instruments
to sector needs.
A first round of pilot assessments is being carried out
in the framework of the OECD Anti-Corruption Network
for Eastern Europe and Central Asia (ACN)
24

25. Priorities for enhancing aid effectiveness
1. The importance of transparency for improving mutual accountability
2. Using comprehensive ownership and leadership
3. Building a public system
4. Human and institutional capacity development
5. Expanding agendas for ODA countries and building partnerships
6. The importance of civil society and National Assembly for improving
democratic responsibility and transparency 25

26. Thank you for your
attention!
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