Can information campaigns spark local participation and improve outcomes ? A study of primary education in Uttar Pradesh, India

There is a growing belief in development policy circles that participation by local communities in basic service delivery can promote development outcomes. A central plank of public policy for improving primary education services in India is the participation of village education committees (VECs), consisting of village government leaders, parents, and teachers. The authors report findings from a survey in the state of Uttar Pradesh, of public schools, households, and VEC members, on the status of education services and the extent of community participation inthe public delivery of education services. They find that parents do not know that a VEC exists, sometimes even when they are supposed to be members of it; VEC members are unaware of even key roles they are empowered to play in education services; and public participation in improving education is negligible, and correspondingly, people's ranking of education on a list of village priorities is low. Large numbers of children in the villages have not acquired basic competency in reading, writing, and arithmetic. Yet parents, teachers, and VEC members seem not to be fully aware of the scale of the problem, and seem not to have given much thought to the role of public agencies in improving outcomes. Learning failures coexist with public apathy to improving it through public action. Can local participation be sparked through grassroots campaigns that inform communities about the VEC and its role in local service delivery? Can such local participation actually affect learning outcomes, and can any impact be sustained? The authors describe information and advocacy campaigns that have been experimentally implemented to address some of the problems with local participation, and future research plans to evaluate their impact.Primary Education,Education For All,Teaching and Learning,Tertiary Education,Access&Equity in Basic Education

Pitfalls of participatory programs : evidence from a randomized evaluation in education in India

Participation of beneficiaries in the monitoring of public services is increasingly seen as key to improving their efficiency. In India, the current government flagship program on universal primary education organizes community members, specifically locally elected leaders and parents of children enrolled in public schools, into committees and gives these powers over resource allocation, monitoring and management of school performance. However, in a baseline survey this paper finds that people were not aware of the existence of these committees and their potential for improving education. The paper evaluates three different interventions to encourage beneficiaries'participation: providing information, training community members in a new testing tool, and training and organizing volunteers to hold remedial reading camps for illiterate children. The authors find that these interventions had no impact on community involvement in public schools, and no impact on teacher effort or learning outcomes in those schools. However, the intervention that trained volunteers to teach children to read had large impact on activity outside public schools -- local youths volunteered to be trained, and children who attended these camps substantially improved their reading skills. These results suggest that citizens face substantial constraints in participating to improve the public education system, even when they care about education and are willing to do something to improve it.Primary Education,Education For All,Teaching and Learning,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Tertiary Education,Economics of Education

Pitfalls of participatory programs : evidence from a randomized evaluation in education in India

Statement of responsibility on t.p. reads: Abhijit V. Banerjee, Rukmini Benerji [i.e. Banerji], Esther Duflo, Rachel Glennerster and Stuti KhemaniSeptember 5, 200

Pitfalls of Participatory Programs: Evidence From a Randomized Evaluation in Education in India

Participation of beneficiaries in the monitoring of public services is increasingly seen as a key to improving their efficiency. In India, the current government flagship program on universal primary education organizes both locally elected leaders and parents of children enrolled in public schools into committees and gives these groups powers over resource allocation, and monitoring and management of school performance. However, in a baseline survey we found that people were not aware of the existence of these committees and their potential for improving education. This paper evaluates three different interventions to encourage beneficiaries' participation through these committees: providing information, training community members in a new testing tool, and training and organizing volunteers to hold remedial reading camps for illiterate children. We find that these interventions had no impact on community involvement in public schools, and no impact on teacher effort or learning outcomes in those schools. However, we do find that the intervention that trained volunteers to teach children to read had a large impact on activity outside public schools -- local youths volunteered to be trained to teach, and children who attended these camps substantially improved their reading skills. These results suggest that citizens face substantial constraints in participating to improve the public education system, even when they care about education and are willing to do something to improve it.

Towards transnational feminist queer methodologies

This article introduces the possibilities of transnational feminist queer research as seeking to conceptualise the transnational as a methodology composed of a series of flows that can augment feminist and queer research. Transnational feminist queer methodologies can contest long-standing configurations of power between researcher and researched, subject and object, academics and activists across places, typically those which are embedded in the hierarchies of the Global North/Global South. Beginning with charting our roots in, and routes through, the diverse arenas of transnational, feminist, participatory and queer methodologies, the article uses a transcribed and edited conversation between members of the Liveable Lives research team in Kolkata and Brighton, to start an exploration of transnational feminist queer methodologies. Understanding the difficult, yet constructive moments of collaborative work and dialogue, we argue for engagements with the multiplicities of ‘many-many' lives that recognise local specificities, and the complexities of lives within transnational research, avoiding creating a currency of comparison between places. We seek to work toward methodologies that take seriously the politics of place, namely by creating research that answers the same question in different places, using methods that are created in context and may not be ‘comparable'. Using a dialogue across the boundaries of activism/academia, as well as across geographical locations, the article contends that there are potentials, as well as challenges, in thinking ourselves through transnational research praxis. This seeks complexities and spatial nuances within as well as between places

Pratham Information Project -- Read India

This data is the basis for the article: Banerjee, Abhijit V.; Banerji, Rukmini; Duflo, Esther; Glennerster, Rachel; and Khemani, Stuti: "Pitfalls of Participatory Programs: Evidence from a Randomized Evaluation in Education in India" in the American Economic Journal: Economic Policy

Pitfalls of Participatory Programs: Evidence from a Randomized Evaluation in Education in India

To comment on this article in the online discussion forum, or to view additional materials, visit the articles page at http://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/pol.2.1.1.Participation of beneficiaries in the monitoring of public services is increasingly seen as a key to improving their quality. We conducted a randomized evaluation of three interventions to encourage beneficiaries' participation to India: providing information on existing institutions, training community members in a testing tool for children, and training volunteers to hold remedial reading camps. These interventions had no impact on community involvement, teacher effort, or learning outcomes inside the school. However, in the third intervention, youth volunteered to teach camps, and children who attended substantially improved their reading skills. This suggests that citizens face constraints in influencing public services. (JEL H52, I21, I28, O15)World Bank. Development Impact EvaluationWorld Bank. Social Development. Trust Fund for Environmentally and Socially Sustainable Developmen

Pitfalls of Participatory Programs: Evidence from a Randomized Evaluation in Education in India

Participation of beneficiaries in the monitoring of public services is increasingly seen as a key to improving their efficiency. In India, the current government flagship program on universal primary education organizes both locally elected leaders and parents of children enrolled in public schools into committees and gives these groups powers over resource allocation, and monitoring and management of school performance. However, in a baseline survey we found that people were not aware of the existence of these committees and their potential for improving education. This paper evaluates three different interventions to encourage beneficiaries’ participation through these committees: providing information, training community members in a new testing tool, and training and organizing volunteers to hold remedial reading camps for illiterate children. We find that these interventions had no impact on community involvement in public schools, and no impact on teacher effort or learning outcomes in those schools. However, we do find that the intervention that trained volunteers to teach children to read had a large impact on activity outside public schools—local youths volunteered to be trained to teach, and children who attended these camps substantially improved their reading skills. These results suggest that citizens face substantial constraints in participating to improve the public education system, even when they care about education and are willing to do something to improve it.community participation; development economics; educational economics