6533b7d7fe1ef96bd1267af6

RESEARCH PRODUCT

Putting Inputs to Work in Elementary Schools: What Can Be Done in the Philippines?

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description

The paper consists in estimating a value-added educational production function of primary education in the Philippines. The information used match household and school-based survey data. The Huber White technique is used so as to take into account the problem of heteroscedasticity when merging individual pupil variables with class/school variables; this procedure helps relate the outcome side of the production (student learning) that concerns the individual level with the input side (school inputs such as teacher qualification, class-size, availability of pedagogical materials, ..) that concerns an aggregate level (class or school). The results show that students taught by a teachers holding a master degree do not perform better than those taught by a teacher who does not. They also show that inputs that contribute clearly to the every day pedagogical life of the students in the classroom such as workbooks or basic materials help enhance student learning; however more sophisticated (and more costly) items such as encyclopedia or reference books do not proove to exert a positive impact on learning. The results provide a relatively clear view of a wide disparities across school inputs in terms of their cost-effictiveness and that the availability of school resources is characterized by a relatively strong pattern of marginal diminishing returns.