Towards Good Governance in Basic Education
BY: YASMIN KHODARY
AUGUST/2014
TOWARDS GOOD GOVERNANCE
IN BASIC EDUCATION: A CASE
STDUY OF FAYOUM
GOVERNORATE
GOVERNORATE
The January 25th
and June 30th
revolutions witnessed
the outcry of the Egyptians against corruption, lack of
transparency, weak accountability and other similar
manifestations of poor governance in general and in
specific sectors related to their daily life, such as
education, health and water and sanitation. Those
manifestations of poor governance seriously barricade
the effective mobilization and allocation of resources
needed for development and for the achievement of the
Millennium Development Goals.
Due to the importance of good governance, the
Social Contract Center (SCC) carried out an
assessment of good governance in basic education
(along with two other sectors: primary health and
water and sanitation) in an attempt to evaluate the
degree to which basic education service providers
apply the principles of good governance (i.e.
efficiency, effectiveness, responsiveness, equity, rule
of law, transparency, anti-corruption, accountability
and participation). The assessment, which has been
carried out for the first time in Egypt, uses nationally
owned indicators that were developed in consultation
with stakeholders from government, private sector and
civil society in order to better reflect the Egyptian
economic, social, institutional and political context.
This policy brief introduces the main findings of
the "Governance in Basic Education" assessment
and provides evidence-based advice and
recommendations to improve the governance
related performance of the basic education sector
and eventually improve the service delivery to
citizens in this sector.
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Good Governance is the good
management of all state institutions that
ensures the adoption of 9 principles within all
institutions' policies and practices.
Such Principles are: Efficiency, Effectiveness,
Responsiveness, Equity, Rule of Law,
Transparency, Anti-corruption, Accountability
and Participation of all stakeholders.
Without good governance in the education, the
blooms of education and education reforms
will not fully and effectively trigger down to
the poor and marginalized groups.
.
The 2009 UNESCO “Education for All” Global
Monitoring Report asserts that inefficiency and
poor governance in education in Bangladesh,
for instance, resulted in geographical and
social gabs in the quality of educational
services and the accessibility to them.
Many literatures trace the decline in Egypt's
development indicators to the decline in
education-related indicators. It is, therefore,
essential to monitor the performance of the
education sector in order to observe the degree
to which it is capable of boosting the
development process.
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On a scale that ranges from zero to 100 degrees, where
zero is the lowest degree and 100 is the highest, governance
in basic education in Fayoum Governorate scored 50.5
degrees. This overall score reflects the average of degrees it
received for the 9 principles of good governance. While the
degrees of Equity (87.1), Efficiency (79.0) and Rule of Law
(65.6) were the highest, the degrees of Participation (5.3),
Accountability (16.3) and responsiveness to the needs of
students and their parents (30.0) were the lowest.
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Methodology
The findings of the assessment are based on a
household survey for a sample of 3000 households
representing districts, rural and urban areas of Fayoum
Governorate. The overall number of students surveyed
within the sample is 1741 students. Throughout the
survey, SCC cooperated with the Central Agency for
Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) for
withdrawing the sample, the Local Development
Observatory (Ministry of Local Development) for
facilitating fieldwork, and the Local Information
Centers in Fayoum for collecting the survey data.
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TOWARDS GOOD GOVERNANCE IN
BASIC EDUCATION: A CASE STDUY
OF FAYOUM GOVERNORATE
The main policy recommendation suggests improving good
governance in basic education through enhancing the
principles which scored the lowest degrees in the index (i.e.
Participation, Accountability and Responsiveness). In
addition, though 'Transparency' was not among the principles
scoring the lowest degrees, the policy recommendations still
address it because it has a positive multiplier effect on the rest
of the principles, such as anti-corruption, rule of law,
effectiveness, etc… Therefore, it is rewarding to boost the
level of transparency and access to information.
87.1
79.0
65.6
64.8
56.1
50.3
30.0
16.3
5.3
50.5
0 20 40 60 80 100
Equity
Effeciency
Rule of Law
Transparancy
Effectiveness
Anti-corruption
Reseponsiveness
Accountability
Participation
Overall Governance Indicator
The Governance in Basic Education in Fayoum Index*
Good Governance Principles
1- Efficiency: Providing the service at the lowest cost
and in the least time possible.
2- Effectiveness: Providing high quality service in
addition to customer satisfaction.
3-Responsiveness: Responding to citizens’ needs,
demands and complaints.
4-Equity: Providing the service with no discrimination
on any basis and according to equal opportunities.
5-Rule of Law: Availability and implementation of
laws and regulations organizing the service provision.
6- Transparency: Availability and accessibility to
information.
7-Anti-Corruption: Availability and implementation
of anti-corruption procedures and mechanisms.
8-Accountability: Availability of mechanisms and
institutions to hold the service providers accountable.
9- Participation: Effective engagement of citizens in
planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation.
* The Governance Index is the average value of all principles of good
governance (Efficiency, Effectiveness, Responsiveness, etc…). Each
principle is composed of a set of indicators and sub indicators.
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The degree of participation (5.3) is the lowest among the
governance principles. It reflected extremely low levels of
participation by students and their parents in the financial and
educational matters related to the school (7.5) or related to the
Ministry of Education and its directorate (0.8). Most of the
students and their parents were unable to express their opinion
or evaluate the school administration, teachers, activities,
premises or facilities. In addition, students and their parents
rarely took part in students unions and the school boards of
trustees, which are the two main mechanisms of participation.
The degree of accountability (16.3) is the second lowest
among the governance principles. It reflected the absolute
inability of students and their parents to hold the school staff
and policies accountable (1.3) in addition to their overall low
knowledge of the available internal or external agencies and
entities responsible for monitoring education service providers
or holding them accountable and their sense or perception of
their existence and their role (31.3).
The degree of Responsiveness (30.0) is the third lowest
among the governance principles. It reflected the low degree
of responsiveness by both the school (25.9) and the Ministry
of Education and its directorate on the local levels (34.1) to
the needs and problems of the students or their parents. This
included responding to the needs and complains properly and
timely and having in place enough mechanisms of complains.
The degree of Transparency (64.8) reflected the
availability of channels for communicating information (e.g.
the school administration and teachers, newspapers, T.V and
Radio), however, with a low level of really using these
channels to disseminate information that are: financial (e.g.
school budget and tuition fees (42.0), the education overall
budget (4.9)) or study related information (e.g. monthly grades
of students, school start date, vacations, etc…).
Main Findings of the Governance Assessment in Basic Education
Lack of participation by students in the
students unions and by parents in the
boards of trustees is traced to: the apathy
by students and parents (possibly because
the two entities are neglected by the
school and are ineffective), the direct
selection by the school administration of
their members and lack of transparency
in communicating the timings of their
elections and other information.
The respondents' knowledge of the available
entities in charge of holding education
service providers accountable was limited.
Their knowledge of external entities, such
as students unions and boards of trustees
was extremely weak (1.3) compared to
their knowledge of internal entities (45.1)
(e.g. Ministry of education).
TOWARDS GOOD GOVERNANCE IN
BASIC EDUCATION: A CASE STDUY
OF FAYOUM GOVERNORATE
According to the survey, the main
unsatisfied need for the respondents is the
availability of secondary schools (general
or technical), females' friendly schools
and classes for disabled.
It is worth noting that one of the best
mechanisms for complaining reported by
the respondents is holding meetings with
the schools' staff.
Increasing accessibility to information and
enhancing levels of transparency are very
important as they reduce corruption,
enable citizens to better know and practice
their rights and assist them to hold service
providers accountable on the basis of their
roles and responsibilities.
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1) Enhancing partnerships (and participation) through: a) facilitating all procedures to allow civil society and
private sector to participate in the educational process either by constructing schools, restoring or building fences or
donating lands), and b) ensuring that students unions and boards of trustees (which are considered excellent arenas
for effective practice of democracy and citizenship) are playing their roles in planning, implementation and
monitoring and evaluation. This requires the educational directorate to better supervise students unions and boards
of trustees and guarantee their roles are being played, announcing publicly and transparently their election dates,
processes and results and providing incentives for parents to participate in the boards of trustees (e.g. inviting them
to the governorate club, etc…).
2) Increasing supervision and accountability through: a) establishing clear and transparent rules for
appointments, increasing supervision over schools especially during the non-morning periods in order to ensure
better quality of education, b) increasing citizens' awareness of entities responsible for holding service providers
accountable, especially bodies other than Ministry of Education such as the boards of trustees and the students
unions, and c) ensuring that schools' administrations apply self-assessment mechanisms that give space for students
and parents to express their opinion or evaluate the school and its roles/facilities.
3) Responding better to the needs and complaints of students and their parents: this does not necessarily
require establishment of new schools, but may include, for example: a) arranging with the local unit to have cheap
and safe transportation to schools and more secured environment around schools, b) considering redistributing
available teachers among the schools to ensure the existence of teachers for activities and all other classes, which
may require some training or rehabilitation for teachers, c) paying special attention to 1st, 2
nd, and 3
rd grades in
primary education by training teachers in those grades or by achieving a more efficient allocation of teachers for
those grades, d) placing emphasis on school activities and providing adequate number of teachers for them, e)
encouraging schools to establish small projects that serve the village in addition to generating profit, f) monitoring
the cleanliness of the school buildings and other facilities, especially classrooms and toilets, g) maintaining and
supervising the school feeding program, h) encouraging non-traditional and low-cost but successful solutions (e.g. in
the areas of cheap construction), i) opening new classes for secondary education or for the disabled instead of
building new schools and j) increasing complaints' mechanisms and announcing the steps for handling such
complaints.
4) Enhancing Transparency through: a) increasing access to information related to education, in general, or to the
education budget and schools revenues and expenditures specifically, and b) expanding the use of available
mechanisms to disseminate information related to education. In this regard, school can be perceived as an efficient
mechanism to disseminate information about education vision and plans, students' records, school activities, etc…
chools' tuitions, grades, activities, etc…
Policy Recommendations for better Governance in Basic Education
* 70% of parents reported
that transportation to schools
is expensive, unavailable and
unsafe and that school
activities are inefficient and
insufficient.
In the coming years, it is important to integrate the principles of good governance gradually into
the priorities of education reform. At the current stage, it is recommended to focus on enhancing
the principles of participation and accountability followed by the principles of responsiveness and
transparency as the starting steps to improve the levels of governance in education.
* 30% of parents reported that schools do
not efficiently utilize the resources
available for them.
* 20% of parents reported that the
environment around the schools is unsafe.
* Over 30% of parents were not
satisfied of the school toilets.
* 25% of parents were not satisfied
of the space and cleanliness of the
classrooms and the playground.