Examining assumptions in education policy: A decade of World Bank research

The importance of education in fostering economic and human capital development cannot be overstated. As recent research has shown, education accounts for 50 percent of global economic growth, 70 percent of income gains among the world's poorest communities, and 40 percent of extreme poverty reduction since 1980.

However, we face a stark reality: globally, an estimated 70% of 10-year-olds are unable to understand a simple written text. This learning poverty underscores the urgent need to improve learning for all, especially for those in under-resourced and marginalized communities.

To address this critical challenge and bridge the gap between research and practice, the World Bank’s Education team, in close collaboration with Development Research Group, Development Impact Group, and Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund, has brought together a decade's worth of rigorous impact evaluations. The studies featured in "Operationalizing Impact: A Decade of World Bank Supported Impact Evaluations" provide policymakers and practitioners with specific, actionable information to enhance evidence-based decision-making in education. Each study is summarized in a one-page format, providing an overview of the issue, the program studied, key findings, and implications for policy and practice.

Evidence-based strategies for program and policy design

This compendium is by no means exhaustive, but it offers policymakers and practitioners insights and evidence-based strategies to inform program and policy design. Each study provides valuable insights within its specific context; however, it is important to note that some findings challenge conventional wisdom or reveal unexpected outcomes. Although there is a tendency in academia to primarily publish positive results, this compendium recognizes the equal importance of highlighting interventions that didn't work as expected.

To illustrate the complexity of education interventions, we've identified five individual studies from the compendium that yielded unexpected results:

1. Contrary to expectations, the construction of preschools in Cambodia (which was poorly implemented) led to negative impacts on cognitive development for five-year-olds, especially for children from less educated and poorer families. This was due to an unexpected reallocation of educational services: many children who previously attended primary school as underage enrollees were left out of the formal school system entirely when preschools were introduced. These surprising findings highlight the need to understand the factors influencing parent decision-making about early childhood education when designing preschool interventions.
2. An information intervention about returns to education in Mexico had differential impacts based on students' initial academic skills and socioeconomic backgrounds. While all students increased their effort in school, only students who started strong academic skills and high socioeconomic backgrounds were able to translate this increased effort into improved learning outcomes, potentially exacerbating existing inequalities.
3. In Indonesia, doubling teachers' base pay neither impacted teacher effort nor student learning outcomes, despite significantly improving measures of teacher welfare. This study challenges the common assumption that increasing teacher salaries automatically leads to improved teaching quality and student performance.
4. A text message intervention providing parenting advice in Nicaragua had unexpected negative spillover effects when local leaders were included. Sending messages to local leaders had a negative impact on parenting practices and children's cognitive outcomes in other households in the same village, possibly because the intervention was perceived as interfering with local leaders' domain of influence.
5. A financial education program in Brazil had mixed effects on students' financial behaviors. While it improved financial knowledge and attitudes, it also increased borrowing and the use of expensive financial products like credit cards. This highlights the complexity of financial decision-making and the potential for unintended consequences in financial education programs.

The studies in this compendium represent just a fraction of the critical work being done by the World Bank and within the wider field of educational researchers. The compendium highlights several promising areas for future investigation, including the role of technology in enhancing learning, effective strategies for teacher professional development and support, and methods for enhancing socioemotional learning alongside academic achievement (among others).

As we look to the future, we see an opportunity to translate this research into evidence-based policy and program design. Your contributions to the compendium can help us expand this vital research, enabling us to conduct more rigorous impact evaluations in diverse contexts, explore new and innovative approaches to improving learning outcomes, investigate long-term impacts of educational interventions, and develop and test scalable solutions that can be implemented across multiple countries and regions.

Know of an impact evaluation that could be featured in this compendium? Write to us to contribute to this growing evidence base. To learn more, check out our website. 

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