Financing higher education in India

This paper is an attempt to analyse the present pattern of funding higher education in India and to discuss the desirability and feasibility of various alternative methods of funding the same. Higher education in India is basically a state funded sector. But as higher education benefits not only society at large, but also individuals specifically, and as it attracts relatively more privileged sections of the society, there is a rationale for shifting the financial burden to the individual domain from the social domain.It is argued here that given the resource constraints and equity considerations, financing higher education mostly from the general tax revenue may not be a desirable policy in the long run. Accordingly some of the alternative policy choices are discussed, including financing higher education from the public exchequer, student loans, graduate tax, student fees, and the role of the private sector. Among the available alternatives, it is argued that a discriminatory pricing mechanism would be relatively more efficient and equitable. While given the socioeconomic and political realities, the government has to continue to bear a large responsibility for funding higher education, instead of relying on a single form of funding, efforts should be made to evolve a model of funding that provides a mix of the various methods. It is also argued that fee and subsidy policies need to make distinctions across various layers and forms of higher education.     

Investing in private education for poverty alleviation: The case of the World Bank's International Finance Corporation

The International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private sector financing arm of the World Bank Group, is currently the largest multilateral investor in private education in developing countries. Drawing from staff interviews and programmatic data, this paper provides a brief overview of the IFC and its mandate; examines the stated purposes of the IFC's work in education; reviews the IFC's portfolio of investments in education; and looks at the linkages between the IFC and the World Bank's lending arms. The paper concludes by questioning the IFC's contribution to the World Bank Group's poverty alleviation mandate.     

THE FINANCIAL PARTICIPATION OF ENTERPRISES IN THE FUNCTIONING OF FRENCH HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS

The article discusses and tries to reconcile two phenomena; that, on one hand, in France, higher education is seriously underfunded, and that, on the other hand, public and private sector enterprises are experiencing shortages in the availability of highly qualified senior staff. At the same time, the need to obtain funding for higher education from sources other than the public authorities is recognized. Ways in which business may contribute to the funding of higher education are discussed, stress being laid on the use of the so‐called apprenticeship tax collected from enterprises and used to support higher education in given areas of training. The functioning and the receipts of this tax are analysed from a neo‐liberal perspective in terms of regional economic development, the types of institutions and programmes which receive subsidies from it, and amount per student. One obvious conclusion is that enterprises are loathe to contribute to the financing of initial education. On the other hand, since they are increasingly willing to finance specific and specialized training, universities, as distinct from other types of higher educations institutions in France, but having the necessary facilities and teaching staff, have been able to seize opportunities offered them to create special further training courses of use to enterprises. Hence, universities receive the largest share of the receipts of the apprenticeship tax.     

A Review of Issues in Deaf Education Under Nigeria's 6-3-3-4 Education System

This article examines issues affecting the education of deaf people under Nigeria's 6-3-3-4 system of education. The system was introduced in 1976 and serves all categories of learners in Nigeria, irrespective of disability. The broad aim of education under the system is to provide all Nigerian learners a wide variety of educational and vocational opportunities to ensure the optimum development of their potential. Evidence indicates that the implementation of the 6-3-3-4 system in Nigerian schools, including schools for the deaf, remains unsatisfactory. A plethora of problems running the gamut from inadequate personnel training programs, lack of facilities, failure of inclusion programs, to limited vocational preparation opportunities, inadequate funding of services, and absence of a legislation supporting the implementation of the 6-3-3-4 system are identified as the major factors militating against the effective implementation of the system in Nigerian schools, including schools for the deaf. The implications for improvements in these areas to achieve a more meaningful implementation of the 6-3-3-4 system are discussed.     

To profit or not to profit: the private higher education sector in Brazil

Brazil has by far the largest higher education system in Latin America, with a sizable share of students enrolled in private-sector institutions. Its recently established and fast-growing for-profit sector is one of the largest worldwide. The for-profit sector already surpasses the public sector in student enrollment, and its role is growing. Public policy has supported for-profit growth, ostensibly for tax revenue reasons, but the federal government has recently launched social initiatives that include tax exemption policies for the for-profit sector in exchange for need-based scholarships. Through exploratory data analysis, this study explores the role, function, and form of the for-profit sector compared with its nonprofit and public counterparts. The findings reveal that the for-profit sector shares some important characteristics with the nonprofit sector but contrasts sharply with the public sector. The study concludes that countries such as Brazil are moving toward public funding for private higher education to meet enrollment targets. These findings may be able to address issues in other countries by considering similar public policies toward private higher education.     

Chronicling decentralization initiatives in the Philippine basic education sector

The Philippine school system is considered as one of the largest in the world with 41,989 public elementary and secondary schools and 7790 private schools under the supervision and regulation of the Department of Education (DepEd Fact Sheet, 2005). This paper chronicles various decentralization initiatives carried out by the basic education sector in the country specifically along the areas of education financing, teacher effectiveness, curriculum development, textbooks and instructional materials, and school–community dynamics and student learning and assessment. This discourse culminates with the discussion of the lessons learned from a decentralized system of education for better school operation and management.     

CHANGING SOURCES AND PATTERNS OF FINANCE FOR HIGHER EDUCATION: A REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL TRENDS

The last decade has seen considerable changes in patterns of financing higher education in both industrialized and developing countries. Financial stringency affecting public budgets, rapid growth in student numbers, and concern for both efficiency and equity have resulted in changes both in systems of financial support for students and mechanisms for funding higher education institutions. This article reviews recent changes in sources and methods of financing higher education in OECD countries, including Australia, France, Germany, Japan, Netherlands, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It examines attempts to shift some of the financial burdens, for higher education from public to private sources, through the introduction of tuition fees and student loans, not only in industrialized countries, but also in developing ones in Africa and Asia.     

Scope, relevance and challenges of financing higher education: The case of Tunisia

Like other developing countries, Tunisia has allocated increasing levels of resources to education, particularly higher education, over the past few decades, mainly through public funding. From 2005 to 2008, public expenditure on education amounted to around 7.4% of GDP, with 2% allocated to higher education. Recently, however, budgetary constraints have increased, student enrollment is increasing rapidly, and the country needs to improve its higher education so that graduates are more employable. In this context, to enhance access and equity, public policy is required to define orientations and programmes to improve quality and efficiency while reducing costs. This article first assesses public expenditure on higher education in Tunisia, with respect to its adequacy, efficiency, and equity, and then explores the challenges posed to financing by demographic changes, the need for higher quality of education, and private provision. It also examines some strategies for reinforcing financing, and analyzes measures to increase private funding.     

Student loans in Nigeria

The Nigerian Students Loans Board was first established in 1972, and between 1973 and 1991 it provided loans totalling 46 million Naira, to help Nigerian students finance undergraduate or postgraduate study in Nigeria or abroad. There have been severe problems, however, and the rate of recovery of loan repayments has been very disappointing. This article describes the operation of the student loan programme in Nigeria and its past problems, outlines the current attempts of the Nigerian Students Loans Board to improve the efficiency of loan collection and proposes the establishment of a new Education Bank to finance student loans and other forms of investment in higher education.     

农村教育的结构性矛盾与化解对策

目前,农村教育体制改革出现了一些新情况和新问题,主要表现在包括经费、师资、校舍等在内的教育资源不足和结构失衡。要化解当前农村教育中存在的结构性矛盾,需要建立中央和地方政府合理的财政分担机制、增加教育投入、优化师资队伍、发展优质民办教育、加大助学力度、保障教育公平等。     

民办教育发展的政策制约与调整

《国家中长期教育改革和发展规划纲要(2010-2020年)》提出,要形成公办教育和民办教育共同发展的格局。然而,这一目标的实现,需要相关政策的调整,因为,民办教育无论在国家财政拨款、税收优惠等显性投入上还是在社会保障、专项资助等一些隐性投入上都无法与公办教育相比,这一切都不利于公办教育和民办教育的共同发展。所以必须通过深化体制改革,调整相关法律法规和政策,营造有利于民办教育健康发展的制度环境。     

Quality of Learning in Nigeria's Universal Primary Education Scheme—1976–1986

The paper critically examines the quality of education in Nigeria's Universal Primary Education (UPE) scheme from 1976 to 1986. The author argues that the positive impact of the UPE scheme was that more people went to school, and many of them can now read and write their names and seem to be better informed. But the standard of Seaming fell far below what it was before the introduction of the UPE scheme in Nigeria. Those who planned the scheme apparently forgot to consider the importance of the availability of qualified teachers, adequate learning environments, equipment and textbooks, classroom management and supervision, and the content of the curriculum. Since availability of the above facilities is integral to effective teaching and classroom performance, the inevitable outcome was the erosion of standards in Nigeria's primary education. The author advises other developing countries to act cautiously when embarking on prestige educational projects, such as the UPE scheme, as a means to combat ignorance and illiteracy. It is also hoped that the Nigerian experience will lead to a further understanding of the postulation by educational analysts of school facilities as major factors in effective teaching and determining the quality of learning in the developing countries.     

Financing education: why should tax justice be part of the solution?

This forum seeks to problematise issues related to the lack of resources to adequately finance public education systems. It explores potential solutions based on increased domestic resource mobilisation through progressive taxation in order to meet the growing financing gap needed to achieve Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4. While many governments in poor countries are already demonstrating a strong commitment to funding education, the papers will argue that they could raise more money by broadening their tax base – for example, by reducing the prevalence of harmful tax incentives or tackling tax avoidance. Steven Klees’s contribution examines the proposals made by the International Commission on Financing Global Education Opportunity as well as the potential for global taxation mechanisms to be used to finance the education and other SDGs. David Archer argues that SDG4 requires a rebuilding of confidence in the capacity of governments to finance good-quality public education through progressive taxation. Finally, Maria Ron Balsera’s contribution uses Pakistan, Ghana, Kenya and Uganda as case studies to analyse the effect of the inadequate financing of education and to explore sustainable and equitable solutions.     

The Education Lending Policy of the European Investment Bank

The purpose of this article is to present the latest Education Lending Policy (ELP) of the European Investment Bank (EIB), adopted by the Board of Governors in 2008. It is structured in two parts. The first briefly presents the EIB in general and the evolution of its education lending portfolio in particular. This sets the stage for the second part of the article, which reproduces the Bank's new ELP — only the second such formal education sector policy statement adopted by the institution to date.     

论世界银行政策贷款条件性的概念及其发展

世界银行,是当今世界最大的国际金融开发组织和首要的国际发展组织。作为世界银行的两大信贷工具之一,政策贷款是用于帮助借款国恢复国际收支平衡、填补政策改革和制度建设方面的资金缺口,旨在实现借款国宏观发展目标的非项目贷款。发展中成员国取得政策贷款往往以满足特定条件,例如经济改革、行政改革、司法改革等为前提,习惯上我们把这些条件合称为“条件性”。条件性可谓世界银行在经济全球化的大时代背景下,向国际社会提供的一项公共产品,它以减少贫困、实现全球普遍发展为终极目标。     

The power struggle over education in developing countries: The case of the UNESCO-World Bank Co-operative program, 1964-1989

This paper examines the relationship between the World Bank and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) between the 1960s and the 1980s. It focuses on the Co-operative Program (CP) between the two organizations, which was established in 1964 and lasted officially until 1989. In the context of the Co-operative Program, the Education Financing Division (EFD) was established, a joint unit located in UNESCO, with the purpose of carrying out technical missions to assist governments in the identification and preparation of educational projects and the formulation of funding requests to the World Bank. Drawing on archival research and interviews with former UNESCO and World Bank officials, the paper traces the history of the Co-operative Program, which was characterized by intense power struggles exacerbated by Cold War tensions. During the 25 years of the duration of the Co-operative Program, the World Bank developed into the most influential policy shaper for education in developing countries, while the influence of UNESCO, created in the post-World War II order as the United Nations’ designated organization for education, declined. Using Bourdieu’s concept of fields and DiMaggio and Powell’s concept of isomorphism as analytical lenses, the World Bank’s expansion to a development agency will be explained by its greater autonomy as a field, endowed with more capital based on the rationalization of education and isomorphic processes of professionalization of the “field of power” of educational planning. To the detriment of UNESCO, the World Bank became the powerhouse of a global governance structure that was built with support from the United States government and furthered by the rise of economics.     

The Perpetual Education Fund: Providing higher education loans in the voluntary sector

Although many strategies are proposed to reduce the opportunity gap in higher education between and within countries, student loans with cost recovery measures are often preferred during times of fiscal constraint. This study briefly reviews the benefits and challenges of student loans over other forms of financial aid and presents the case for voluntary sector involvement in contexts where government and market failures constrain effective solutions. It describes an innovative program that has emerged to meet this challenge—the Perpetual Education Fund. This program utilizes public–private partnerships, a large financial corpus, pre-existing administrative structures, personal relationships, local vocational schooling, and intergroup solidarity to administer loans and recover costs. Because voluntary sector participation in loan financing and administration is relatively new, the experiences and innovative survival strategies of this program have valuable implications for other emerging programs.     

埃塞俄比亚高等教育"成本分担"制研究

为适应高等教育发展需要,根据国家教育和培训政策的相关条款,在充分酝酿和准备的前提下,埃塞俄比亚政府自2003年起在公办高校开始推行"成本分担"计划.根据该项计划,学生将承担学习期间的全部食宿费用和15%的学费,在毕业一年后以"毕业税"的形式交纳.虽然计划的推行曾引起过不同的反响,实施计划的保障机制还需完善,但毕业税的顺利实施将促进教育公平、增强教育财政的后劲,使埃塞俄比亚高等教育走出发展的困境,其积极意义已逐渐被社会所认识.     

The public-private division of responsibility for education

In this chapter “private” schools are defined as those that were privately founded and are privately managed; they usually have some private funding, although in some cases considerable funding and control come from the government. The size and nature of the private sector is viewed as stemming from excess demand for education due to limited public spending (i.e., these are students who would prefer to use the public schools but are involuntarily excluded and pushed into the private sector); differentiated demand due primarily to cultural heterogeneity (i.e., these are students whose differentiated tastes along religious, linguistic or ethnic lines lead them voluntarily to choose the private sector even if a public school place is available); and the supply of non-profit educational entrepreneurship (e.g., founders who start schools to maximize religious faith or believers, rather than profits) by competing religious organizations. The impact of public policies, including public educational spending and private subsidies, is also considered.     

城乡接合部义务教育学校存在经费“洼地”吗？

农村义务教育经费保障机制有效提高了我国义务教育投入水平。然而，城乡接合部学校的城市性质使其享受政策保障受到一定限制，同时其教育经费又往往难以达到主城区水平，因此城乡接合部地区可能成为处于主城区和农村之间的义务教育经费“洼地”。本研究基于教育经费统计数据和空间数据，使用空间断点回归方法，定量地研究“新机制”背景下城乡属性对于学校生均教育经费投入的影响。结果发现，城乡接合部学校生均经费显著地低于邻近的农村学校，而且存在学生规模过大的问题。本研究建议，现行的城乡义务教育经费保障机制应该对城乡接合部学校的教育经费予以重点倾斜。