Indicators for Educational Planning

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Indicators for Educational Planning

• ..all you wanted to know about indicators but
  were afraid to ask

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Why indicators?

• More complex education systems
• Greater need for information-based decision
  making
• Transparency in use of funds
• Targets harder to attain more diagnosis needed
• Monitoring and evaluation more a part of the
  accountability requirement

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How is the information used?

• Political rather than rational imperatives rule
  (EFA, FTI, Catalytic Funds etc)
• Need for more accessible information
• Need to assess the functioning of the education
  system in all facets
• Assessment must be easy to interpret
• Description of the system must be understandable

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What do indicators attempt to do?

• Show the evolution of the education system
• Underscore the trends
• Highlight problems

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Defining an indicator

• A tool which gives a sense of the state of the
  education system and reports on that state to the
  whole community
• Its characteristics are
• - its relevance
• - its ability to summarise information
• - its relationship to other indicators
• - its precision and comparability
• - its reliability

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The capacity of an indicator

• Measures how close one is to an objective
• Identifies problematic situations
• Meets policy concerns
• Answers questions regarding policy choices
• Compares the state of play to a standard or
  reference value

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How should indicators work?

• Indicators should work like a control panel or
  like the warning lights on a car
• They indicate that there is a problem or that an
  objective has been fulfilled or is on the way to
  fulfilment
• A specialist then addresses the problem
• An indicator is not a target or an objective
• It only illustrates progress towards a target
• It is a signpost not a destination

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The hierarchy of evaluation

• Goal
• Purpose
• Objectives
• Indicators (OVIs)

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An example from Uganda

• Goal to increase the efficiency and
  effectiveness of secondary education
• Purpose To improve the quality of teaching and
  learning of English, maths and science
• Outputs a) TRCs established and functioning
• b) In-service teacher education
  upgrades knowledge and skills
• c) Provision of materials
• d) Systems for sustainability in place
• e) Gender biases addressed in TRCs and
  in-service teacher education

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What kind of indicators could we construct to
measure these outputs?

• Which are PROCESS issues?
• Which are PRODUCT/OUTCOME issues?

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An example from Bangladesh

• See the paper from PEDP II
• Are you satisfied with the categories of
  Outcome, System and Process Indicators all of
  which come under the (ADB) heading of Key
  Performance Indicators ?
• Do these indicators satisfy our criteria of
• relevance, ability to summarise information,
  relating well to other indicators, precision and
  comparability, reliability?
• How does the approach compare with that of Kenya
  ?

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Per Dalin and his Development Chain

• The need to develop indicators for
• The Pilot Phase
• The Implementation Stage
• The Early Institutionalisation Stage
• The Institutionalisation Stage
• The Dissemination Stage

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A final word on the Log Frame

• A mixed audience of believers and non-believers
• The Log Frame apparently offers a technology for
  evaluation through its structure
• Its limitations are the underlying theory of
  causation (the output is purely the result of the
  input), its human capital theoretical basis, its
  inflexibility in terms of unexpected change, its
  over-simplification of purpose

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