| Notes |
1. Overview
Drawing on a number of source documents and in particular ongoing research being conducted
under DFID's Operational Research and Impact Evaluation Capability in South Asia
programme,
1 this Guidance Note draws the following preliminary conclusions:
Strategic
There are key roles for LCPS to play in the delivery of a quality basic education, but their
involvement is not a simple undertaking that can quickly reform a failing state system;
Involvement of LCPS in PPPs can be effective, but these arrangements have been
difficult to implement because the government has historically decided which partnership
model would be the most appropriate;
For sustainable results, there needs to be a comprehensive system for dialogue in which
both the state and the private sector participate as partners;
Public consensus is also critical because, in practice, opposition can arise due to
ideological concerns, and concerns about the equity and fairness of privatisation; and
The respective roles of the state and the private sector must be clearly delineated
according to the country context, including governance, financial management and
administrative capacity of public and private providers, the size and nature of the LCPS
sector and the government’s fiscal situation.
Regulatory
The partnership decision depends on the government’s capacity to regulate and
effectively control the quality of education delivery; and
Different contracting models, with several common characteristics including the
Government as funder/regulator but not necessarily the provider, provision of perstudent funding to schools, autonomous management, accountability and a strong focus
on outcomes, are currently being used.
Financial
Disadvantaged groups – such as girls/women in some contexts, or the very poor – still
require specific, targeted demand-side support as they cannot be reached by LCPS that
charge the relatively high fees needed to operate their school;
While 'for profit' and 'not for profit' LCPS share characteristics in their educational
approaches, there are differences in their commercial approaches which have
implications for state funding (reference the Bangladesh LCPS experience);
It is especially difficult to find private investors willing to fund LCPS, particularly if those
LCPS operate as 'not for profit' entities (reference the Gyan Shala experience); and
LCPS are delivering education at a unit cost that is comparable to or less than the unit
cost of similar public education providers (reference the Foundation Assisted Schools
[FAS] experience);
1 Funded by DFID Bangladesh, DFID India, DFID Nepal and the DFID South Asia Research Hub.
3
Research
There is still a lack of data and comparative analysis on education outcomes to be able
to assess value for money from the government perspective and for prospective
students and their families to distinguish between high-quality and low-quality public and
private providers;
Different approaches to partnerships with LCPS have been and are being tried in
countries with contrasting development and governance characteristics. The results
must be interpreted taking those different contexts into account; and
The lack of comprehensive and comparable data on both 'for profit' and 'not for profit'
LCPS continues to be problematic for educators, researchers, aid organizations and
policymakers alike. |