Nicaragua Efa Revised Proposal Nov 21 (all)

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Nicaragua

Education for All – Fast Track Initiative Country Proposal

November 21, 2002

The proposal was written by: Emilio Porta, Advisor to The Minister of Education, Culture and Sports of Nicaragua (MECD), Gustavo Arcia, Consultant, Robin Horn, Task Manager World Bank. The authors acknowledge the support given by the technical staff of MECD.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Executive Summary........................................................................................................................ 5 Introduction..................................................................................................................................... 7 I. Profile of Nicaragua........................................................................................................................ 7 A. Poverty and the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP).................................................. 8 B. Political Context ................................................................................................................ 8 II. Education for All by 2015 .............................................................................................................. 9 A. Government Commitment to Education for All ................................................................... 9 B. Current Status of Key Indicators versus EFA Targets........................................................... 9 C. Education Sector Performance: 1993-2001........................................................................ 10 Major Achievements in Education .................................................................................... 10 Improving Internal Efficiency and Student Flow ................................................................ 11 Increasing Emphasis on Quality Enhancing Investments .................................................... 12 Chief Constraints to Achieving EFA ................................................................................. 13 Preschool attendance............................................................................................................ 14 D. Key Government Policy Initiatives ................................................................................... 15 School Autonomy in Nicaragua: A Success Story ..................................................................... 15 Other Government Initiatives ................................................................................................... 16 The National Education Plan: 2000-2015 .................................................................................. 17 III. Education Financing ................................................................................................................... 18 Education Expenditures and Education Finance ......................................................................... 18 Private Costs of Public Schooling ............................................................................................. 18 Public Financing of Primary Education ..................................................................................... 19 IV. Conclusions: Key Constraints to Achieving the Targets of Education for All...................... 23 V. Nicaragua's EFA-FTI Program: An Overview........................................................................ 23 EFA-FTI Program Firmly Rooted in National Education Plan. ....................................... 23 A. Sub-Model I: Schooling Improvement Program (Programa de Mejoramiento Escolar—PME) ................................................................................................................. 24 Objectives and Targets.......................................................................................... 24 Building on the National Education Plan’s Strategies to Improve School Quality. ............................................................................................................................... 24 Indicators and Targets. .......................................................................................... 25 Building on Successful Experience ...................................................................... 25 Levels of Schooling Improvement ........................................................................ 28 Implementation ..................................................................................................... 29 Costs of Implementation and Trajectory of Outcomes ......................................... 32 B. Sub-Model II: Student Scholarship Program (Programa Becas-Escola res) ................. 35 Building on the National Education Plan to Provide Incentives to the Poor. ....... 35 Costs of Implementation and Targets ........................................................................ 37 C. Evaluation and Monitoring EFA Interventions .................................................................. 38 D. Summary of Outcomes and Financial Requirements of Nicaragua's EFA-FTI Program........ 39 E. Financing EFA Interventions through an EFA Trust Fund .................................................. 43 Creation and Management of an EFA -FTI Trust Fund. ............................................................... 44 3

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

LIST OF TABLES Key Indicators of EFA Inputs and Outcomes..................................................................................6 Progress on Attaining PRSP Targets...............................................................................................8 Status of EFA/Sector Development Plans Relative to the “Indicative Framework”.......................9 Current and Projected Education Expenditures (% of GDP).........................................................17 MECD budget 1991-2002...............................................................................................................18 MECD sources of external funding, 2000-03 (US$).....................................................................19 MECD: Average per student cost by type of school, 2002.............................................................20

Indicators and Targets Schooling Improvement Program Sub-Model...............................23 Levels of Schooling Improvement..................................................................................................26 School Autonomy and Enrollment in the Atlantic Region..............................................................29 Approximate Cost per School (US$)...............................................................................................30 Annual Costs of implementation, at different periods of time (US$)..............................................31 Indicators and Targets of the Scholarship Sub-Model (Percent of children in poverty).................32 Average number of years of education by poverty level.................................................................33 Proposed Number of Scholarships per Year, 2003-05.....................................................................33 Proposed scholarship amounts.........................................................................................................34 Financial Requirements of EFA Strategy (‘000s US$)...................................................................40

List of Figures Reasons why children between ages 7-12 do not attend school....................................................13 MECD budget as percent of GDP..................................................................................................18 Public Primary Education Expenditures 2002...............................................................................19 Trajectories of School Improvement..............................................................................................31 Education Map...............................................................................................................................36 Primary School Enrollment with and without EFA..................................................................... 37 Repetition and Dropouts with and without EFA...........................................................................38 MECD Financial Needs for Primary School with and without EFA............................................38 Financing Requirements for EFA and MECD Budget Projections for Sustainability..................39

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Nicaragua, a country of 5 million people and a per capital GDP of $450, is the second poorest country in Latin America. Despite its poverty, Nicaragua has made dramatic improvements in education. Primary school enrollment has increased, from 79% in 1993 to 113% in 2001 and the number of years of education among the extreme poor has increased from 2.8 to 3.6 years during the same period. This achievement has been noted by the World Bank's paper on EFA financing as one of the top performing countries in the world in terms of the speed with which it is reaching universal primary education. Moreover, girls' rate of net enrollment in primary (82%) is almost equal to boys' (83 %) and the average number of years of schooling among girls (5.3 years) is higher than for boys (4.5 years). Gender parity is practically achieved. Although these trends are encouraging, arriving at universal comple tion of primary education in 2015 cannot be reached without additional financing for the following reasons: (i) Nicaragua's population is young and growing—with over 50% of population below 16 years of age—the education system has to keep on expanding in order to maintain its current coverage, (ii) The high repetition and dropout rates are due to both poverty (demand side factors) and supply side issues (poor quality of school). About 50% of children not attending school cited poverty as the main barrier to attendance. Moreover, children in extreme poverty are twice as likely to repeat and dropout than non-poor children. At present, the government spends about US$ 82.6 million in primary education, yielding US$95 per primary school student in traditional centralized schools, and US$ 101 per student in autonomous schools. Of the total primary school budget, about 32% comes from external funding (US$27 million). Domestic resources pay for teacher’s salaries, which account for 67 % of the recurrent budget. External resources finance innovative interventions and supplement non-salary recurrent expenditures, such as textbooks and school materials. To reach universal enrollment and completion of primary education, domestic Government resources will pay for existing teachers and for the additional teachers needed to educate new students in the system. Given the gains in internal efficiency resulting from the proposed EFA-FTI strategy, it is expected that by 2015, total expenditures on teacher salaries will be lower than the payroll expenditures without the EFA strategy. However, to reach universal primary completion, it is estimated that the government will need to spend a total of US$1.7 billion between 2003 and 2015 altogether to cover recurrent and capital costs. Of this amount, only 11 % (US$ 180 million) will be needed from external donors . Most of these additional funds needed are required at the beginning of the decade. As domestic funds increase, external funding needs will decrease, reaching a breakeven point by 2014. The additional, donor-financed resources needed for universal completion of primary would be used in two main areas: § an incentive fund to improve the quality of schooling, and § direct assistance to families of extremely poor children stimulate their enrollment, attendance, and learning achievement. By improving internal efficiency and school quality, and reducing repetition, the system will pay for itself, which will be manifested in a decline of the total financing need by 2014, even with the tremendous growth of school-age students that the system must accommodate. These improvements will provide tremendous social benefits. A work force with enhanced basic skills will be far more productive and therefore a necessary condition for poverty alleviation and economic growth.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Nicaragua has the capacity to achieve universal primary completion. Its track record is the best indicator of its commitment and capacity. It also has created the capacity to monitor and evaluate its educational progress through a school tracking system, now in operation, which tracks and geographically maps all information on infrastructure, teachers, and non-salary items, in each and every school in the country. This tracking system is scheduled to include the tracking of a student assessment system by next year. The proposed interventions build up on the success of autonomous schools, which have proven to be successful in improving internal efficiency, parental participation and quality of service delivery. In addition, autonomous schools will be reinforced to become Model Schools, a successful system now ending its 8th year pilot phase. There is no greater return than to invest in the human development in a country that has both the track record and political will to lift its population out of poverty and affirm their dignity.

Key Indicators of EFA Inputs and Outcomes

a

1993 (Historical) 2001 (Baseline) Primary Gross Enrollment Ratio 79 113 Net Enrollment Girls 81.4 82.6 Net Enrollment Boys 77.9 83.4 Completion Rate Grade 6 n.d. 70 First Grade Repetition Rate 33a 25 Number of Primary School 738,000 906,000 Students Number of Teachers 18,000 23,510 Pupil Teacher Ratio 41 36 Number of Classrooms n.d. 29,733 Education Spending as % of 2.7 4.3 GDP Primary Spending as % of n.d. 58 Education Spending Teacher Salaries as % of 92 67 Recurrent Expenditures Teacher Salaries as Multiple of 1.1 2.5 GDP per capita Includes children below 6 years of age whose parents send them to first grade.

2015 (Target) 100 100 100 100 6 1.16 million 33,200 35 40,000 4.5 60 65 3.5

Expected Results for Outputs and Outcomes – With and Without EFA Increase in access to 1st Grade without EFA-FTI Increase gross enrollment without EFA-FTI Increase net enrollment without EFA-FTI Increase primary completion without EFA-FTI

2001 90% 90% 113% 113% 83% 83% 87% 87%

2005 95% 90% 110% 110% 85% 84% 90% 87%

2015 (Target) 100% 90% 100% 110% 100% 85% 98% 90%

Benefits per beneficiary Total number of beneficiaries Total EFA-FTI costs EFA-FTI cost-per-beneficiary

2003 222,602 $17,898,000 $80

2004 243,581 $25,083,000 $103

2005 245,126 $32,060,000 $131

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

INTRODUCTION This proposal was prepared by staff at the Ministry of Education, Culture, and Sports (MECD) and has as its main objective the inclusion of Nicaragua into the Education for All—Fast Track Initiative (EFA-FTI). As such, it is more of a conceptual framework than a detailed guide for implementation. If Nicaragua is admitted into the EFA-FTI, the Ministry will prepare a detailed program design and implementation plan1 . It is important to point out that this proposal builds on the accomplishments of the National Education Plan 2001-2015 and on the Government’s Poverty Reduction and Economic Strategy Paper (PRSP). As such, it reinforces the right of Nicaragua’s children to a basic education, as mandated by the Constitution. Both the National Education Plan and the Poverty Reduction and Economic Strategy were widely discussed with the citizenry throughout the country, reaching a well-documented consensus on key issues affecting education and poverty reduction. The National Education Plan was indeed a collaborative effort between the MECD and more than 3,000 representatives of the education community, and its resulting document was vetted and validated in a variety of fora across the country. Moreover, the Government has presented ample evidence of participation by different groups and stakeholders in civil society in the consultation process for both initiatives. With regard to the EFA-FTI proposal, the government consulted with key members of the education community. First, during the preparation stages the main components were presented to all education donors in three occasions—two as a group, and one individually. The proposal was also discussed in depth with MECD Directors. Once funding is certain, the proposal will be discussed with parents and schools to refine its implementation mechanisms 2 . Although the National Education Plan provided an overall strategic framework to guide sector-wide education reform, it did not articulate specific quantitative targets. In many ways, the EFA-FTI proposal takes up where the Plan leaves off. For the area of primary education, the proposal specifies indicators, annual targets, programmatic mechanisms, and next steps for achieving substantial improvement on critical indicators. Although it does not delineate management and execution processes, the EFA-FTI proposal has prepared the foundation for implementation. This proposal presents only a small portion of all that needs to be done to improve education in Nicaragua. The proposed activities address some key issues of the National Education Plan in the area of primary education, which have a cost-effective impact on learning and education for all. However, the MECD is actively working in other areas in order to complement the activities proposed here. I.

PROFILE OF NICARAGUA

A. Country Overview Nicaragua, a democratic republic in Central America, has a population of 5 million, growing at 2.6 percent per year, with more than 50 % of its inhabitants below the age of 20. It is considered a low-

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This report benefited from the inputs and suggestions of USAID, UNICEF, SETEC, and World Bank staff. The MECD staff responsible for the preparation of this document thanks them for their support. 2 It is extremely important to realize that discussing EFA with parents and teachers, before funding is secured, may create undue expectation and political fallout if funding does not materialize.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports income country, with a GDP of approximately US$460, and with 45% of the population classified as poor and 15 % as extremely poor 3 . A. Poverty and the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) Nicaragua has made significant progress over the last decade in reducing poverty. The Living Standards Measurement Surveys (also referred here to here as Encuesta Nacional de Hogares sobre Medición de Nivel de Vida—EMNV) carried out for Nicaragua in 1993, 1998 and 2001 show a continuous decline in the proportion of the total population living under the poverty line. The decline in the share of the population living in extreme poverty is even more pronounced, having fallen from 19.4 percent in 1993 to 15.1 percent in 2001. The decline in poverty was most pronounced in the rural areas, where most of the poor are concentrated, and especially in the Pacific and Central regions. Besides poverty reduction, Nicaragua has exhibited significant progress in meeting its other PRSP targets, which are closely linked to the Millennium Development Goals. This development reflects the overall positive growth performance during the second half of the 1990s, the priority given by the government to improving the coverage of basic social services and generous amounts of donor assistance, especially in the aftermath of hurricane Mitch in 1998. Progress on Attaining PRSP Targets Poverty Indicators Data Source Extreme Poverty Ratio (%) LSMS Net Primary Enrollement Ratio (%) MECD Maternal Mortality MINSA Infant Mortality (/1,000 live births) DHS Child Mortality (/1,000 live births) DHS Access to Reprod. Health Serv. (%) MINSA Chronic Malnutrition (%) LSMS Water Coverage (%) ENACAL Sanitation Coverage (%) LSMS Illiteracy Rate (%) LSMS National Strategy for Sustained Development

1993 19.4 75.6

Actual Measures 1998 1999 2001 17.3 79.6 40 50

23.7

19.7

82.6 21.5

84.1 18.8

PRSP Targets 2001 2015

15.1 16.0 9.3 88.0 77.9 90.0 148 125 37 31 21 40 22 21.0 23.8 22.0 100.0 17.8 17.9 7.0 66.5 70.0 69.5 100.0 86.2 85.0 95.0 18.7 18.5 10.0 (to be implemented by 2005)

On Track? yes yes yes yes yes partly yes partly yes no yes

Source: World Bank, Nicaragua Poverty Assessment Follow-up, 2002.

B. Political Context In the presidential election of November 4 2001, Enrique Bolaños won by an unexpectedly wide margin (56 percent of the popular vote versus 42 percent for the runner-up Sandinista candidate, Daniel Ortega). These elections mark the third successive peaceful hand-over of political power in Nicaragua since 1990. The lack of violence during the elections, the clarity of election results and the reconciliatory postelection stance of the winning candidate have created a climate of optimism and good will for the incoming government. Upon assuming office, the new Administration began to implement a vigorous anti-corruption campaign that has resulted in some notable indictments.

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The figures presented here are drawn from what it is considered the most reliable sources. In some cases they may differ from MECD figures because they are taken from national household surveys, which reflect the situation of children more accurately.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

II. EDUCATION FOR ALL BY 2015 A. Government Commitment to Education for All Primary education is one of the success stories of Nicaragua’s social policy in recent years. Despite significant fiscal constraints, Nicaragua has maintained its commitment to the expansion and improvement of primary education, and has been able to increase its educational performance. This progress is evidenced by three world-class surveys on living standards. Through successive government administrations, Nicaragua has kept it firm commitment to raising the educational attainment of its citizens, with special attention to the poor or otherwise excluded populations. B. Current Status of Key Indicators versus EFA Targets

Status of EFA/Sector Development Plans Relative to the “Indicative Framework”

Indicator

Value Indicative in 2001 benchmark by 2015

Targets, Rationale and Implementation Targets Value

Date

Rationale to get there

Resource mobilization Public domestically-generated revenues as % of GDP4 Public recurrent spending on education as % of public recurrent discretionary spending (a) Public recurrent spending on primary education as % of total recurrent spending on education (b)

23%

14-18

18%

2015 IMF agreement

14%

20

20

2015 HIPC initiative

65%

42-64

65%

2002 Goal Attained

66%

100

100

100

98%

Student flow indicators Number of children entering first grade as a percent of age group (seven year old children) (c) Number of seven year old children in first grade as a percent of age group (seven year old children) Number of children enrolled in sixth grade as a percent of age group (12 year old children)5 (d) Number of 12 year old children enrolled in sixth grade as a percent of age group (12 year old children)

44%

87%

66%

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Increase preschool 2015 supply; reduce overage (these figures use a different methodology than EFA standards) Increase multigrade 2015 schools in rural areas; targeted scholarships (these figures use a different methodology than EFA standards)

It must be noted that domestically generated revenues go down because of expected increases in GDP at a disproportionally higher rate than the growth of government. As the economy grows, the relative share of government is expected to decrease. 5 This indicator includes repeaters (3%), yielding a completion rate of 95% and a dropout rate of 2%. These figures are considered more realistic than a 100% completion rate.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Status of EFA/Sector Development Plans Relative to the “Indicative Framework”

Indicator

Value Indicative in 2001 benchmark by 2015

Targets, Rationale and Implementation Targets Value

% repeaters among primary school pupils

Date

Rationale to get there

8.2%

10

8%

2003 Goal attained

36

40

35

2005

2.5

3.5 Per Capita GDP (Low Income)

3.0

Service delivery indicators Pupil–teacher ratio in publicly-financed primary schools (e) Average annual remuneration of primary school teachers:(f): Existing teachers

2.5

n.a.

New teachers

2.5

n.a.

n.a.

n.a.

Teachers under different salary regime (e.g,, hired by the community) Recurrent spending on items other than teacher remuneration as % of total recurrent spending on primary education g) Annual instructional hours for pupils in publicly-financed primary schools % of pupils enrolled in privately-financed primary schools

Increase multigrade schools Implement new career 2005 track for teachers

33%

33

33%

2003 Goal attained

900

1000

1000

2005

7%

7%

7%

2015 Goal Attained

a/ Discretionary spending is defined as public spending from all sources less debt service (interest payment only). b/ Includes spending through ministries providing primary and secondary schooling, vocational/technical education and higher education; the target “indicative” benchmark by 2015 should be calibrated to the length of the first cycle of schooling, i.e. 5 years, 42% if it is 5 years, 50%, if 6 years, 58% if 7 years, and 64% if 8 years). c/ Defined as non-repeaters in grade 1 as a percentage of the population cohort at the official age of entry to first grade. d/ Defined as non-repeaters in grade 6 as a percentage of the population cohort whose age is the official age at entry + 5. e/ Denominator includes only teachers with teaching duties; publicly financed schools refer to those whose teachers are fully paid by the government, either directly or indirectly. f/ Refers to teacher remuneration at mid-career; remuneration includes salary and cash value benefits (i.e. pension, health services, transport, housing and other items paid for by the state). g/ Spending on items other than teacher remuneration include: (i) the remuneration of non-teaching staff in schools, as well as staff at the district, regional or central levels; (ii) spending on pedagogical materials, maintenance and other running costs, (iii) in -service teacher training; (iv) running costs of student assessments and examinations; and (v) student subsidies, school feeding and other services included under demandside financing.

C. Education Sector Performance: 1993-2001 Major Achievements in Education The results of the 1998 and 2001 surveys on living standards show that some key indicators related to human capital accumulation have improved substantially since 1993 (Table 1). Despite a decline on preschool attendance, the system has shown significant gains in performance. Gross enrollment rates have steadily and significantly increased among the poor. This is the most important accomplishment in Nicaragua’s education sector. In particular, the gains shown by the extreme poor—which resulted in significant reduction of the gap between the poor and the non-poor—are very encouraging, since they confirm the effectiveness of educational investments and Government commitment for the past decade.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Improving Internal Efficiency and Student Flow §

§

§

§

§

§

§ §

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Literacy increased. The proportion of illiterate people continues to decline. Overall, about 18.7% of the population older than 10 years of age was illiterate in 2001, a figure 2.8 percentage points lower than in 1993. The biggest gains were found among the rural poor, who show a reduction of 6.5 percentage points since 1993. Primary school attendance increased. The proportion of children 7-12 years of age who attend school increased significantly. As a result, the proportion of children not attending dropped considerably, especially in rural areas, with the biggest gain in primary school attendance found among the poor. This is perhaps the most improved indicator of success in school coverage during the last eight years. Gross enrollment rates showed substantial improvement. Consistent with the figures on school attendance, the gross enrollment rate increased dramatically, gaining 33.7 percentage points since 1993. Most importantly, the gains were distributed among all poverty groups and in both urban and rural areas. Net enrollment rates improved. The net enrollment rate—defined as the percent of children of appropriate age enrolled in primary school—increased a small amount. Between 1993 and 1998 the net enrollment rate remained constant, but improved significantly between 1998 and 2001. The net enrollment rate for boys increased almost three times the girls’ rate during this period. School attendance increased dramatically among teenagers. Between 1998 and 2001, the proportion of children between the ages of 13-18 not in school dropped significantly across all poverty groups.6 However, rural areas showed the most dramatic improvements, since the proportion of children 13-18 not attending secondary school dropped by more than 45 percentage points since 1993. This finding is consistent with the large increase in the gross enrollment rate for primary school reported above, since the problem of overage still persists in Nicaragua. Girl’s schooling attainment levels increased. Overall, the mean years of schooling increased for girls, but not for boys. However, in rural areas the mean years of schooling increased among girls and boys by about 1 year. Moreover, among extremely poor boys in rural areas there was a gain of 2.1 years, which is very significant. Still, girls showed a steady increase in schooling among all poverty groups. Access improved in rural areas. The distance to school dropped slightly in rural areas, although the time required to get to school remained more or less the same. Nonetheless, the average time spent on the way to school is less than 30 minutes across all groups. Repetition declined. Repetition has declined significantly since 1998. In part this is due to the implementation of a program of automatic promotion between grades 1 to 3. In practice, many children repeat the first and second grades at the request of parents or in consultation with teachers, which accounts for the repetition figures reported by the MECD. Nicaragua is in a curious situation: 6-year olds represent the largest age group in the first grade, even though they should be in the last year of preschool. As a result, many children in this age group repeat first grade voluntarily. The presence of so many 6-year olds in first grade ahead of time signals the need to pay significant attention to preschool and the first year of primary school. The evidence from the LSMS confirms MECD figures, since repetition has also declined significantly across all poverty groups. In fact, repetition among the extreme poor in 2001 was less than half what it was in 1998, and in rural areas, the repetition rate among the rural extreme poor for 2001 was almost one-third of the rate for 1998.

Because of repetition, many children over the age of 12 are still enrolled in primary school.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Increasing Emphasis on Quality Enhancing Investments During this same time period, the Government gave priority to increasing its level of investment in school quality. The key instrument for this is its school autonomy program. Between 1997 and 2002, the proportion primary schools that have become fully autonomous under the national school decentralization program increased from 8.8 percent to 40.1 percent; the proportion of primary students in autonomous schools is approaching 60 percent, will attain 100 percent by 2007 in accordance with the education participation law (Ley de Participación Educativa). Research in Nicaragua has demonstrated the positive contribution of school autonomy to school quality and student achievement. 7 In addition, the Ministry has given high priority to other quality enhancing investments for all primary schools in the country, including guaranteed textbooks and learning materials, a revised curriculum, reinforced levels of teacher training, the introduction of school development planning, and especially the Model Schools Program on a pilot basis in nearly 200 schools. The Model School Program. The Model School program, which was developed with the support of USAID, is a comprehensive school desig n based on a student-centered, constructivist philosophy of education. (The main requirements of a Model School are outlined in Technical Annex 3.) This design for primary education reform features an integrated package of interventions for improving cla ssroom methodologies based on a highly successful Latin American model Escuela Nueva. The Model School reform package includes re-training teachers to act as learning facilitators (rather than traditional lecturers); individually paced and self-managed le arning; small-group and peer-directed study; active learning based on student projects; democratic student government; and very active parent and community participation in support of local school quality. Model Schools are characterized by lively, stimula ting classroom environments, and feature enhanced classroom and school libraries; resource centers for teachers to use for developing classroom materials; and continuous qualitative evaluation. The Model Schools involve teachers and administrators in the production of teacher-training manuals and classroom learning materials for use in the program. Teacher professional development, while not yet completely decentralized, utilizes a local micro-training approach, and supports the development of teacher quality circles (Micro-Centros de InterCapacitación/MIC’s). Each model school serves as the hub of an in-service training network. The Model School Master Teachers train other teachers and work with local educators, including school principals (directores), assistant principals, and municipal education supervisors, who in turn provide leadership for the MIC’s. The program also includes a strong alliance between the Model Schools and Nicaragua’s eight Normal Schools, which are responsible for training primary school teachers. The Government’s emphasis on quality is a direct outgrow of the commitments expressed in the National Education Plan, which states that the educational system should assure a proper supply of books, didactic materials, laboratories, equipment and technical pedagogical conditions in schools. Moreover, schools 7

Fuller, Bruce and Magdalena Rivarola. “Nicaragua’s Experiment to Decentralize Schools: Views of Parents, Teachers, and Principals.” Paper No. 5, Working Paper Series on Impact Evaluation of Education Reforms. Development Economics Research Group, The World Bank, Washington, D.C. 1998. King, Elizabeth and Berk Ozler. “What’s Decentralization Got To Do With Learn ing? The Case of Nicaragua’s School Autonomy Reform.” Working Paper Series 9 on Impact Evaluation of Education Reforms. Policy Research Department, The World Bank, Washington, D.C. 1998Castro, Vanessa, “Evaluación del Régimen de Autonomía y la Calidad del Servicio Educativo en 6 Escuelas de las Zonas Rurales Nicaragüenses.” Mayo 1999. King, Elizabeth, Laura Rawlings, Berk Ozler, Patricia Callejas, Nora Gordon, and Nora Mayorga de Caldera. “Nicaragua’s School Autonomy Reform: A First Look.” Paper No 1, Working Paper Series on Impact Evaluation of Education Reforms. Policy Research Department, The World Bank, Washington, D.C. 1996.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports should be safe, equitable and able to promote higher levels of learning. To this end, the MECD’s efforts should emphasize improvements in all of the qualitative aspects of education, guaranteeing higher standards in reading, writing, arithmetic, and other essential skills. Chief Constraints to Achieving EFA

Demand and supply side constraints to school attendance and performance. Judging from the figures on non-attendance, system coverage has improved significantly since 1998. Moreover, there is remarkable progress in reducing non-attendance since 1993. In 1993 about 21.5 % of 7-12 year old children were not in school. This figure is now down to 12.1 %. There is still a large difference between extreme poor children and the non-poor, but that difference is narrowing gradually: non-attendance among the extreme poor declined by 17 percentage points in eight years. Yet, almost one-third of extreme poor children do not attend school. This is a serious problem that needs to be addressed. The figure below shows that lack of attendance can be explained by two main factors: a financial hardship for the child's family, which is a demand side issue; and an inadequate school, which is a supply-side issue. Demand side constraints for the poor. Overwhelmingly, the majority of male children between 7 and 12 years of age cited economic problems as a reason for not attending school. More than 50 % of poor males cited economic issues (including the need to work in and out of the home) as the main barrier for attendance, and in the case of extremely poor males in urban areas, this figure increases to 78 %. Among the rural poor, about 22 % of the males cited the need to work in the fields as a reason for nonattendance. Among girls, the reasons for non-attendance are similar, with one important difference: personal security is a more prominent reason than in the case of boys. Rural families are reluctant to send their girls long distances over scarcely populated areas given the high level of civil insecurity in the country. As a result, about 14% of poor girls cited security as a deterrent to school attendance.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Reasons why children between ages 7-12 do not attend school

Over age 2%

Household work 3% Not interested 13%

Work/agricultural work 9% School is full

Illnes/handicap 2%

1%

Others 4%

Grade not offered 1%

School is too far 18%

There are no teachesrs

Lack of money 35%

4% Lack of personal security 3% Family problems 5%

Source: EMNV 2001

Supply side constraints for the poor. Supply constraints are defined as the lack of classroom space, the lack of teachers, or the lack of school materials in sufficient quantities as to deter children from attending school. In addition, the perceived inadequacy of the school curriculum can also be included as a supply constraint. Urban males in extreme poverty cited a lack of interest in school (16.3 %) as an important reason for non-attendance. Among girls, the reasons for non-attendance are similar, with one important difference: personal security is a more prominent reason than in the case of boys. Rural families are reluctant to send their girls long distances over scarcely populated areas given the high level of civil insecurity in the country. As a result, about 14% of poor gir ls cited security as a deterrent to school attendance. Preschool attendance The proportion of 4-6 year olds in preschool declined significantly between 1998 and 2001. Although the LSMS sample sizes for each group in the table was small, suggesting caution in the assessment of the figures, the differences are too large to ignore. Still, if one counts the proportion of 4-6 year olds attending primary school (mostly in first grade), the proportion of this age group enrolled in school is significant: 56.7%. System Equity: Girls education and attention to indigenous populations Given that education is a right, and an end in itself, it is necessary to maximize access permanence in the education system for the entire school age population, complementing universal access with higher levels

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports of quality. In particular, key strategies underlying this objective are: Access to free, compulsory primary education of good quality at least through sixth grade, for all boys and girls, prioritizing children in poverty, as well as those in ethnic minority populations. To ensure the equitable access to education, in particular for children in poverty, Nicaragua will have to improve on those factors internal to the school that affect learning, and also implement interventions and financial transfers for poor families to elevate the levels of investment in their education. Girl’s education is not a problem in Nicaragua. In general, the gross enrollment rates for females are higher than for males. An exception is the rural area of the Atlantic, where the gross enrollment rate for females is slightly less than for males. However, since the net enrollment rate for females is higher, the overall rate of females to males in school is higher in al regions except Managua and the urban area of the Pacific region. Ethnic equity in Nicaragua is a complex issue due to the confounding factor of difficult physical access to those rural areas populated by ethnic minorities, mixed with the issue of language. The Nicaragua education system uses language other than Spanish to indicate ethnicity. Less than 6% of the population speaks a mother tongue other than Spanish, such as English and Miskito. In the urban areas of the Atlantic educational access is comparable to the rest of the country, but in the rural areas of the Atlantic, where ethnic minorities live intermingled with the mestizo mainstream, access is more difficult. But in summary, the issue of equity in education seems to apply in particular to the rural population of the Atlantic Coast, indicating the need for targeted interventions to improve the mean years of education of the population and their access to schools and well-trained bilingual teachers, books, pedagogical materials 8 . D. Key Government Policy Initiatives School Autonomy in Nicaragua: A Success Story The Government has defined two main goals in education: to increase the coverage of basic education and to improve education quality. In the case of autonomy, the National Education Plan calls for the creation of systems of good governance and management of education capable of rapid response, promotion of participation, and accountability. This statement implies the transfer of responsibilities to schools to strengthen their autonomy and management capacity, the allocation of the necessary resources, and the delivery of the technical and human resources necessary to complement schools functions. Expansion and consolidation of school autonomy. Nicaragua is the only country in the hemisphere that has a legislated policy to give school councils (composed of parents—with majority vote, teachers, and the school principal) autonomous control over public education finances (including teacher salaries) and school management. The objectives of school autonomy are: (i) to increase community participation in school management: (ii) increase local efficiency in resource use, and (iii) increase local accountability. Autonomous schools receive a fiscal transfer that is administered by the school council. This transfer is based on a formula that takes into account the number of students, the location of the school, and the school record for repetition and dropouts. The Government believes that school autonomy will continue to yield improvements in educational performance due to better local accountability and more parental support of learning activities. About 80 percent of primary school students are enrolled in autonomous schools. Overall, 8

About 24.5 % of 7-12 year olds in the rural Atlantic region do not attend school, while in urban areas only 7.7 % of this age group do not attend school. This latter figure is similar to the urban areas in the rest of the country. Source: EMNV 2001.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports external research carried out in 1996 and 1997 on the educational impact of school autonomy in Nicaragua has shown that the internal efficiency in autonomous schools is better than in centralized schools, but there are complaints about the lack of understanding of the rules of autonomy among parents and teachers, an issue being addressed with communication and training programs. Evidence from the 1998 and 2001 household surveys indicate that “voluntary” fees imposed by school councils in autonomous schools have a negative effect on parental support, and only a small impact on school finances9 . Schools with good leadership on part of the school director have shown the most gains in internal efficiency. 10 Other Government Initiatives Rehabilitation and replacement of school infrastructure In collaboration with the Social Investment Fund (FISE), the Ministry has expanded the quality of primary school infrastructure in rural areas. Schools due for rehabilitation are selected with the help of a poverty map based on the 1998 LSMS, but this system is in the process of change, with the MECD assuming more control over the choice of schools. This increase in MECD participation is a direct response to past difficulties in ensuring an efficient supervision of infrastructure quality at the local level. Expansion of preschool coverage. The Ministry of Education is supporting a program to expand preschool access through community preschools, hoping to cover close to 30% of preschool age-children by the end of 2002. The community preschools system includes the training of mothers as preschool caregivers, nutritional assistance, and preventive health care. The strategy to promote the expansion of preschool coverage by supporting the community preschool model was selected because of its cost-effectiveness: The cost per student is less than 50 % of the cost of formal preschools 11 , making it possible to expand coverage more rapidly than would otherwise be possible. Although preschool enrollment declined during 2000 and 2001, this decline has reversed slightly in 2002. The causes of the decline are not yet known, but a probable cause is the difficult economic climate in rural areas due to the coffee crisis and the 2001 drought. Curricular reform. The MECD has modified its primary school curriculum to make it less encyclopedic and more oriented to basic math, reading, and writing skills. It has also expanded the provision of textbooks and school materials with external funds. However, textbooks are still lacking in more isolated areas. The Ministry is revising the curriculum and teaching methods in teacher training schools, and improving in-service training. Now the MECD is planning to revise the curriculum to include learning elements more pertinent to the real life of students, with the aim of improving the link between formal education and real life problems. Model School Program. The Model School program’s conception of an effective school sets a high standard for all the nation’s schools. It has a mature programmatic framework, adapted to Nicaraguan conditions. The model is a Nicaraguan adaptation of basic education reforms underway throughout the Hemisphere in the general tradition of the highly successful Colombian Escuela Nueva school reform movement. In response to the 9

Arcia, Gustavo, 2002. “Improving Human Capital under Fiscal Constraints: Primary Education in Nicaragua: Evidence from the 1993, 1998 and 2001 Surveys on Living Standards.” Background paper for this proposal. See the technical annex in this document. 10 See footnote 2, above, for references related to the impact of school autonomy on student outcomes. 11 Arcia, Gustavo and Vanessa Castro, 1999. “Evaluación del Programa de Atención Integral a la Niñez Nicaragüense (PAININ).” Consulting Report, Inter American Development Bank, Managua.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports success of the BASE Project Model School reforms, this year the Government of Nicaragua announced its intention to expand the Model School program at least ten-fold over the next several years. With encouragement and support from the World Bank, USAID and international partners, Nicaragua began a school autonomy program in the early ‘90s. The basic Model School formula 12 is an integral approach that involves teachers, parents, and community members in all reform areas. Strong emphasis on school autonomy and community participation – in support specifically of education quality, as well as local school administration – is a distinguishing feature of the Nicaraguan model of the contemporary Hemispheric primary education reform movement in the Escuela Nueva tradition. Modernization of central administration and assessment. The MECD is in the process of modernizing central administration and planning through two mechanisms: (i) a system for measuring and reporting student achievement, and (ii) an Integrated Management Information System containing education statistics, administrative and budgetary information, and information on student achievement. Achievement testing on a regular basis is now in the process of implementation. Conclusions So far, the Government’s strategy has increased the supply of schools in rural areas, increased the participation of parents in school affairs, improved the supply of educational resources and services to the schools, raised per student expenditures, and has begun to have an impact on educational outcomes (as measured by promotion rates and some limited student testing efforts.13 Although other elements of the strategy are in progress and/or their effects will be felt in a few years, a remaining concern now is to assure that improvements in school quality continue, and that the impact of these improvements are socially equitable. The National Education Plan: 2000-2015 The Ministry of Education has prepared a long-term plan for public education, which reflects the views of most stakeholders in the sector and discusses some new areas that had not been covered in previous strategic efforts. The Plan, as it is informally known, emphasizes eight basic principles, which are then translated into strategic objectives. The Plan is ambitious but it follows the trends in education reform in the rest of Central America and the Caribbean. The MECD was extremely successful in generating a broad consensus among a diverse group of stakeholders with different—and sometimes conflicting— interests. Close to 3,000 people had an opportunity to give an opinion on the Plan. In part, this success was due to the inclusive nature of the dialogue, in which everyone’s voice was reflected in the interim documents. Another part of the success was due to the generation of discussion without a budget constraint, which in turn resulted in the support of all stakeholders at the Plan’s presentation. The MECD now has begun the second phase of the Plan: setting priorities to configure them to the constraints of the education budget. The principles, policies, and strategies set out in the Plan, although lacking in implementation mechanisms, are consistent with the pursuit of the Education for All targets. 12

(1) A basically eclectic learner-centered pedagogical approach with a generally constructivist theoretical orientation; (2) Involvement of teachers, principals and local education official in all aspects of design; (3) democratic student, parent, and community governance; (4) active parental and community involvement in support of school quality; (5) active teaching and learning with emphasis on small-group and peer-directed learning; (6) new teacher manuals, student workbooks, and other learning materials in keeping with the program; (7) classroom and school libraries; (8) resource centers for teachers; (9) a changed, enriched classroom environment; (10) continuous qualitative assessment and evaluation. 13 A national assessment system has been designed and is going into implementation during the next 6 months.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports III. EDUCATION FINANCING Education Expenditures and Education Finance

Education expenditures have two components: private and public. Nicaragua’s social sector strategy has addressed both, through targeted subsidies to families in poverty, and through increased educational expenditures. Private Costs of Public Schooling The evidence from the review of the sector’s performance clearly indicates a strong negative link between poverty, enrollment and performance. Although public schooling is free, parents are asked to contribute with some fees—which are supposed to be optional—and to cover the cost of registration, uniforms, school snacks, and transportation. Overall, the average annual expenditure per primary student in a public school by a family was approximately US$28 in 2001, varying from US$19 per student per year among poor families to US$39 among non-poor families. Among poor families the real per student cost is about the same as in 1998, while for non-poor families the cost has increased 25% from three years ago. The cost of public education to poor families is significant, but of lower budgetary impact than in 1998. The total cost of sending a child to a primary public school represents about 2.9 % of the non-food expenditures of poor households. This is substantially lower than in 1998, when the education cost per student represented 6.3 % of the non-food expenditures.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Public Financing of Primary Education Following the recommendations of donors, Nicaragua has continued to support the financing of basic education. Since it is a small economy, the government still has a large share of GDP, albeit a declining one. It is expected that by 2005 the government’s share of GDP will be 30 %. At the rate it is declining, by 2015 the size of government should be between 18 and 20% of GDP, which is considered an appropriate share.Education expenditures account for almost 4% of GDP, of which the largest share is for primary education. Current and Projected Education Expenditures (% of GDP) 2002 2003 2004 2005 33.3 31.9 30.6 30.4 23.2 22.3 19.9 19.4

Central Government Expenditures Recurrent Capital Total Education Expenditures Recurrent Capital Primary Education Recurrent Capital

10.1 4.3 3.0 1.3 2.5 2.0 0.4

9.6 4.1 2.8 1.3 2.3 1.9 0.4

10.7 3.9 2.6 1.3 2.3 1.8 0.4

11.0 3.9 2.6 1.3 2.2 1.8 0.4

Source: IMF agreement of July 2002 and Directorate of Finance, MECD. Capital expenditures figures provided by the National System of Public Investment (SNIP), Ministry of Finance. Although the budget allocations to education have increased, funding had remained relatively stable as a proportion of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). (see statistical annex for details). It is important to note that the budget projections of the Ministry of Finance already include funds from the HIPC initiative. Total HIPC funding for Nicaragua for the period 2001-2003 is estimated at US$ 60 million per year, of which 5% is scheduled for improving education, particularly the funding of autonomous schools and infrastructure. Because HIPC funds are channeled through the national budget, they are already included in the MECD budget projections.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Fig. 4. MECD Budget as Percent of GDP 5.00% 4.50% 4.00% 3.50% 3.00% 2.50% 2.00% 1.50% 1.00% 0.50% 0.00% 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002

Total funding for the MECD—and for education in general—increased in dollar terms between 1996 and 2000 (Table14). In 2001 and 2002 the rate of growth in the education budget declined slightly due to the severe fiscal constraints faced by the Government in light of the drastic reductions in international coffee prices, the onset of a drought in 2001, and the need to repay large amounts of short-term internal debt. These events had a substantial negative impact on fiscal revenues and on the rate of growth education budget. By 1998 the MECD was able to spend between around US$15 million per year in activities funded by external donors. This amount represented around 15 % of the MECD budget. For 2002 these funds increased to US$32.7 million, or 30 % of the budget. MECD budget 1991-2002 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 MECD ('000s of US$) 49 62 57 61 72 74 101 106 101 105 Primary education (‘000s 30 38 35 38 45 48 68 73 72 77 of US$) % of MECD 61 62 62 62 63 65 67 69 71 73 expenditures Source: MECD expenditures: Ministerio de Hacienda y Crédito Público. Exchange rate: Central Bank. Primary education expenditures: Constructed and estimated from various sources.

In 1999 and 2000 the Government faced a serious crisis in the private banking sector, forcing it to finance a bail out with short-term bonds. These bonds, whose value is of around US$ 900 million, had a maturity of three years. Now that payments are due the Government had to reduce its operating expenses by 15% in order to maintain is fiscal deficit in check. However, the education budget was protected as much as possible, suffering a lower reduction than the rest of the Central Government. The fiscal problem posed by the short-term internal debt is still an obstacle in the current negotiations between the Government and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). However, both the Government and the IMF are trying to find a way to refinance the debt and schedule repayment at a more reasonable pace. MECD expenditures in 2002 are expected to reach US$ 105 million. About 73% of these expenditures, about US$ 77 million, are for primary education. About 65% of the primary education budget is assigned to teacher salaries, and 15% is for infrastructure (Fig. 5). The current budget shares for primary education

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports are now better distributed than in the early 90s when teacher salaries amounted to 92 % of recurrent expenditures14 , versus 76% in 2002. Fig. 5. Public Primary Education Expenditures, 2002

Teachers 65%

Admin.Exp 3% Food 6% Materials 5% Training 5%

Capital Exp. 15%

Scholarships 1%

B. Education Funding from External Sources. A significant portion of Nicaragua’s public expenditures in education comes from external sources. Some of these funds come from large projects in basic education (i.e.: APRENDE I and II, with World Bank funding; and BASE I and II with USAID funding), secondary education, and adult education. Most of the external funds have been allocated to improvements in basic education quality and coverage, through the distribution of textbooks and educational materials, the construction or rehabilitation of rural schools; teacher training; curricular reform, and the development of new instructional model (i.e.: Escuelas Modelo).

Funding Source

MECD sources of external funding, 2000-03 (US$) 2000 2001 2002 (Projected)

World Bank, Basic Education (APRENDE II)

2003 (Programmed)

2,234,131.00

6,049,536.00

14,959,673.00

22,000,000.00

World Food Program (School Lunch)

527,176.00

1,937,000.00

1,824,803.00

1,982,250.00

UNICEF - Basic Education

368,507.00

299,318.00

214,181.00

659,119.00

3,569,566.00

3,750,398.58

1,327,596.13

4,697,467.62

European Union -- Support to Education (Project ASEN y PRRAC) 14

Arcia, Gustavo, Miriam Quispe-Agnoli, and Carlos Gargiulo, 1994. "Recuperación de costos para la capacitación de maestros y la producción y distribución de material educativo." (Cost Recovery in Teacher Training and in the Production and Distribution of Educational Material). Research Triangle Institute, Research Triangle Park, NC, 1994.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Funding Source

MECD sources of external funding, 2000-03 (US$) 2000 2001 2002 (Projected)

Inter American Development Bank - Education Reform

39,946.00

27,670.00

3,229,392.00

3,720,579.00

723,321.00

58,550.00

75,300.00

27,650.00

4,620,909.00

8,919,364.00

organization of American States

607,434.00

3,500.00

USAIND - Basic education (BASE II) Luxenbourg - Teacher training Japan - Primary scholl construction Spain (Project AECI)

2,119.00 7,157.00 2,957,710.00

2,851.00

Finland--Bilingual ed., Atlantic Region TOTAL

2003 (Programmed)

14,608,231.00

192,327.00

166,233.00

223,753.00

692,009.00

24,957,674.58

19,334,998.13

33,797,592.62

Exchange rates: 2000: C$ 13.10 = 1 US$; 2001: C$13.40 = 1 US$; 2002: C$14.20 = 1 US$; 2003: C$14.98 = 1 US$. Source: Office of External Projects. MECD

C. Government Expenditures per Primary School Student Nicaragua has made significant progress in improving primary education funding, even in the face of severe fiscal problems. Total per student expenditures for primary average US$ 97, which are significantly lower than per student expenditures in neighboring countries, but much better than in 1998 15 . In 1998 the average recurrent expenditure per student was approximately US$ 55, which led the Government to aggressively seek additional funding for recurrent expendit ures. As a result, recurrent expenditures per student have increased to US$ 83, allowing for better teacher pay and for a better distribution of non-salary expenditures in books and pedagogical material16 . MECD: Average per student cost by type of school, 2002 Total cost Total cost Recurrent cost Type of public school Cordobas US$ US$ Centralized 1,304 91 Autonomous 1,447 101 Model School—Centralized 1,977 138 Model School—Autonomous 1,855 129 Multigrade—Centralized 1,304 91 Multigrade—Autonomous 1,447 101 Model School—Multigrade Autonomous 598 42 Model School—Subsidized private 1,312 91 Subsidized private 825 58 Average per student expenditure 1,388 97 Source: Estimated from data from the Office of the Director of Finance, MECD 15

79 84 125 112 79 84 24 89 55 83

Capital cost 12 17 12 17 12 17 17 3 3 14

In comparison, recurrent expenditures for 2000 in El Salvador and the Dominican Republic, with much larger GDP per capita than Nicaragua, hover around US$130 per primary school student. Source: Arcia, 2000. Op. cit., pp-19-20. 16 Teachers in Nicaragua received a 28% nominal increase in pay in 2001. However, their salary is still considered relatively low by members of the education community. The current salary amounts to approximately 2.5 times the GDP per capita, while advocates of better salaries argue that it should be 3.5 times the GDP per capita. This is an issue that merits analysis to determine what should be a fair teacher salary given the salaries of other people with similar levels of education and experience.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

IV. CONCLUSIONS: KEY CONSTRAINTS TO ACHIEVING THE TARGETS OF EDUCATION FOR ALL Supply side issues. The main area for improvement—and one of the core components of the proposed EFA strategy—is in the area of school quality . In particular, it is very important to improve the quality of school resources to help improve teacher performance. These resources include the quality of the school infrastructure, the quality and availability of textbooks and pedagogical materials, and the quality of training and professional development for multigrade teachers. In the area of quality the MECD is scheduled to begin measuring student achievement, the results of which will be reported widely in order to generate more awareness of geographical priorities, and to complement the climate of local accountability framed by the school autonomy program. Also, the MECD needs to improve its efforts to expand the scope and quality of training on the school autonomy program to make autonomy more effective for the poor. Demand side issues. In terms of access, the main effort by the MECD—and the other core component of the EFA strategy—is to help families in extreme poverty defray the direct and indirect costs of educating their children. Direct costs are the cost of uniforms, school materials, transportation, and food. Indirect costs are the wages earned by children. Both are significant barriers to school attendance. As a result, the MECD must implement a program of scholarships targeted to extremely poor children, and to complement this program with school lunch or other school feeding program that have shown to have a significant positive impact on school attendance in the past.

V. NICARAGUA'S EFA-FTI PROGRAM : AN OVERVIEW EFA-FTI Program Firmly Rooted in National Education Plan. The actions that are proposed below to achieve the targets of the Education for All Fast Track Initiative are firmly based on the objectives and strategies put forward in the Nicaragua’s National Education Plan 2000-2015, along with the government’s 2001 Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper. The key principle of the EFA-FTI proposal is: “Given that education is a right, and an end in itself, it is necessary to maximize the possibilities of access to, and permanence in, the education system for the entire population, especially for school age children, assuring access to education with higher levels of quality.” -- National Education Plan 2000-2015 It is on this basis that the EFA-FTI proposal gives it’s top priority to the aggressive expansion of existing programs that promote equity of schooling opportunities and incentives and support mechanisms to steadily improve the quality of these opportunities.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

A. Sub-Model I: Schooling Improvement Program (Programa de Mejoramiento Escolar—PME) Objectives and Targets Objective : The objective of this program is to help assure that all children, especially children from poor families, can effectively complete sixth grade before their 13th birthday. The program will pursue this objective by providing funding and guidelines for school councils or other stakeholders to raise the learning conditions in their schools, step by step, in order to more effectively: a. Attract children in the community to attend their school, b. Motivate children to attend school on a daily basis, c. Provide students and teachers with adequate levels of textbooks, varied library books, and other instructional materials; d. Engage parents and children in their school and the educational process; e. Stimulate teachers to improve instruction and monitoring of student progress, and ultimately; f. Offer children substantially better opportunities to learn and acquire skills. Research and experience in Nicaragua and internationally point to these factors as key determinants of student performance. By raising learning conditions, and by involving the stakeholders in the process of continuous improvement, schools will be better able to advance more students each year to higher grade levels with increased levels of learning achievement, and help assure they can graduate from sixth grade at the correct age. Moreover, by targeting a more intense package of technical assistance to schools serving the poorest children and to those located in the Atlantic Coast, this program will raise the equity of learning opportunities across the country, as well as provide the most disadvantaged children with the skills and knowledge needed to rise out of poverty.

Building on the National Education Plan’s Strategies to Improve School Quality. An Equitable Road to Quality Improvement. The Schooling Improvement Program is structured around the National Education Plan’s focus on systematic and equitable enhancement of school quality. In particular, the Plan stresses the importance of… “improving all of the qualitative aspects of education and guaranteeing higher standards of schooling to promote well recognized and measured learning levels, especially in reading, writing, arithmetic, and essential practical competencies.” (The Plan, p. 33). The Plan adds that this improvement would include the: “creation of a safe school setting that benefits from an equitable distribution of educational resources chosen to promote higher levels of learning and the attainment of well defined learning levels” (The Plan, p. 33, italics added), and “assuring books, didactic materials, laboratories, equipment and technical pedagogical conditions in schools” (The Plan, p.33). A Decentralized Model of Quality Improvement. In addition, the approach to be used in this model is tightly linked to Nicaragua’s decentralized model of education management. In particular, by giving the power and responsibility for school improvement to parent-managed school councils, the Schooling Improvement Program is structured around the principles of “systems of good governance and management of schooling capable of rapid response, promotion of participation, and accountability. (The Plan, p. 38). More to the point, the National Education Plan 2000-2015 specifies the importance of:

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports (a) “modernizing the educational institution, which implies the transfer of responsibilities to schools to strengthen their autonomy and management capacity… “ (The Plan, p. 38); (b) “introducing strategic planning into education management with flexible schemes that build capacity to identify problems, develop viable solutions, implement these solutions, and evaluate the results” (The Plan, p. 38); (c) “supporting schools with technical assistance to help them develop schooling improvement projects…” (The Plan, p. 38); (d) “establishing norms and mechanisms that guarantee the effective participation of both mothers and fathers, teachers, students, teacher organizations, representatives of local government, the private sector, churches, and ethnic communities in decentralized practices of planning, management, and implementation of schooling processes” (The Plan, p. 40); and finally, (e) “establishing mechanisms that guarantee the optimal, transparent, and rational use of human and material resources” (The Plan, p. 40).

Indicators and Targets. The indicators and targets in this sub-model are that by year 2015, all schools will have succeeded in raising their standards up to at least a minimum level of quality, referred to as the Fundamental Level, and 58 percent of the nation’s schools will have surpassed this level to at least the next higher level—the Satisfactory Level. It is expected that many of the schools attaining the Satisfactory Level will have advanced to superior levels, including the status of Model School.17 Indicators and Targets of the Schooling Improvement Program Sub-Model Indicators Year Standards of School Improvement 2002 2005 2008 Below fundamental level 70% 56% 37% Fundamental level 19% 33% 41% Satisfactory level or higher 10% 12% 21% Total 100% 100% 100% At least at fundamental level 30% 45% 62% Superior levels (above Satisfactory) 2% 3% 5%

2015 0% 43% 58% 100% 100% 22%

Building on Successful Experience The Schooling Improvement Program should be seen as an extension and expansion of existing, recognized, and positively evaluated programs currently under implementation by the Ministry of Education. In particular, the Ministry has been successfully managing two different interventions that have helped school councils, and in fact the broader school community, raise the conditions of learning of their schools.

a. Building on the Model Schools. The Model School Program is a long-term effort to improve the quality of primary education in Nicaragua by promoting modern teaching methodologies and community support for schools. In developing nations where primary education is in crisis, the cause is virtually always antiquated teaching methods, not just economic deprivation. In most failing primary systems, teachers are still trying to teach 17

See chart, below, “Levels of Schooling Improvement,” for a description of the characteristics of each level.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports young children by lecturing at them from the front of the room while the children sit in rows, passive and often uncomprehending, copying from the chalkboard into notebooks, chanting in unison, and memorizing by rote. Economic development aside, it would not occur to elementary school teachers in nations with developed education systems to use century-old teaching methods, because teachers were not taught that way themselves. Modern active- learning methods are used throughout the national network of 170 Model Schools. Model School classrooms are organized so that students spend most of the school day working together in pairs and small groups. Teacher guides, study guides and learning materials are developed by model school teachers for piloting in the model schools and eventual use nationwide. The Model Schools have strong student governments, and parents and communities participate actively in managing the schools and working to improving school quality. Active student participation in learning in the Model Schools increased in 2001 by 11.7% in graded and 33.7% in multi- grade classrooms. Parent and community participation is over 90% of parents in most Pacific/Central Region Model Schools; Model School retention rates exceed 90%; and Model School completion rates exceed the national average by 20%. The BASE II mid-term evaluation report (June 2002) calls the Model School program an “integrated and coherent reform effort involving all aspects of the primary school system in Nicaragua, which is having an extremely positive effect ”. The report characterizes the best of the Model Schools as “not only a national, but international model of what a ‘good’ primary school should look like.” a. Building on Fondo Sonrisa. One of these interventions is Aprende’s Fondo Sonrisa. Under implementation since 1999, this intervention provides a small fund to students, their parents, and teachers to make their schools a more attractive place for students by financing extra-curricular projects that otherwise could not be realized at the school. Examples of projects that have been financed through this fund include: school newspapers, soccer fields, school plays, field trips, school vegetable gardens, science projects, musical bands, folklore dancing groups, and art workshops. Schools have successfully planned, implemented, and supervised thousands of projects financed with this fund. The Ministry has recently modified the Fondo Sonrisa program with the addition of a requirement that the school prepare its own School Development Plan (PDE). This simple but powerful instrument helps bring together students, teachers, principal, and parents in an effort to diagnose the school’s key problems with respect to student learning and initiate a strategic planning process to raise student outcomes. It should be noted that Fondo Sonrisa is also a vehicle for the implementation of other projects funded by other donors, such as UNICEF, which provide additional technical and financial support to participating schools. 18 b. Extending the SIMCEP-model of parent-managed implementation beyond infrastructure. The Schooling Improvement Fund will also build on lessons and the ongoing implementation experience of the SIMCEP model of school maintenance and rehabilitation. This model engages the school councils of autonomous schools to lead the school improvement process. Although the SIMCEP

18

SIMCEP stands for Sistema de Mantenimiento de Centros Escolares Primarios.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports model has been limited to infrastructure improvements, the model can be expanded to include other aspects of school quality. Until today, it has helped hundreds of school councils identify infrastructure problems, formulate a physical plant improvement project, contract local workers and purchase building materials, supervise the renovation, and maintain accounting records. The SIMCEP model has yielded both increased community involvement and enthusiasm for the school improvement effort, and has demonstrated efficient implementation capacity of the school councils, and a transparent management of the funds. In the proposed Schooling Improvement Program, schools assessed as suffering from extremely poor or unsafe physical conditions will be included in an expanded SIMCEP program in order to attain the Fundamental Level standard. In addition, the same financing and community engagement mechanisms will be employed to mobilize the school staff and parents themselves to undertake the necessary investment with resources from the fund to attain higher standards of quality. Both of these programs operate with clear rules, simple instruments that facilitate the planning and implementation of the required actions by parents, teachers, and even primary school children, and routine monitoring and reporting at all levels, from the school level up to the Ministry and external donors. In addition to these interventions, the Ministry has developed, with the support of the Inter-American Development Bank, USAID and the World Bank, a well structured, up-to-date, geographically based school information system that captures information on, and helps monitor, school conditions and quality levels. Sub-Model Description. The Schooling Improvement Program integrates the best elements of these three initiatives to create a unified framework aimed to systematically raise the conditions of learning in Nicaragua’s schools. The program’s objective is to help all children complete a good quality primary school education by the time they are 13 years of age. To support this objective, as further detailed below, the program defines a series of school improvement standards, provides a fund to finance school improvement, supports schools in their capacity to organize and administer themselves, and engages parents and other local stakeholders in the process of raising their school up to the next higher standard. The Ministry will disseminate the standards throughout the country as simple guidelines that would include wall charts for schools and municipal delegations, self-administering checklists, and user friendly manuals to guide and help implement the preparation of budgets and to monitor implementation. The program will be reinforced with an aggressive communication campaign. In addition, the Ministry will contract an external body to be responsible for certifying the school’s attainment of each level. Focus on Equity. One of the principal objectives of the School Improvement Program is to improve the educational equity in Nicaragua. Tens of thousands of children are enrolled in schools that do not offer even the most minimal learning opportunities that are available to children attending schools elsewhere in the country. These disadvantaged children are enrolled in schools that lack qualified teachers, reading books and other didactic material, adequate classrooms with appropriate furniture and usable chalkboards, functional roofs, windows, walls, toilets, or water service. It is not just the fact that schools in these appalling conditions exist, but that they exist in the same country and even in the same municipalities where good schools may also be found. In many parts of the country quite good, even excellent public schools can be readily identified. These schools may not be "first world" schools in every sense, but they are schools to which middle-class parents from any country in the world would be happy to send their children. This disparity exists in part because the government or donors have invested in some schools

27

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports while allowing many other schools to operate below any kind of minimum level of functioning. Because children tend to frequent schools that reflect residential patterns of economic differentiation, the schools at which these manifestly substandard conditions exist tend to be attended by children from families living at or below the poverty line. Inadequate learning opportunities compound the deleterious effect of learning deficits. Moreover, even if students attending substandard schools somehow manage to progress through the school cycle, they do so while being less prepared and motivated than their peers. In this way, substandard schools contribute to grade repetition and to student disaffection, ultimately inhibiting the chances of the poor to escape from poverty. Standards of Schooling Improvement. Obviously, just brin ging schools up to a minimum level of functioning is not sufficient to guarantee an education that prepares graduates for the competitive global economy. Nicaragua needs to embark on a program that generates higher and higher levels of school improvement. The Standards of Schooling Improvement Program establishes a series of standards, in which each schooling improvement standard symbolically represents a step on a ladder of improvement. The components of each level are designed to be easy to measure by non-professionals. The Ministry of Education has defined a set of initial standards for improving the conditions of learning in Nicaragua’s schools. These standards will be consulted with Nicaraguan stakeholders as they are being finalized for implementation. Once established, the Ministry will disseminate the standards throughout the country as simple guidelines that would include wall charts for schools and municipal delegations, self-administering checklists, and user friendly manuals to guide and help implement the preparation of budgets and to monitor implementation. The program will be reinforced with an aggressive communication campaign. In addition, the Ministry will be responsible, either directly or through the assistance of third parties, for certifying the school’s attainment of each level. The following chart specifies this preliminary proposal. It is important to point out that attaining the Fundamental Level will be relatively easy for most schools to achieve without much external support (except in the Atlantic Coast). To achieve the Fundamental Level should only require between US$ 2,000 and US$ 8,000 per school (depending on school size and baseline conditions). Raising the school to successively higher standards will require additional investment and increasing levels of technical assistance and support from the Ministry or from other organizations. Levels of Schooling Improvement School Development

Management

Fundamental Level School prepares simple “School Development Plan” (to determine investments required to raise standard) School is autonomous or meets conditions to become autonomous. School council meets regularly.

Pedagogic Model

Most likely traditional, but all students use textbooks

Educational

School has classroom book

Satisfactory Level School staff and school community implement the “School Quality Self Assessment” Instrument School council (consejo) meets regularly throughout the year to take decisions and manage funds and works in consensus with teachers and the student council. Familiarity with Model School design and other pedagogical additions compatible with it.

School has “Model School”

28

Superior Levels School sets short and longterm goals and targets, monitors them together with consejo School management information system, computerized in larger schools. Management of routine processes in place. School adopts “Model School” (all required elements) program or other comprehensive schooling improvement program As needed for the Model

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Levels of Schooling Improvement Materials

Security & Infrastructure

Health

Fundamental Level corners or school library, textbook set, consumables for all students, basic teacher materials, chalk. Protection against rain and vandals, secure place for materials, parent involvement. (35% need some type of physical improvement)* Safe drinking water, separate toilet facilities for boys and girls with hygienic conditions.

Teachers and Teacher Development

Teachers for every class, cross-teacher observation once per month.

Monitoring of Results

School records and posts daily attendance, rates of repetition, and graduation.

Enrollment

Accept all children who want to enroll, up to capacity. Student/ teacher ratio between 25:1 and 40:1

Estimated investment per school

US$ 5,000 per school. Schools requiring SIMCEP investment would need an additional US$ 14,000

Satisfactory Level package of instructional materials. A desk and chair for every student, with appropriate ergonomic characteristics. School can be closed and locked, assures security conditions (fence if necessary). Annual screening and medical referral for hearing, vision, and other health problems, mainstream special needs students. Separate toilet facilities for every 45 children. Safe wastewater and solid waste disposal. School finances teacher training based on results from PDE, self-assessment tests.

School sends home report cards twice per year, and reports routinely to parents on failing or frequently absent students. School administers standardized test School offers all grade levels, so that any student can complete 6th grade, School refers children below 7 years to preschool US$ 8,000 per school

Superior Levels School program or other comprehensive schooling improvement program

Functioning electricity, school security in place, connection to town water and sewage--if available — are in place. Full integration of children with special needs, including teaching aides. Immunization and oral hygiene programs in place.

All teachers have completed training consistent with the "Model School Program" or other school improvement design. All teachers formally qualified. School attains promotion & completion rate targets annually agreed upon with MECD, without decreasing standardized test scores. School offers preschool to all students requesting it

US$8,000 for each level (includes training and technical assistance to adopt pedagogic designs)

* Repairs are required at hundreds of schools with inadequate roofing, water permeated floors or standing water inside classrooms during rains, precarious infrastructure, lack of basic furniture or storage for books and other didactic material.

Implementation Implementation of the Model School Design.

As indicated in the above table, full adoption of the Model School program, by both rural multi-grade schools and also urban schools, would automatically move beneficiary schools up into the “Superior” level on the above School Improvement Scale.

29

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports The 170 Model Schools are the cornerstone of the MECD strategy for replication and sustainability of the school reforms supported by the international donors. Each Model School serves as the hub of an inservice training network. A corps of Model School Master Teachers train other teachers and work with local educators, including school principals (directores), assistant principals, and municipal education supervisors, who in turn provide leadership for the MIC’s. The program also includes a strong alliance between the model schools and Nicaragua’s eight Normal Schools, which are responsible for training primary school teachers. Other replication features include the 1,100 Project-supported teacher quality circles (MIC’s); full incorporation of Nicaragua’s eight Normal Schools into the reform effort; resource centers for local development of learning materials by teachers; and close collaboration and involvement of local school-community councils and regional, municipal, and local Ministry administrators and technical personnel. It is important to point out the mechanisms of how to support the implementation of the Model School Program under this decentralized Schooling Improvement Program have yet to be discussed with the stakeholders and operators of the current pilot program functioning in 174 schools. For example, it is expected that while many of the resources can be transferred to schools for them to acquire the material and pay for the required elements of the Model School Program (including training and technical assistance to the school), some type of guaranteed quality control of the support services would need to be managed from a more centralized le vel to assure adequate services. Implementation for Autonomous Schools . With the exception of schools on the Atlantic Coast (see below), schools will need to become autonomous to participate in the Schooling Improvement Program. EFA-FTI will finance the transitional and annual costs of upgrading schools into the autonomous legal framework (see below). For autonomous schools, parent councils will be responsible for raising the standard for their school. Specifically, they will: a. Self diagnose on the school’s conditions and comparison with the standards to categorize the conditions of learning currently offered by the school, which will be facilitated by the preparation of a School Development Plan (PDE); b. Identify the next level the school needs to pursue; c. Determine the school’s deficiencies with respect to the standard; d. Design and submit a budgeted improvement project (using the simple instruments referred to above) to raise the school to the next higher level; e. Obtain funding to implement the schooling improvement project; f. Request Ministry certification of standard attainment. Certification process administered by an external body. g. Once the school is certified at a given level, it can pursue the next higher level of quality. h. Schools must be recertified every three years to ensure continuous compliance with the standards of its certified level. Each autonomous school is eligible to have one school improvement project funded per year. The fund would finance between US$5000 and $30000, with each school eligible to benefit from the fund no more than once per year.

30

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Implementation for Non-Autonomous Schools in the Atlantic Coast.19 Few schools located in the Atlantic Coast are participating in the autonomy program. Consequently, they would not be able to participate in the same implementation arrangements as those described previously. Nonetheless, the conditions in these schools are among the worst in the country, as are the indicators of student outcomes in the Atlantic Coast schools. At the same time, numerous NGOs, community, religious, and other organizations have been actively engaged in supporting, expanding, or even operating schooling in the region. They have demonstrated their commitment, competence, and pragmatism, time and time again. Yet, these organizations lack resources to improve the schools they are supporting and expand their assistance to additional ones, and they lack a common framework for improving the quality and results of these schools. Since school autonomy has developed slowly in the Atlantic Region, the MECD would adapt the implementation of the fund to the real conditions present on this region of the country. Currently, only 4% of the schools, and 10% of enrollment, participate in the autonomy program. It is estimated that 3 of every 10 children between the ages of 7 and 12 in the Atlantic do not attend primary school. In fact, the North and South Sub-Regions of the Atlantic, show primary coverage rates of 78% and 63%, respectively. In absolute terms, using data from 2001, it is estimated that there are more than 32,000 children age 7-12 out of the school system in the Atlantic Region. This number is important because the population of children it represents 13% of the national total and 32% of the national total of the children outside the schools system. School Autonomy and Enrollment in the Atlantic Region NonPrimary Primary Autonomous Enrollment Autonomous Enrollment Schools (Non Auto.) Schools (Autonomous) RAAN 893 59,073 25 3,970 RAAS 840 58,093 46 7,631 Source: Directorate of Statistics, MECD.

Given these conditions and needs, the Schooling Improvement Program in the Atlantic Coast has been modified to set up a special fund to be accessed only by schools located in this region, under slightly different rules, which would allow cooperating alliances with diverse NGOs and Churches to offer a variety of services. Parent councils will be responsible for raising the standard for their school. Accordingly, in this region, the implementing agent is the locally active organization rather than the school council. Eligibility. Organizations and associations wishing to participate in the program will need to demonstrate their commitment and ties to the school or schools they are supporting. This may include the presentation of an agreement or other evidence of an arrangement between the school and the organization, with signatures from parents, teachers, and the leadership of the organization in question. In this respect, once the organization proves its legitimacy, it would follow the same steps as the school council in a normal autonomous school set up, with the following functions: a. Compare the school’s conditions with the standards to categorize school conditions, and the preparation, with the participation of parents and teachers, of a School Development Plan (PDE); b. Identify the next level the school needs to pursue; c. Determine the school’s deficiencies with respect to the standard; 19

For further information please reefer to Technical Annex 6

31

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports d. Design and submit a budgeted improvement project (using the simple instruments referred to above) to raise the school to the next higher level; e. Obtain funding to implement the schooling improvement project; f. Request Ministry certification of standard attainment. g. Once the school is certified at a given level, the organization can pursue the next level of quality. A detailed description of this approach is included in the Annex.

Costs of Implementation and Trajectory of Outcomes Cost per school. The weighted average amount to finance per school is less than US$ 10,000 annually, including approximately 2,000 schools that will require SIMCEP-type infrastructure investments of US$ 15,000 each to raise the schools up to the minimally functional level with respect to their physical plant. The proposed cost per school reflects only those factors that involve financial expenditures. However, many quality-related factors only require a better application of existing resources, and thus require minimal resource outlays. In fact, only a few cells in the quality improvement matrix required significant funding per school. Also, the proposed actions can be implemented in parallel at the speed allowed by local conditions. Approximate Cost per School (US$) Up to Fundamental level without infrastructure improv. Up to Fundamental level, with infrastructure improv.

5,000 15,000

Up from Fundamental to Satisfactory level

8,000

Up to Superior levels

8,000

Trajectory of Implementation and Outcomes. Given that the program design is an adaptation of activities currently under implementation, but that the scope of the current projects relatively limited, implantation and expansion of the School Improvement Program is expected to proceed slowly at first as the institutions currently managing the core activities will need to modify certain operational components to expand coverage, particularly in the areas of monitoring, supervision, and audit.

Satisfactory Level

Fundamental Level

Schools below this line require SIMCEP investment to attain Fundamental Level

32

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Initial implementation will be focused on reducing the largest disparities in the system and simultaneously capitalizing on expanding programs for which the Ministry has most experience. Consequently, the emphasis during these first few years will be on helping improve the inputs and physical conditions of the schools furthest below Fundamental standard. As depicted in Figure 1, schools councils of “substandard schools” (colored gray in the figure) would receive grants on a priority basis to raise their schools up to the Fundamental level or eventually higher (colored black). Many of these schools would require some infrastructure improvements via the SIMCEP model. A smaller number of schools at the Fundamental level or higher would also be eligible to move up to higher levels. Given this priority, it is expected that the first few years will be characterized by a relatively rapid rise in the number of schools attaining the Fundamental level, but slower growth rate of schools attaining higher levels. As the institutions arrangements are stabilized, and technical teams are expanded, the trajectory of school improvement for all levels above "Below Fundamental" should grow at and increasing rate at an as depicted in the graphic below.

Trajectories of School Improvement 2002-2015

Number of Schools

6000 5000 Below Fundamental level

4000 Fundamental level

3000 Satisfactory level

2000

Superior levels

1000 0 2003

2005

2007

2009

2011

2013

Year

33

2015

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Investment costs. The investment costs related to improved school quality are shown below, following the implementation trajectory depicted in the graph. The costs are presented in three and four-year intervals to facilitate the evaluation of the investment package. The annual resource requirements are listed in Table A12 in the statistical annex. Investment costs of implementation, at different periods of time (US$)

Below Fundamental level with infrast. Below Fundamental level w/o infrast. Satisfactory level Superior levels or higher Total

Period of Time 2003-05 2006-08 2008-11 2,311,932 7,671,580 2,283,933 275,230 2,739,850 7,341,214 1,542,072 3,930,938 8,289,417 1,666,829 1,277,902 3,922,382 5,796,063 15,620,269

21,836,946

2011-15 2,141,291 4,697,729 7,600,645 7,691,166 22,130,830

The EFA-FTI Schooling Improvement Program is composed of two cost components: (1) the investment costs of the Schooling Improvement Program (as described above), and (2) the annual costs associated with school classification under the funding formula regulations. The investment costs include the costs of upgrading the schools to fundamental and higher standards, including infrastructure, equipment, material, and training costs. The annual costs are related to the distribution of enrollment into schools with higher unit costs on the basis of current funding formulas. A prerequisite for participating in the Schooling Improvement Program is that the school functions under Nicaragua’s autonomous schools legal framework. Funding formula regulations, established to assure sustainable financing for autonomous schools, stipulate slightly higher per-student costs for autonomous schools, associated with consumable materials and support. In particular, as centralized schools are reclassified as autonomous schools, unit costs increase by US$9 (10%) per student. As centralized multigrade schools become autonomous multigrade schools, which in turn become autonomous multigrade model schools, unit costs increase by $9 (10%) and $36 (38%), respectively. As a result, during the first few years of the EFA-FTI program, investment costs represent a smaller share of the Schooling Improvement Program than the recurrent costs due to the funding requirements of autonomous schools. This trend is reversed in later years (starting in 2011) as the additional impact of autonomy is absorbed by the ordinary MECD budget. The total costs of the Schooling Improvement Program until 2005 are portrayed in the chart below. EFA-FTI Schooling Improvement Program: Total Costs until 2005 (US$ millions) EFA Schooling Improvement Program—Investment Costs EFA Schooling Improvement Program – Annual Costs EFA Schooling Improvement Program—Total Costs

34

2002 0 0 0

2003 2004 $1,932 1,932 8,111 15,117 10,043 17,049

2005 1,932 21,910 23,842

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports B. Sub-Model II: Student Scholarship Program (Programa Becas-Escolares) The Government is aware of the need to implement subsidiary actions in favor of the poorest populations in order to increase their permanence in school, especially by means of necessary financial transfers to families to reduce the opportunity cost of studying instead of working. It is essential that only families in need receive the transfers, avoiding the capture of these subsidies by less needy families or by opportunists. Objectives, Indicators and Targets : The objective of this initiative is to substantially increase the number and proportion of poor children who successfully complete primary school. In Nicaragua, a child’s school attendance is a function of his level of poverty status, which in turn has a direct influence on his/her likelihood of repeating a grade or dropping out of school. The scholarship programs create a new structure of opportunities for the poor. The leading indicators are the rates of preschool participation, primary school enrollment, grade promotion, and sixth grade completion of children living in conditions of extreme poverty. The targetsfor each of these indicators are given in the following table: Indicators and Targets of the Scholarship Sub-Model (Percent of children in poverty) Indicator Year 2002 2005 2008 Net primary enrollment rate 81 85 93 Completing primary 41 44 60 Obtaining preschool 26 35 50 Average promotion rate 70 75 85

2015 98 95 60 96

Building on the National Education Plan’s Strategies to Provide Incentives to Poor Families. The National Education Plan clearly emphasizes the critical importance of providing financial support for the poorest families in Nicaragua as incentives for enrolling and maintaining their children in school. “To assure the equity of access to education, in particular for children in poverty, Nicaragua will not only need to develop those factors internal to the school that affect learning, but also to implement interventions and financial transfers for poor families to elevate the levels of investment in their education” (The Plan, p.8). The National Education Plan is even more explicit. The government will need to: “Implement subsidiary actions in favor of the poorest populations in order to increase their permanence in the education process, especially by means of necessary financial transfers to families to reduce the opportunity cost of studying instead of working. It is essential that these transfers are received only by those families in need, avoiding the capture of these subsidies by less needy families or by opportunists (p. 29).

Background Although Nicaragua has reduced the incidence of extreme poverty, the direct and indirect costs of schooling are still the biggest barrier to school attendance: 51% of children out of school do not attend because of financial problems. Given this barrier, there is a need to implement demand subsidies targeted to children in extreme poverty, who are the most affected by the financial difficulties faced by their families. Building on Successful Experience. The government has recognized the need to help extremely poor families defray the cost of sending their children to school. In Nicaragua, two pilot programs of this

35

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports nature have been implemented over the past 3 years, both with success: The Social Protection Network (Red de Protección Social—RPS) and the MECD’s Beca program. The MECD has been directly involved in the implementation of both programs. Sub-Model Description. The proposed intervention is an expansion of The Ministry of Education Project Aprende II´s “Beca Program," in combination with the RPS. The scholarship program will provide subsidies targeted to extremely poor children between the ages of 6 and 12. Each beneficiary family could benefit with up to three scholarships, provided that all their school-age children attend school. Children who are 6 years of age will receive benefits only if they attend preschool education. It has already been pointed out that the early enrollment of these children negatively affects the internal efficiency of the primary education system. Furthermore, to reduce the incentive to repeat in order to prolong the receipt of benefits, children who fail a grade will be excluded from the program. To target beneficiaries more effectively the Ministry will use the Government’s poverty map, which is based on the most recent empirical evidence from surveys on living standards. In addition, the MECD will establish clear mechanisms to select families in rural areas, and reduce the potential for exclusion or erroneous inclusion. According to the 2001 survey on living standards, approximately 75 per cent of the population in extreme poverty lives in rural areas and have an average of less than two years of education.

% Population Average years of education

Average number of ye ars of education by poverty level Extreme Poor Poor Non Poor Urban Rural Urban Rural Urban Rural 25 75 46 54 73 27 2.42 1.68 4.11 2.53 6.61 3.78

Moreover, survey figures indicate that more than 45,000 children in extreme poverty did not attend school, and that 46.1 % of them did not attend school for lack of money and 11.1 % because they were doing domestic and agricultural work. To those in extreme poverty one has to add another 40,000 children in poverty (but not extreme) who could also qualify for this assistance. Coverage. During the first three years of this program, about 60,000 children per year will receive the proposed scholarships. Assuming some errors in targeting of 15 % results in a program that would cover nearly 30,000 children in extreme poverty and nearly 25,000 in poverty (not extreme)20 . To implement the targeted distribution of these scholarships the MECD will coordinate with the Red de Protección Social (RPS), the Government’s social safety net in order to enhance their current health funding. The mechanism of implementation will be prepared by the MECD and may include the direct targeting of scholarships or the use of a contractor. Proposed Number of Scholarships per Year, 2003-05 2003 2004 2005 Extreme poor 28,000 29,400 30,870 Poor 23,000 24,150 25,358 Error 7,650 8,033 8,434 20

Errors in targeting may occur from errors in the selection procedure, or from deliberate attempts to include all children in poor communities. Past experience with the RPS indicates that by including all children in areas where the non-poor population is small considerably reduces social problems and helps increase the effectiveness of the program.

36

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports TOTAL

58,650

61,583

64,662

The proposed target of 60,000 scholarships will cover all children who cannot attend school because of economic hardship 21 . Targeting students via the RPS will be relatively simple, since the program will cover only those students who are not attending school for economic reason22 . Costs of Implementation and Targets The average amount to finance per student would be less than US$ 140 annually, which will cover the direct costs of schooling, plus the wages forgone by working children of poor families23 . Since the forgone wages are different as children become older, the level of compensation would also increase. This measure will stimulate school attendance throughout the entire primary level. The amount to be financed according to the age of the children is detailed below.

Age 7 8 9 10 11 12+

Proposed scholarship amounts Amount per child (US$/year) 90 90 90 120 130 140

To compensate schools for the added work involved in the local management and supervision of the program, the MECD will give each schools an annual transfer of US$ 15 per student enrolled in the scholarship program. To guarantee transparency, the MECD will impose administrative sanctions to any school director found manipulating school information to increase benefit capture. To this end, the MECD will employ a system of random audits throughout the year. The program will invest about US$ 8 million per year for the first three years. This amount will be reduced at approximately the same rate as poverty, ensuring that its overall objectives are not distorted, and guaranteeing the sustainability of school financing after the EFA initiative ends.

21

It must be remembered that 102,285 children 7-12 years of age do not attend school. About 52,000 cited economic reasons for their nonattendance. Assuming a reasonable targeting error, 60,000 scholarships should cover them all. 22 The RPS has already worked on developing short protocols in which key observable variables (such as access to potable water, or the mother’s years of education) can be used as proxy variables for poverty during the identification process. However, the MECD will work with the RPS to develop its own econometric estimates to reflect the specific requirements of the scholarship program. 23 Initial estimations indicate that working children older than 10 years have an opportunity cost of less than US$120 per year, and a direct cost of US$ 24 per year. Children under 10 years usually have child-care duties (taking care of younger siblings) which impose an indirect opportunity cost on families at times of peak labor demand. See: Arcia, Gustavo, 1999. “A Cost-Effective Method for Targeting Social Safety Net Benefits.” CAER II Discussion Paper No. 64, Harvard Institute for International Development, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports EFA-FTI Scholarship Program Costs: Total Costs until 2005 (US$ millions) 2002 0

EFA Scholarships

2003 7,855

2004 8,034

2005 8,217

Survey data indicates that extreme poverty is being reduced at a rate of 5 % per year. It is expected that the amount given in scholarships will be gradually reduced to approximately US$ 5 million in 2015. A more detailed listing of the program costs is presented in the Technical Annex. Other Implementation Issues. The MECD will revise the operational manual of its Becas APRENDE program and define the mechanisms for implementation in collaboration with the RPS. The scholarship holders shall comply with the eligibility criteria established by the MECD and shall fill in the application forms for funds that the MECD will provide to them at municipal delegations. Monetary transfer will be distributed every six months. The mother (primarily) or the family head will sign an agreement guaranteeing school attendance during the entire academic year and that their children will have free time to study and do their homework. In this same document, the scholarship holder will sign the agreement whereby he/she will attend school. The local School Council will sign an agreement with the MECD, whereby it will ensure promises that all beneficiaries will be admitted to school and that beneficiary children will receive the same quality of education as everyone else in school. In addition the school well inform the MECD and the parents on the child’s school performance. The School Council will keep a copy of both agreements and they will witness the monetary transfers to beneficiary families. The MECD will give participating schools additional funding to cover the additional costs implied by the increase in attendance. C. Evaluation and Monitoring EFA Interventions To evaluate progress in the implementation and effectiveness of EFA, the MECD will use regular yearly evaluations done by external consultants. In addition, regular monitoring will be done through existing instruments, such as the Educational Map. During 2001 the MECD implemented the first version of an Educational Map at the national level. The map contains a cartographic digital database of the entire country, with a digital record of 100% of all schools, infrastructure information, student registration, performance and teacher registration and, the capability to store and process all other available information. The Educational Map allows MECD staff to analyze education information from the micro to the national level. The Educational Map will be used to administer, monitor, and evaluate field information on the Beca Program and on the School Improvement Program. This information will be updated continuously, at the same rate as the programs are being implemented, since data for the MAP will come from participating schools.

38

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Enrollment Deficit 2001 RAAN

JINOTEGA

NUEVA SEGO VIA MADRIZ

ESTELI

MATAGALPA CHINA NDEG A LEO N BOACO

Children out of school

RAAS MASAYA MANA GUA

0-5000

CHONTALES

GRA NAD A CARAZO

5000-10000 RIVAS

10000-15000 RIO SAN JU AN

15000-20000

D. Summary of Outcomes and Financial Requirements of Nicaragua's EFA-FTI Program The main outcome of EFA is the improved education of all primary school-age children. This outcome embodies not only universal access to education, but also significant improvements in education quality.

39

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Primary School Enrollment with and without EFA 1,250,000 1,200,000 1,150,000

Students

1,100,000 1,050,000 1,000,000 950,000 900,000

With EFA

20 13 20 14 20 15

20 10 20 11 20 12

20 05 20 06 20 07 20 08 20 09

20 02 20 03 20 04

850,000

Without EFA

As a result, enrollment under EFA would most likely be lower than enrollment under current trends, because the gains in education quality will translate into gains in internal efficiency. Thus, it is expected that by 2015 Nicaragua would have a little more than 1 million students in primary school, which would be about 50,000 student less than under current trends. However, as seen in the graph below, the number of repeaters and dropouts would be substantially smaller under EFA. Under current trends, the number of repeaters and dropouts will exceed 100,000 and 45,000 respectively. Under EFA the number of repeaters would be less than half the above figures.

40

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Repetition and Dropouts with and without EFA 140,000 120,000 100,000 Repeaters with EFA

80,000

Repeaters without EFA Droputs with EFA

60,000

Dropouts without EFA

40,000 20,000

20 14

201 2

20 10

20 08

20 06

200 4

20 02

0

By 2015 the MECD would need a Primary School budget of about US$ 140 million, which would almost double the current budget. However, this is a reasonable projection in light of the rate of growth of the student population, and the increased cost requirements of the EFA initiative. Fortunately, if the MECD increases its Primary School budget by 5 % a year, it would reach the same target by the time the EFA initiative ends. MECD Financial Needs for Primary School with and without EFA (US$) 1,250,000 1,200,000 1,150,000 1,100,000 1,050,000

With EFA Without EFA

1,000,000 950,000 900,000 850,000

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

41

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

800,000

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports MECD projections indicate that the supply side of the EFA strategy, the Schooling Improvement Program (including the incremental costs associated with funding autonomous schools, would require approximately US$ 10 million in 2003, increasing to about US$ 17 million in 2004, and stabilizing at around US$ 24 million per until 2008. Beginning in 2009 the additional funds required to implement EFA begin to decline, since the MECD budget increases begin to catch up with its financing requirements, reaching a break-even point in 2014. It is assumed that the MECD will continue its efforts at expanding the budget for primary education. Otherwise, the EFA initiative would be unsustainable. These cost only refer to the provision of educational services and do not include the cost of scholarships. Under the assumption of an annual 5 % increase in the Primary School budget, the MECD would not need direct EFA assistance for operations by the year 2014. However, once the cost of the scholarships program is included, the break-even point changes to 2015. The demand side of the EFA strategy—the scholarship program—would require US$ 7.8 million in 2003, US$ 8 million in 2002 and in 2003, and stabilizing at around US$ 6 million per year after 2008. Beginning in 2009 the additional funds required to implement EFA begin to decline, since the MECD budget would begin to catch up with its financing requirements, reaching a break-even point in 2014.

Financing Requirements for EFA and MECD Budget Projections for Sustainability 160,000 140,000 120,000 '000s US$

100,000 80,000 60,000 40,000 20,000 0 -20,000

2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 Total Cost under EFA

MECD Budget Projections

MECD Financing Needs under EFA

Demand subsidies

Total EFA financing

The costs of the demand side scholarships peak at approximately US$ 8.2 million in 2005, and begin declining steadily until they reach a level of US$ 4.5 million per year in 2015. This decline is based on the assumption that with economic growth, and the poverty reduction trends from the past 10 years, it is reasonable to project a net reduction in the required funding for scholarships, since the number of poor people —and the extremely poor in particular—are also expected to decline.

42

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Adding the cost of the School Improvement Program with the Scholarship Program yields an approximate total cost US$ 17.9 million in 2003, increasing to US$ 25 million in 2004 and to US$ 32 million in 2005 and declining until the break-even point—indicating sustainability—in 2015. The total cost of the EFA initiative in Nicaragua is summarized below.

a. Projected Costs b. MECD Budget b.1 EFA Schooling Improvement Program— Investment Costs b.2 EFA Schooling Improvement Program – Annual Costs c. EFA Schooling Improvement Program—Total Costs (a-b) d. EFA Scholarships e. Total EFA financing (c+d) a. Projected Costs b. MECD Budget b.1 EFA Schooling Improvement Program— Investment Costs b.2 EFA Schooling Improvement Program – Annual Costs c. EFA Schooling Improvement Program—Total Costs (a-b) d. EFA Scholarships e. Total EFA financing (c+d)

Financial Requirements of EFA Strategy (‘000s US$) 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 82,041 92,084 103,192 114,293 118,498 82,041 82,041 86,144 90,451 94,973

2007 122,772 99,722

2008 126,257 104,708

0

1,932

1,932

1,932

5,207

5,207

5,207

0

8,111

15,117

21,910

18,318

17,844

16,342

0 0 0

10,043 7,855 17,898

17,049 8,034 25,083

23,842 8,217 32,060

23,525 7,846 31,370

23,050 7,474 30,524

21,549 7,102 28,652

2009 129,641 109,943

2010 133,000 115,441

2011 134,863 121,213

2012 136,788 127,273

2013 138,753 133,637

2014 140,737 140,319

2015 142,730 147,335

7,279

7,279

7,279

5,533

5,533

5,533

5,533

12,418

10,280

6,372

3,982

-416

-5,115

-10,137

19,697 6,730 26,428

17,559 6,359 23,918

13,651 5,987 19,638

9,514 5,615 15,130

5,116 5,243 10,360

418 4,872 5,290

-4,605 4,500 -105

The net result is that—for EFA to achieve its goals—both the MECD and the EFA initiative must work in tandem: the MECD by ensuring a steady increase in primary education funding—as well as the efficient implementation of EFA programs—and EFA by ensuring a firm commitment to education funding—even if it is tied to performance. E. Financing EFA Interventions through an EFA Trust Fund Based on the positive experience obtained in financial management from the Aprende Project, it is recommended that the funds needed to implement the EFA program be managed using a Financial Management Report. The MECD already has a system in use that has been working for more than three years, yielding satisfactory results.

43

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Creation and Management of an EFA-FTI Trust Fund. § § §

§ § § §

The donors will create a trust fund for financing the EFA initiative. Special Account. All deposits from donors would be deposited in a local Special Account to finance EFA programs and activities. Program Management Reports would be implemented as a means to request and withdraw funds from this EFA Special Account. These reports would contain detailed information about the physical and financial progress of EFA's activities, during the trimester, year to date, and cumulative from the beginning of the program, as well as the projected cash flow needed for the next six months of operation. The indicators for each of the sub-models would be tracked and linked to expenditures. By using the Project Management Reports, the EFA management unit will have the necessary administrative elements to manage the inflows and outflows of funds, and to report on these activities as well as current balances. All Program Management Reports would be submitted to a multidonor supervisory body (to be determined after EFA approval), which will be responsible to review and approve the reports, to allow future disbursements to occur. The Special Account will be opened in a commercial bank, to receive exclusively the funds withdrawn from de program. Funds deposited in the Special Account will be periodically transferred to a local currency account, from which all local payments will de made to finance the programs current activities. The EFA implementation unit will maintain separate accounting records, considering all the necessary elements to be audited as requested by the donors.

F. Proposal Risks and Mitigating Measures There are three main risks involved in the implementation of EFA FTI: Macroeconomic, Fiscal, and logistical. Macroeconomic risks refer to the potential for a lower than expected economic growth, which would exert undue financial pressure on parents, which would in turn reduce school enrollment. Since the model proposed here involves the implementation of demand-side financing, through scholarships targeted to the poor, the Government would expand this component as the problem unfolds. The idea behind this mitigating measure is that the temporary setback of an economic contraction should not stop human capital accumulation, since education is the key factor for future productivity. The advantage of the EFA FTI is that the Government would have already in place the mechanism to deal with this risk. Fiscal risk refers to the potential reductions in domestic education funding that may arise if revenues are lower than expected, or if other sectors in the budget (i.e.: internal debt payments) crowd out education funding allocations. To alleviate the negative impact of this risk the Ministry of Education will invoke the PRSP agreement with the IMF, in which HIPC funds and domestic resources are primarily allocated to education. This would help protect education spending by enrolling the support of donors and the IMF in the funding of primary education. Logistical risks refer to the problems that may arise from implementing the EFA strategy. To reduce this risk the MECD will incorporate the key implementation indicators of EFA into its management information system, allowing for the rapid detection of implementation problems.

44

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Nicaragua Education for All – Fast Track Initiative Country Proposal Technical Annexes November 21, 2002

Annex Page 1

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table of Contents: Technical Annexes TECHNICAL ANNEX 1: ESTIMATION OF EFA COSTS ...................................................3 TECHNICAL ANNEX 2: COSTS OF THE SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM.....11 TECHNICAL ANNEX 3: REQUIREMENTS FOR A MODEL SCHOOL ..........................14 TECHNICAL ANNEX 4: 2001 LIVING STANDARDS MEASUREMENT SURVEYSUMMARY..................................................................................................................................14 TECHNICAL ANNEX 5: SOCIAL POLICY UNDER CONSTRAINTS.............................31 TECHNICAL ANNEX 6: SCHOOLING IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM IN THE ATLANTIC COAST....................................................................................................................56 TECHNICAL ANNEX 7: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATION

PLAN 2001-2015 .......................................................................................................................61

Annex Page 2

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

TECHNICAL ANNEX 1: ESTIMATION

OF EFA COSTS

There are 5771 primary schools in the country. Of those, about 70% need to be improved to achieve the Fundamental Level in 2003 (Table A1). By 2015 all primary schools in the country would be at or above the Fundamental Level and 58% would be at or above the Satisfactory Level. Table A1. Indicators and Targets of the Schooling Improvement Fund Sub-Model Indicators Year Standards of School Improvement 2002 2005 2008 2015 Below fundamental level 70% 56% 37% 0% Fundamental level 19% 33% 41% 43% Satisfactory level or higher 10% 12% 21% 58% Total 100% 100% 100% 100% At least at fundamental level 30% 45% 62% 100% Superior levels (above Satisfactory) 2% 3% 5% 22%

Under this proposed schedule, more than 4,000 schools would have to be upgraded during the curse of the EFA initiative (Table A2). It is assumed that the number of schools would increase at a rate sufficient to ensure an average of 35 students per classroom. This student/classroom ratio would yield close to 8,000 schools by the year 2015. Funding for the implicit increase in the number of schools would also be funded by EFA. The projected number of schools will be sufficient to cover the enrollment projections under the EFA strategy. The enrollment projections will be presented in EFA Model section in this Annex. Table A2. Number of Schools Targeted under the Schooling Improvement Fund Sub-Model Indicators Year Standards of School Improvement 2002 2005 2008 2015 Below fundamental level 4,040 3,820 2,724 0 Fundamental level 1,206 2,292 3,018 3,474 Satisfactory level or higher 525 833 1620 4798 Total 5,771 6,945 7,362 8,272

The necessary enrollment projections, and the corresponding costs under the EFA strategy, were obtained with the aid of a simple projection model of student flows. This model can be summarized as follows:

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Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Structure of the EFA Projection Model The model begins by estimating the number of students entering the 1st grade, which is calculated as the rate of new entrants to the 1st grade relative to the number of 7 year olds in the country. i1,t = Pi,t /POP 7t

(1)

where i1,t represents the intake rate for the first grade in year t, P1,t represents the new entrants to the 1st grade in year t, y POP7,t is the 7 years of age cohort in year t. The repetition rate is estimated by: rg,t = Rg,t+1 /Eg,t

(2)

where r is the repetition rate, R is the number of repeaters, E is total enrollment, g is the grade and t is the year. The rate of promotion is calculated by: pg,t = Pg+1,t+1 /Eg,t

(3)

p is the promotion rate. As a result, the dropout rate dg,t is a residual estimated by: dg,t = 1- rg,t - pg,t

(4)

Enrollment projections are estimated by the standard student flow from one grade to the next. First grade enrollment is equal to the net entry plus repeaters: E1,t = i1,t *POP 7,t + r1,t -1 *E1,t -1

(5)

While enrollment in subsequent grades is estimated by: Ej,t = pj-1,t -1 *Ej-1,t -1 + rj,t -1 *Ej,t -1

(6).

Empirical and estimated data The initial transition rates required by the model are from MECD statistics, while the transition rates for subsequent years are extrapolated from the goals outlined in the EFA initiative. Table A3 presents the transition rates for selected years1 . This table shows that first grade enrollment is a lot higher than the number of 7 year olds in the country. This is due to the high proportion of 6 year olds enrolled in the first grade, which in turn increases the rate of repetition to 25% for the first grade2 . Following EFA goals, the numbers of students enrolled approach the size of the 7-year-old cohort by the year 2015.

1

The complete model is available on request. This rate is taken from the 2001 survey on living standards. Official MECD statitisc indicate a 15% rate of repetition for the 1st grade. However, this statistic hides a methodological issue in which many repeaters are classified as drop outs. 2

Annex Page 4

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Pop. 7 year olds 1st . grade enrollment 1st . grade repetition Apparent Intake Rate

Table A3. Summary EFA Model—Transition Rates for Selected Years 2002 2003 2004 2005 2007 154,634 156,668 158,711 160,743 174,933 231,304 230,281 229,257 228,234 226,187 58,057 54,745 51,433 48,121 41,497 1.1204 1.1204 1.1204 1.1205 1.0558

2010 189,098 223,117 31,561 1.0130

2015 213,663 218,000 15,000 0.9501

Repetition Rates 1st grade 2d grade 3rd grade 4th grade 5th grade 6th grade

2002 25.10% 14.30% 8.80% 9.30% 6.20% 4.00%

2003 23.63% 13.58% 8.35% 8.82% 5.95% 3.92%

2004 22.16% 12.87% 7.91% 8.33% 5.71% 3.85%

2005 20.69% 12.15% 7.46% 7.85% 5.46% 3.77%

2007 17.75% 10.72% 6.57% 6.88% 4.97% 3.62%

2010 13.35% 8.58% 5.23% 5.42% 4.23% 3.38%

2015 6.00% 5.00% 3.00% 3.00% 3.00% 3.00%

Promotion Rate 1st grade 2d grade 3rd grade 4th grade 5th grade 6th grade

2002 69.00% 82.00% 84.00% 86.00% 85.00% 87.00%

2003 70.85% 82.92% 84.85% 86.69% 85.77% 87.62%

2004 72.69% 83.85% 85.69% 87.38% 86.54% 88.23%

2005 74.54% 84.77% 86.54% 88.08% 87.31% 88.85%

2007 78.23% 86.62% 88.23% 89.46% 88.85% 90.08%

2010 83.77% 89.38% 90.77% 91.54% 91.15% 91.92%

2015 93.00% 94.00% 95.00% 95.00% 95.00% 95.00%

Drop Out Rate 1st grade 2d grade 3rd grade 4th grade 5th grade 6th grade

2002 5.90% 3.70% 7.20% 4.70% 8.80% 9.00%

2003 5.52% 3.49% 6.80% 4.49% 8.28% 8.46%

2004 5.15% 3.28% 6.40% 4.28% 7.75% 7.92%

2005 4.77% 3.08% 6.00% 4.08% 7.23% 7.38%

2007 4.02% 2.66% 5.20% 3.66% 6.18% 6.31%

2010 2.88% 2.04% 4.00% 3.04% 4.62% 4.69%

2015 1.00% 1.00% 2.00% 2.00% 2.00% 2.00%

Under the above assumptions, the enrollment projections are estimated for the period 2003-15. These projections—by grade—are shown in Tables A4 and A5. Currently the system enrolls about 900,000 students in primary schools. Given the assumed improvements in the transition rates—direct products of the EFA strategy—enrollment is expected to reach 1.1 million students by 2015. These students would be distributed in different types of schools, again, following the improvements envisioned by the EFA strategy. Current enrollment is distributed among centralized and autonomous schools, and subsidized private schools. The desired trend is for enrollment to increase in those schools considered as Model Schools, which would have the characteristics discussed in the School Improvement Program in the EFA proposal. Moreover, in rural areas the desired trend would be to enroll students in Multigrade Model schools, under

Annex Page 5

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports the rules of school autonomy. The differences in enrollment by type of school have direct implications for costs, since each type of school has different per student expenditures, with the Model schools investing more per students that other school types.

Table A4. Summary EFA Model—Population and Enrollment Projections for Selected Years 2002 2003 2004 2005 2007 2010 Population projection by age group 6 154,634 156,668 158,711 160,743 174,933 189,098 7 151,273 153,728 156,212 158,726 171,387 185,265 8 147,688 150,586 153,529 156,532 167,606 181,177 9 143,985 147,295 150,683 154,152 163,673 176,926 10 140,060 143,853 147,748 151,754 159,528 172,445 11 135,802 140,236 144,801 149,512 155,098 167,657 12 132,310 136,859 141,554 146,404 151,240 163,486 Enrollment 1st grade 2d grade 3rd grade 4th grade 5th grade 6th grade Total Projected distribution of enrollment by type of school Regular Centralized Regular Autonomous Centralized, Model School Autonomous, Model School Multigrade Centralized Multigrade Autonomous Multigrade Autonomous, Model School Subsidized Model School Subsidized Regular School Other Total

2002 231,304 176,011 156,321 131,383 109,875 99,593 904,487

2003 230,299 183,510 157,388 142,892 119,531 97,301 930,920

2004 229,446 186,774 164,618 145,441 130,698 106,263 963,241

2002 16.13% 38.29% 2.26% 5.07% 12.68% 14.55% 0.00% 0.08% 9.17% 1.76% 100.00%

2003 10.76% 33.86% 1.51% 11.72% 8.46% 9.70% 13.83% 1.72% 6.61% 1.84% 100.00%

2004 5.38% 29.43% 0.75% 18.36% 4.23% 4.85% 27.67% 3.36% 4.06% 1.92% 100.00%

2015 213,663 209,332 204,713 199,910 194,847 189,437 184,724

2005 2007 2010 2015 228,701 224,396 220,527 215,022 189,489 193,254 198,536 207,214 168,886 175,984 183,459 197,151 152,477 161,541 171,642 188,650 134,232 146,723 159,666 179,978 117,110 128,844 145,818 170,618 990,895 1,030,742 1,079,647 1,158,633

2005 0.00% 25.00% 0.00% 25.00% 0.00% 0.00% 41.50% 5.00% 1.50% 2.00% 100.00%

2007 2010 0.00% 0.00% 10.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 30.00% 35.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 50.00% 55.00% 5.00% 8.00% 3.00% 0.00% 2.00% 2.00% 100.00% 100.00%

2015 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 35.00% 0.00% 0.00% 55.00% 8.00% 0.00% 2.00% 100.00%

As a result of the desired trends in enrollment, it is expected that by the year 2015 enrollment will be concentrated in Model Autonomous Schools (mostly in urban areas) and in Model Multigrade Autonomous Schools (mostly in rural areas). As Table A4 shows, 55 % of the students would be in

Annex Page 6

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Model Multigrade Autonomous Schools, and 35 % in Model Autonomous Schools. The remaining students would be in subsidized private schools, which—while of limited coverage—yield significant financial savings to the MECD because of a significantly lower cost per student to the Government.

Table A5. Summary EFA Model—Enrollment Projections by Type of School for Selected Years Type of School 2002 2003 2004 2005 2007 2010 2015 Regular Centralized 145,932 100,131 51,804 0 0 0 0 Regular Autonomous 346,334 315,213 283,484 247,724 103,074 0 0 Centralized, Model School 20,471 14,046 7,267 0 0 0 0 Autonomous, Model School 45,884 109,060 176,828 247,724 309,222 377,877 405,522 Multigrade Centralized 114,724 78,718 40,725 0 0 0 0 Multigrade Autonomous 131,592 90,292 46,713 0 0 0 0 Multigrade Autonomous, Model School 0 128,777 266,497 411,221 515,371 593,806 637,248 Subsidized Model School 703 15,998 32,358 49,545 51,537 86,372 92,691 Subsidized Regular School 82,925 61,554 39,070 14,863 30,922 0 0 Other 15,923 17,132 18,496 19,818 20,615 21,593 23,173 Total 904,487 930,920 963,241 990,895 1,030,742 1,079,647 1,158,633

Given the above enrollment projections, the next step is to estimate the required funding. Using MECD data for 2002 the cost per student was calculated for each type of school. Fortunately, the experience with Model schools under USAID’s BASE project, as ell as information on infrastructure costs from the SIMCEP, allowed for an accurate estimate of per student cost (Table A6). Table A6. Summary EFA Model—Estimated Annual Cost per Student by Type of School (US$) Regular Centralized 85 Regular Autonomous 94 Centralized, Model School 130 Autonomous, Model School 121 Multigrade Centralized 85 Multigrade Autonomous 94 Multigrade Autonomous, Model School 130 Subsidized Model School 86 Subsidized Regular School 54 Other 123

Total expenditure estimates by type of school are shown in Table A7. The estimates show that by 2015 the MECD would need a Primary level budget of about US$ 140 million, which would almost double the current budget. However, this is a reasonable projection in light of the rate of growth of the student

Annex Page 7

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports population, and the increased cost requirements of the EFA initiative. Fortunately, as it will be seen later, if the MECD increases its Primary budget by 5 % a year, it would reach the same target by the time the EFA initiative ends.

Table A7. Summary EFA Model—Projected Costs by Type of School and Year (US$) 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 Regular Centralized 12,467,394 8,554,499 4,425,751 0 0 0 0 Regular Autonomous 32,656,324 29,721,948 26,730,109 23,358,235 16,679,907 9,719,015 6,588,082 Centralized, Model School 2,652,344 1,819,905 941,545 0 0 0 0 Autonomous, Model School 5,552,005 13,196,286 21,396,243 29,974,567 33,635,753 37,415,919 40,157,393 Multigrade Centralized 9,801,215 6,725,101 3,479,295 0 0 0 0 Multigrade Autonomous 12,407,992 8,513,740 4,404,665 0 0 0 0 Multigrade Autonomous, Model School 0 16,741,049 34,644,564 53,458,774 60,119,803 66,998,202 70,393,342 Subsidized Model School 60,434 1,375,468 2,782,086 4,259,833 4,345,584 4,431,134 5,406,598 Subsidized Regular School 4,485,233 3,329,299 2,113,191 803,930 1,230,169 1,672,516 1,133,723 Other 1,958,533 2,107,201 2,274,967 2,437,601 2,486,670 2,535,624 2,578,178 Total Cost for Primary 82,041,473 92,084,496103,192,417114,292,940118,497,886122,772,411126,257,316 Projected Costs by Type of School and Year (US$) 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 Regular Centralized 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Regular Autonomous 3,344,574 0 0 0 0 0 0 Centralized, Model School 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Autonomous, Model School 42,919,407 45,723,069 46,363,658 47,025,151 47,700,874 48,382,851 49,068,110 Multigrade Centralized 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Multigrade Autonomous 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Multigrade Autonomous, 73,778,815 77,194,792 78,276,306 79,393,112 80,533,943 81,685,333 82,842,264 Model School Subsidized Model School 6,404,463 7,426,206 7,530,249 7,637,687 7,747,436 7,858,200 7,969,498 Subsidized Regular School 575,558 0 0 0 0 0 0 Other 2,617,729 2,655,933 2,693,143 2,731,567 2,770,818 2,810,432 2,850,237 Total Cost for Primary 129,640,546133,000,000134,863,357136,787,518138,753,071140,736,817142,730,110

The model does indeed assume that the MECD will continue its efforts at expanding the budget for primary education. Otherwise, the EFA initiative would be unsustainable. Table A8 shows the direct financing needs of the MECD under the EFA initiative. These cost only refer to the provision of educational services and does not include the cost of scholarships. The complete cost package is presented in the next table. Under the assumption of an annual 5 % increase in the Primary school budget, the MECD would not need direct EFA assistance for operations by the year 2014. However, as will be seen later, once the cost of the scholarships program is included, the break-even point changes accordingly.

Annex Page 8

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports The results of the model projections indicate that the supply side of the EFA strategy would require US$ 10 million in 2003, increasing rapidly to US$ 18 million in 2004, and stabilizing at around US$ 24 million per until 2008. Beginning in 2009 the additional funds required to implement EFA begin to decline, since the MECD budget increases begin to catch up with its financing requirements, reaching a break-even point in 2014. Table A8. Summary EFA Model—MECD Direct Financing Needs under EFA Strategy under Current Expenditure Trends (in ‘000s US$) 2,002 2,003 2,004 2,005 2,006 2,007 2,008 Total Cost of Primary Education under EFA Strategy 82,041 92,084 103,192 114,293 118,498 122,772 126,257 Projected MECD funding 82,041 82,041 86,144 90,451 94,973 99,722 104,708 Financing Needs under EFA Strategy 0 10,043 17,049 23,842 23,525 23,050 21,549 MECD Direct Financing Needs under EFA Strategy under Current Expenditure Trends (in ‘000s US$) Total Cost of Primary Education under EFA Strategy Projected MECD funding Financing Needs under EFA Strategy

2,009

2,010

2,011

2,012

2,013

2,014

2,015

129,641 109,943

133,000 115,441

134,863 121,213

136,788 127,273

138,753 133,637

140,737 140,319

142,730 147,335

19,697

17,559

13,651

9,514

5,116

418

-4,605

The last cost estimation involved combining the direct cost of education under EFA—the supply side of the problem—with the demand assistance to poor families, to arrive at a total cost of EFA for Nicaragua. The total cost of the EFA strategy is presented in Table A9. Total EFA funding required for 2003 is approximately US$ 20 million, increasing to US$ 35 million in 2005 and declining until the break-even point—indicating sustainability—in 2015. Table 9 includes the funding allocated to the demand subsidies. These funds peak at approximately 10 million between 2003 and 2005, and begin declining steadily until they reach a level of US$ 6 million per year in 2015. This decline is based on the assumption that with economic growth, and the poverty reduction trends from the past 10 years, it is reasonable to project a net reduction in the required funding for scholarships, since the number of poor people —and the extremely poor in particular—are also expected to decline. The net result is that—for EFA to achieve its goals—both the MECD and the EFA initiative must work in tandem: the MECD by ensuring a steady increase in primary education funding—as well as the efficient implementation of EFA programs—and EFA by ensuring a firm commitment to education funding—even if it is tied to performance.

Annex Page 9

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table A9. Total Cost Requirements under the EFA Strategy (in ‘000s US$) 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 Cost Requirements for EFA 82,041 92,084 103,192 114,293 118,498 122,772 MECD Budget Projections 82,041 82,041 86,144 90,451 94,973 99,722 MECD Financing Needs under EFA Strategy 0 10,043 17,049 23,842 23,525 23,050 Demand subsidies 0 7,855 8,034 8,217 7,846 7,474 Total EFA financing 0 17,898 25,083 32,060 31,370 30,524 Total Cost Requirements under the EFA Strategy (in ‘000s US$) 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 Cost Requirements for EFA 129,641 133,000 134,863 136,788 138,753 140,737 MECD Budget Projections 109,943 115,441 121,213 127,273 133,637 140,319 MECD Financing Needs 19,697 17,559 13,651 9,514 5,116 418 under EFA Strategy Demand subsidies 6,730 6,359 5,987 5,615 5,243 4,872 Total EFA financing 26,428 23,918 19,638 15,130 10,360 5,290

Annex Page 10

2008 126,257 104,708 21,549 7,102 28,652 2015 142,730 147,335 -4,605 4,500 -105

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

TECHNICAL ANNEX 2: COSTS OF THE SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM Table A10. School Improvement Program Targets Number of Schools by Type Standards of School Improvement 2002 2005 2008 2011 2015 Below Fundamental level 4,040 3,820 2,724 1,092 0 Fundamental level 1,206 2,292 3,018 3,434 3,474 Satisfactory level 525 625 1,252 2,419 2,978 Superior levels or higher 0 208 368 858 1,820 Total 5,771 6,945 7,362 7,804 8,272 Periods of Time Number of years Percent requiring SIMCEP Total additional Fundamental Up to Fundamental needing SIMCEP Up to Fundamental w/o SIMCEP Additional from Fundamental to Satisfactorio Additional from Satisfactorio to Superior Total in multiyear period

2003-05 3 70% 220 165 55

2006-08 2008-11 3 3 50% 10% 1,096 1,631 548 163 548 1468

308 208 737

786 160 2042

1658 490 3780

2011-15 4 1,092 153 940 1520 961 3574

Table A11. Required funding for the School Improvement Program per 3-year Periods Cost per school US$ Below Fundamental level w/Simcep 14,000 14,000 14,000 14,000 Below Fundamental level w/o Simcep 5,000 5,000 5,000 5,000 Satisfactory level 5,000 5,000 5,000 5,000 Superior levels or higher 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 Total Amounts per 3-year Period 2003-05 2006-08 2009-11 2012-15 Below Fundamental level w/Simcep 2,311,932 7,671,580 2,283,933 2,141,291 Below Fundamental level w/o Simcep 275,230 2,739,850 7,341,214 4,697,729 Satisfactory level 1,542,072 3,930,938 8,289,417 7,600,645 Superior levels or higher 1,666,829 1,277,902 3,922,382 7,691,166 Total 5,796,063 15,620,269 21,836,946 22,130,830

Annex Page 11

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table A12. Required Annual Funding for School Improvement Program Total Amounts per Year 2,003 2,004 2,005 2,006 2,007 2,008 Below Fundamental level w/Simcep 770,644 770,644 770,644 2,557,193 2,557,193 2,557,193 Below Fundamental level 91,743 91,743 91,743 913,283 913,283 913,283 w/o Simcep Satisfactory level 514,024 514,024 514,024 1,310,313 1,310,313 1,310,313 Superior levels or higher 555,610 555,610 555,610 425,967 425,967 425,967 Total 1,932,021 1,932,021 1,932,021 5,206,756 5,206,756 5,206,756 Total Amounts per Year Below Fundamental level w/Simcep Below Fundamental level w/o Simcep Satisfactory level Superior levels or higher Total

2,010

2,011

2,012

2,013

2,014

761,311

761,311

535,323

535,323

535,323

2,447,071 2,763,139 1,307,461 7,278,982

2,447,071 2,763,139 1,307,461 7,278,982

1,174,432 1,900,161 1,922,791 5,532,708

1,174,432 1,900,161 1,922,791 5,532,708

1,174,432 1,900,161 1,922,791 5,532,708

Annex Page 12

2,009 761,311 2,447,071 2,763,139 1,307,461 7,278,982

2,015Total 535,323 14,408,735 1,174,432 1,900,161 1,922,791 5,532,708

15,054,023 21,363,072 14,558,278 65,384,109

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A13. MECD costs per activity and type of school, 2002 (US$) Admin Teacher Admin. Costs School lunch Materials Capital Inv. Scholarships Training Salaries Salaries Total Regular Centralized 220,675 1,466,338 1,044,130 1,715,746 193,105 347,432 498,577 7,361,439 12,626,767 Regular Autonomous 149,128 1,647,281 1,086,412 5,635,442 160,954 1,368,942 518,743 22,656,001 33,073,775 Centralized, Model School 30,955 205,688 333,611 240,674 27,087 776,577 69,403 1,033,149 2,686,190 Autonomous, Model School 19,757 218,242 471,938 746,618 21,3241,098,572 68,726 3,001,608 5,627,029 Multigrade Centralized 173,483 1,152,756 820,839 1,348,827 151,808 273,132 391,209 5,787,910 9,926,481 Multigrade Autonomous 56,662 625,896 412,790 2,141,224 61,155 520,139 197,100 8,608,300 12,566,603 Multigrade Autonomous, Model School 1,229 13,577 11,512 46,448 1,327 17,237 4,276 18,193 112,569 Subsidized Model School 422 0 8,137 1,909 0 18,941 1,991 30,240 61,217 Subsidized Regular School 49,728 0 366,356 225,181 0 149,174 234,890 3,566,961 4,542,563 Other 4,361 0 1,323 52,245 0 480 10,590 1,346,848 1,411,485 Total 706,399 5,329,779 4,557,048 12,154,314 616,760 4,570,624 1,995,505 53,410,649 82,634,680

SOURCE: DIRECTORATE OF FINANCE, MECD Table A14. MECD per student expenditures, per activity and type of school, 2002 (US$) Admin Admin. Costs School lunch Materials Capital Inv. Scholarships Training Salaries Regular Centralized 3 10 7 12 1 2 Regular Autonomous 1 5 3 16 0 4 Centralized, Model School 3 10 16 12 1 37 Autonomous, Model School 1 5 10 16 0 24 Multigrade Centralized 3 10 7 12 1 2 Multigrade Autonomous 1 5 3 16 0 4 Multigrade Autonomous, Model School 1 5 4 16 0 6 Subsidized Model School 3 0 11 3 0 27 Subsidized Regular School 3 0 4 3 0 2

Annex Page 13

Teacher Salaries 3 1 3 1 3 1 1 3 3

Total 50 65 50 65 50 65 6 42 42

85 94 130 121 85 94 39 86 54

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

TECHNICAL ANNEX 3: REQUIREMENTS FOR A MODEL SCHOOL The Model School program is a results-based educational quality intervention that depends principally on teacher training rather than commodity inputs. The per-school investment required to produce a Satisfactory- or Superior- level school (Technical Annex 2, “Costs of the School Improvement Program,”) using the Model School methodology will vary depending on each school’s baseline characteristics, so the cost projections shown in Annex 2 are necessarily projected averages. Table A14a below shows characteristics which should be measured formatively using a combination of quantitative and qualitative methodologies to track progress and to determine total investment requirements by school, in keeping with the School Improvement Program classification system. Table A14b shows illustrative commodity inputs for an appropriately equipped Model School (these also will vary according to each school’s start- up condition). Table A14a: Objective Criteria for use in Applying Model School Program Training and Commodity inputs, and Measuring Progress under the School Improvement Classification System 1. Learner-centered active-learning methodology clearly is the predominant pedagogical approach in every classroom. 2. A variety of student learning styles and paces are in evidence in every classroom. 3. Individualized, small- group, and peer-directed learning are in evidence in every classroom. 4. Teachers observably comprehend the ir roles and manage their classrooms as learning facilitators and learning-resource managers. 5. Active, productive, inclusive, and democratic student government is in evidence. 6. School and/or classroom libraries are present and in use. 7. Learning resources centers are present and in use in every classroom. 8. Hands-on learning projects are in evidence. 9. Most teachers are active participants in MIC’s (teacher quality circles). 10. Systematic and participatory curricular and pedagogical planning is in evidence involving participation by both teachers and community members. 11. Active, productive family and community participation is present in support of school quality. 12. The school autonomy program is active and viable in support of both school management and school qua lity. 13. Resource Centers are adequately equipped and supplied, and are conveniently available to and actively used by teachers. 14. Active participation by a broad base of experienced and capable teachers is taking place in developing learning materials and peer- in-service training materials. Annex Page 14

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports 15. Students self- instructional learning guides are present and in use in every classroom. 16. Teacher training Modules are available to all teachers and are used by teachers. 17. Locally developed academic content and learning materials are in use, appropriate to local cultural and other realities. 18. Teachers are trained in and carrying out qualitative continuous student assessment. 19. Flexible promotion is in place and functioning. 20. There is observable evidence of teacher and student sensitivity to and acceptance of ethnic, physical, and other personal differences.

Table 14b: Typical/Illustrative Training and Commodity Inputs for a Model School Workshops 4 Workshop with Department and Municipal Delegates 4 Five-day Workshops for teachers 2 Workshops for Parents 3 Workshops for Teacher Training Schools 4 Workshops with NERA Directors 4 Meetings in the Training Mini Centers (Minicentros de Intercapacitación) 1 Meeting with parent leaders 1 Meeting with successful leaders of successful Training Mini Centers 1 Meeting with outstanding studetns of Mathematics and Spanish 2 Meetings with parents from successful schools Field visits Rural Forum Documents 13 Interactive Modules for teacher training 10 information sheets for parents Information Bulletins Pedagogical Materials 1 Mathematics Learning kit Instructional games Pedagogical writing boards for each child School Libraries: 120 books, bookcases, tables, and chairs Sport Equipment Baseball and basketball

Annex Page 15

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

School Orchard Set of tools School Nutrition Kitchen equipment Non Salary Incentives Teacher’s briefcase with educational material Briefcases for parents Shirts and caps for teachers and parents School Projects Mini- financing of School Councils as an incentive for the improved implementation of academic and physical projects. Other: Materials for the preparation of pedagogical aids and First Aid Kit

Annex Page 16

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

TECHNICAL ANNEX 4: 2001 LIVING STANDARDS MEASUREMENT SURVEY-SUMMARY Table A15. Nicaragua 2001: Gross Enrollment Rates by gender Pre-school1

Primary 2

Secondary 3

Total

Male

Female

Total

Male

Female

Total

Male

Female

All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor

1.8 3.0 1.5

1.5 * *

2.1 * *

113.3 101.7 116.0

115.0 99.7 118.3

111.6 103.7 113.6

62.4 14.6 72.1

56.6 10.6 67.2

68.4 19.7 77.1

Poor Non-poor Urban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor

2.0 * * * *

2.4 * * * *

1.6 * * * *

112.6 114.1 115.1 101.7 116.4

112.5 117.8 118.1 102.1 119.7

112.6 110.4 112.0 101.2 113.0

34.3 88.1 83.2 26.8 87.6

30.0 83.4 79.3 19.7 84.2

39.2 92.5 87.1 34.6 90.9

Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor

* * 2.4 3.4 2.7

* * 2.6 * *

* * 2.1 * *

118.6 113.0 111.2 101.8 115.3

120.3 116.7 111.2 98.8 116.2

116.8 109.0 111.2 104.4 114.4

56.6 95.4 34.3 10.6 44.4

53.6 92.7 28.6 7.9 38.5

60.2 97.8 40.9 14.4 50.9

Poor 2.9 3.5 * 108.8 107.6 110.1 Non-poor * * * 117.2 120.6 113.9 Quintile Poorest 2.5 * * 107.9 107.2 108.5 II * * * 119.1 120.0 118.2 III * * * 113.3 118.0 108.7 IV * * * 118.5 122.6 114.5 Richest * * * 106.4 106.3 106.5 Zone Managua * * * 119.9 123.8 115.1 Pacific- Urban * * * 114.8 121.4 108.3 Pacific - Rural * * * 122.9 122.9 122.8 Pacific - Total * * * 118.7 122.1 115.3 Central - Urban * * * 106.9 102.3 111.0 Central - Rural 2.6 * * 103.9 106.0 101.9 Central - Total 3.0 * * 105.1 104.6 105.4 Atlantic- Urban * * * 117.8 118.0 117.4 Atlantic - Rural * * * 105.1 99.6 110.2 Atlantic - Total * * * 110.7 108.1 113.3 1 number in pre-school/ number of 4-6 yrs old (Number of observations=2) 2 number in elementary school/ number of 7-12 yrs old 3 number in secondary school/ number of 13-17 yrs old * n<10

20.7 65.6

15.6 58.4

26.6 74.1

18.9 45.5 61.9 91.4 103.9

13.8 43.7 51.8 88.8 106.4

25.0 47.7 72.7 93.8 101.7

84.9 84.8 48.2 67.2 80.4 23.6 46.5 72.2 18.2 42.3

86.7 77.0 40.0 59.2 77.5 17.0 39.6 57.8 17.2 36.2

83.3 92.9 56.6 75.4 83.4 32.4 54.7 89.0 19.2 48.8

Annex Page 17

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A16. Nicaragua: Net Enrollment Rates by gender Primary 2

Secondary 3

Total

Male

Female

Total

Male

Female

All Rural Urban

83.0 79.0 86.4

83.4 78.5 87.4

82.6 79.5 85.3

42.9 22.8 57.8

38.5 19.3 54.0

47.5 26.8 61.6

Poorest II III IV Richest

74.1 84.3 85.1 88.1 86.6

73.6 83.3 86.6 87.3 90.3

74.6 85.3 83.7 88.9 82.1

14.1 30.0 43.4 62.5 70.9

10.3 28.5 39.9 54.6 73.6

18.8 31.8 47.1 69.7 68.5

Managua Pacific- Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific - Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total

88.3 86.5 90.6 88.5 81.8 71.9 75.7 87.9 73.7 80.0

90.2 88.9 90.6 89.7 77.6 72.2 74.2 91.6 68.4 79.1

85.9 84.2 90.5 87.2 85.4 71.7 77.0 84.0 78.7 80.9

59.9 56.5 34.5 45.9 58.2 15.2 32.5 43.0 10.5 25.0

60.6 48.6 27.9 38.6 52.6 13.3 28.0 40.8 6.9 22.7

59.4 64.7 41.3 53.4 64.0 17.6 37.9 45.6 14.0 27.4

Total Extreme Poor 70.4 73.2 71.2 10.5 7.3 Not Extreme Poor 85.9 88.8 86.7 49.5 45.7 Poor 79.3 78.9 79.7 24.0 21.1 Non-poor 87.2 88.5 85.8 60.2 55.9 Urban Extreme Poor 72.2 67.0 72.1 19.9 11.3 Not Extreme Poor 87.8 83.2 82.9 60.8 57.5 Poor 84.5 84.7 84.4 39.9 38.6 Non-poor 87.5 89.1 85.9 66.0 62.0 Rural Extreme Poor 69.7 65.8 72.8 7.5 6.1 Not Extreme Poor 83.0 83.4 83.6 29.3 25.7 Poor 76.1 75.3 77.0 14.3 10.4 Non-poor 86.2 86.9 85.6 42.3 39.7 2 number 7-12 yr olds in elementary school/ number of 7-12 yrs old 3 number 13-17 yr olds in secondary school/ number of 13-17 yrs old * n<10

Annex Page 18

14.8 53.3 27.3 64.2 29.4 63.9 41.4 69.6 9.5 33.3 18.8 45.4

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A17. Nicaragua 2001: Reason for Not attending School by gender (7 - 12 year olds only) Extreme Poor Urban Rural

Total

Not Extreme Poor Urban Rural

Total

Poor Urban

Rural

Total

Non-poor Urban Rural

Total

Male Age Not interested Domestic Duties Work in fields No vacancy Level not offered Distance Insufficient Teachers Insufficient Security Family problems Monetary problems Other Female Age Not interested Domestic Duties Work in fields No vacancy Level not offered Distance Insufficient Teachers Insufficient Security Family problems Monetary problems Other

0.0 16.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 78.4 5.3

0.0 19.4 0.0 17.7 0.0 0.0 8.8 3.6 0.7 4.4 43.2 2.2

0.0 18.7 0.0 13.6 0.0 0.0 6.7 2.8 0.5 3.4 51.4 2.9

0.0 11.9 0.0 4.8 0.0 1.6 1.3 0.0 10.6 4.0 60.8 5.1

3.2 8.5 0.4 23.0 1.3 2.2 18.3 4.2 5.2 5.7 21.4 6.7

2.1 9.7 0.3 16.6 0.8 2.0 12.3 2.7 7.1 5.1 35.3 6.1

0.0 13.0 0.0 4.6 0.0 1.5 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.8 73.6 5.5

1.5 14.6 0.2 22.0 0.8 0.6 12.7 4.5 0.8 5.8 32.9 3.7

1.1 14.2 0.2 17.5 0.6 0.8 9.4 3.3 0.6 4.8 43.4 4.2

0.0 14.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.9 0.0 24.5 4.8 49.5 4.3

3.2 6.0 0.0 10.0 0.0 5.6 22.5 0.0 20.1 0.0 21.4 11.2

1.6 10.1 0.0 4.9 0.0 2.7 12.5 0.0 22.4 2.5 35.7 7.7

2.6 0.0 0.0 2.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 6.8 88.3 0.0

3.1 25.7 2.2 8.5 0.0 1.5 17.5 4.1 2.0 8.2 26.9 0.4

3.0 19.8 1.7 7.1 0.0 1.1 13.5 3.1 1.5 7.9 41.0 0.3

10.6 16.4 8.6 5.5 3.2 0.0 2.6 0.0 0.0 1.6 49.8 1.7

0.0 9.5 4.1 4.6 2.4 2.7 21.7 7.6 4.6 5.2 30.5 7.3

4.0 12.1 5.8 4.9 2.7 1.6 14.4 4.7 2.8 3.9 37.8 5.2

2.9 10.4 2.0 1.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 5.1 78.5 0.0

1.8 18.3 3.1 6.8 1.3 2.3 17.8 6.4 1.5 6.9 31.5 2.4

2.1 16.3 2.8 5.4 1.0 1.7 13.4 4.8 1.2 6.4 43.2 1.8

17.7 11.7 13.1 10.8 6.4 0.0 5.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 31.9 3.4

0.0 14.2 3.6 5.1 0.0 0.0 34.6 0.0 18.5 5.7 2.9 15.4

10.6 12.7 9.3 8.5 3.8 0.0 16.9 0.0 7.4 2.3 20.3 8.2

Annex Page 19

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A18. Nicaragua 2001: Percent Not Attending School

All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Urban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Quintile Poorest II III IV Richest Zone Managua Pacific - Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific - Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total

Percent not attending school 7 - 12 yrs 13 - 18 yrs 7 - 18 yrs 12.1 37.2 24.0 27.7 62.2 43.0 8.5 32.2 19.9 18.6 49.9 32.5 4.6 25.8 15.3 6.9 25.9 16.2 22.9 53.3 37.2 4.3 23.8 14.4 12.5 36.5 23.1 3.6 21.1 12.6 18.1 52.6 33.8 28.6 65.1 44.9 13.5 47.3 29.0 22.4 58.0 38.3 7.2 40.3 22.9 24.0 14.1 9.4 4.2 1.9

57.0 43.8 39.7 23.2 19.0

38.7 27.1 23.6 13.6 11.2

4.0 6.3 6.2 6.3 11.7 25.8 20.5 7.7 24.5 17.1

23.5 28.4 46.3 36.9 26.9 57.9 45.3 35.3 55.7 46.5

14.5 16.6 24.8 20.5 19.0 40.3 32.0 19.3 37.3 29.3

Source: 2001 LSMS data

Annex Page 21

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A19. Nicaragua 2001: Pre -school attendance of children 0-3 & 4-6 years old

All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Urban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Quintile Poorest II III IV Richest Zone Managua Pacific - Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific - Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total

0-3 years CICO/CDI 1.8 0.6 2.1 1.7 1.9 1.7 0.6 1.8 1.9 1.6 1.9 0.6 2.6 1.6 2.8

Pre-school 6.0 3.8 6.6 3.4 9.4 7.5 0.9 8.1 2.6 10.7 4.3 4.7 4.2 3.9 5.8

4-6 years CICO/CDI 2.3 1.4 2.5 2.2 2.4 2.9 0.7 3.1 3.5 2.5 1.6 1.6 1.7 1.5 2.2

Pre-school 28.8 22.1 30.5 24.3 34.9 32.4 18.9 33.8 26.6 36.6 24.9 23.2 25.7 22.9 30.7

School 27.9 17.6 30.6 24.0 33.2 32.4 18.7 33.8 28.9 35.0 23.0 17.3 25.9 21.0 28.8

1.3 1.8 2.8 1.9 1.2

3.2 3.3 4.8 8.9 14.9

1.5 2.8 2.1 3.1 2.2

21.1 27.1 29.6 33.4 43.2

19.3 29.6 28.1 35.0 34.3

1.3 1.9 0.6 1.2 2.8 3.2 3.1 1.6 0.0 0.6

8.3 5.6 5.1 5.3 8.8 4.9 6.3 6.6 1.2 3.3

2.7 1.5 1.3 1.4 6.1 2.4 3.6 1.2 0.5 0.8

33.0 37.7 29.2 32.3 28.5 24.7 25.9 29.2 16.4 22.2

34.3 33.5 30.6 32.0 31.3 20.0 23.7 27.8 14.4 20.5

Note: Using data from Section 4a Source: LSMS 2001

Annex Page 22

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A20. Nicaragua 2001: Primary school repetition rates, percent with no books and mean number of days absent Repetition (%) No books Days absent (%) All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Urban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Quintile Poorest II III IV Richest Zone Managua Pacific- Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific- Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total

8.2 6.5 8.5 9.4 6.8 7.5 8.9 7.4 10.4 5.6 9.0 5.6 10.3 8.7 9.6

11.3 16.9 10.1 14.4 7.7 9.4 12.9 9.2 13.0 7.2 13.5 18.3 11.6 15.4 9.0

4.4 4.1 4.4 4.2 4.6 4.5 4.6 4.5 4.4 4.6 4.2 4.0 4.3 4.1 4.5

9.4 9.3 7.7 7.9 4.9

19.6 9.4 9.9 8.3 6.0

4.3 4.2 4.2 4.5 4.9

7.8 10.1 11.2 10.7 5.1 7.2 6.4 7.4 5.9 6.6

6.4 9.8 5.3 7.6 9.6 16.5 13.9 18.1 24.4 21.4

5.5 3.7 4.0 3.9 4.2 4.0 4.0 5.0 5.5 5.3

Source: LSMS 2001

Annex Page 23

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A21. Nicaragua 2001: Secondary school repetition rates, percent with no books and mean number of days absent

All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Ur ban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Quintile Poorest II III IV Richest Zone Managua Pacific- Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific - Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total Source: LSMS 2001

Repetition (%)

No books (%)

Days absent

5.9 4.7 5.9 3.8 6.6 6.3 2.2 6.4 3.1 7.2 4.4 6.7 4.2 5.0 4.0

27.5 23.3 27.6 31.1 26.2 27.4 31.1 27.3 30.8 26.5 27.7 17.1 28.7 31.5 24.9

4.3 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.3 4.4 5.3 4.4 4.6 4.4 4.0 3.4 4.0 4.1 3.9

4.1 1.9 6.7 4.9 8.8

29.7 32.0 31.6 24.0 25.5

4.4 4.7 3.9 4.0 4.7

6.5 6.4 3.9 5.5 5.9 5.3 5.7 5.5 4.1 5.2

31.6 21.0 19.1 20.4 26.5 28.1 27.0 37.4 49.3 40.2

5.6 3.7 4.3 3.9 3.0 3.3 3.1 5.2 6.8 5.4

Annex Page 24

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A22. Nicaragua 2001: Percent Illiterate (10 years and older) and Average Years of Schooling (10-19 years old)

Illiterate (10 years and up) All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Urban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Quintile Poorest II III IV Richest Zone Managua Pacific- Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific- Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total

Means years of schooling (10-19 years old) Total Male Female

18.7 41.3 15.2 29.4 10.8 10.9 35.5 9.5 19.4 7.7 30.4 43.2 26.0 35.7 20.4

4.9 2.6 5.4 3.6 6.1 5.9 3.2 6.1 4.5 6.5 3.6 2.4 4.1 3.0 5.0

4.5 2.4 5.0 3.3 5.8 5.5 2.8 5.7 4.3 6.1 3.3 3.6 6.4 2.8 4.8

5.3 2.9 5.7 3.9 6.5 6.2 3.6 6.4 4.7 6.8 3.9 2.6 4.4 3.3 5.2

38.8 23.4 18.5 12.2 4.9

2.8 4.2 4.9 5.9 7.3

2.6 4.0 4.5 5.6 6.9

3.1 4.4 5.4 6.1 7.6

7.8 10.1 20.5 14.7 17.5 37.5 29.1 15.6 37.7 27.4

6.4 5.8 4.6 5.2 5.5 3.0 4.0 4.6 2.7 3.6

6.0 5.6 4.2 5.0 5.0 2.7 3.6 4.3 2.5 3.3

6.7 6.0 5.0 5.5 6.1 3.2 4.4 5.0 2.9 3.8

Source: LSMS 2001

Annex Page 25

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A23. Nicaragua 2001: Percent literate ( 15-24 years and 15 years and older) and ratio of Females to Males(literate and in school) Literate (15-24 years)

All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Urban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Quintile Poorest II III IV Richest Zone Managua Pacific- Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific- Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total

Literate (15 Ratio of Literate Ratio of Girls to Boys years and Females to Males in Primary and older) (15-24 years) Secondary education

86.4 65.6 89.8 76.1 94.3 93.9 74.6 94.8 88.0 96.0 75.7 63.3 80.2 69.1 88.9

77.7 51.1 81.5 64.5 86.7 86.4 54.7 88.0 75.0 90.3 64.1 50.0 68.6 57.9 74.9

104 87 106 91 112 110 101 110 85 120 93 83 96 96 89

101 114 100 101 101 98 99 98 94 101 106 120 102 108 104

67.2 81.5 88.0 94.7 98.1

53.6 70.9 77.1 84.6 93.8

92 95 95 109 122

109 95 104 105 94

96.1 95.1 86.1 91.0 89.3 68.4 76.8 86.9 68.3 76.6

89.3 87.3 73.2 81.1 79.7 57.3 67.0 79.3 57.6 67.9

110 97 97 97 126 98 110 100 82 90

87 98 108 102 116 106 111 102 118 110

Note: Literate is defined as those who can read and write Source: LSMS 2001

Annex Page 26

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Table A24. Nicaragua 1993: Percent literate ( 15-24 years and 15 years and older) and ratio of Females to Males(literate and in school) Literate (15-24 years)

All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Urban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Quintile Poorest II III IV Richest Zone Managua Pacific- Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific- Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total

Literate (15 Ratio of Literate Ratio of Girls to Boys years and Females to Males in Primary and older) (15-24 years) Secondary education

82.3 65.5 88.9 75.1 93.8 94.3 81.6 95.2 89.8 96.3 70.5 60.4 75.7 65.4 84.5

76.3 52.2 80.9 62.7 87.3 87.7 69.9 88.8 79.6 90.9 57.8 47.1 62.9 52.0 72.5

109 96 112 105 113 112 92 113 107 114 105 97 108 103 109

98 111 96 103 94 97 108 96 96 97 100 110 96 109 82

66.2 77.1 88.3 93.0 96.8

52.8 65.6 77.8 85.0 91.7

95 114 107 107 121

111 100 99 98 87

92.2 94.6 84.4 90.5 92.7 61.2 73.7 94.5 56.6 75.8

86.1 88.4 68.3 81.1 84.2 48.8 62.9 85.7 48.6 67.4

105 108 106 108 109 111 110 167 99 137

92 96 100 97 108 103 105 106 95 101

Source: LSMS 1993

Annex Page 27

Republic of Nicaragua Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports Tabl e A25. Nicaragua 1998: Percent literate ( 15-24 years and 15 years and older) and ratio of Females to Males(literate and in school) Literate (15-24 years)

All Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Urban Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Rural Extreme Poor Not Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Quintile Poorest II III IV Richest Zone Managua Pacific- Urban Pacific - Rural Pacific- Total Central - Urban Central - Rural Central - Total Atlantic- Urban Atlantic - Rural Atlantic - Total

Literate (15 Ratio of Literate years and Females to Males older) (15-24 years)

Ratio of Girls to Boys in Primary and Secondary education

85.6 65.0 89.4 76.0 93.7 94.2 81.2 96.1 88.2 97.9 75.4 63.9 81.7 72.5 86.2

77.3 55.5 80.9 64.5 86.6 87.2 67.5 90.1 77.7 92.6 64.5 56.8 71.4 62.3 77.4

109 91 112 104 113 115 101 116 105 119 101 88 105 103 97

108 92 111 101 115 110 101 111 96 117 106 89 112 105 108

68.0 79.5 90.5 90.4 97.1

57.3 66.8 78.3 84.4 91.5

93 115 103 113 118

96 106 107 104 127

96.2 93.3 86.9 90.2 92.3 65.8 74.9 88.1 64.2 76.4

88.9 86.9 73.0 80.5 84.4 56.3 66.4 78.0 54.8 66.7

112 110 111 110 127 94 107 102 106 104

110 103 111 106 130 98 110 114 93 106

Note: Literate is defined as those who can read/write Source: LSMS 1998

Annex Page 28

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table A12. Nicaragua: Gross Enrollment Rates 1993 Primary Total Male

Female

Secondary Total Male Female

1998 Total

Primary Male Female

Secondary Total Male Female

All 118.1 115.4 121 21.6 22 21.3 107.3 106.9 107.6 57 49.9 63.7 Extreme 75.9 72.7 79.1 4 2.7 5.5 89.1 87.3 91.1 11.3 8.6 14.8 Poor Poor 97.3 93.9 100.9 12.4 11.6 13.2 102.3 101.7 103 26.4 21.9 31.3 Non-poor 144.9 142.6 147.5 31.8 34.3 29.5 113.1 113.3 112.9 86.6 81.5 90.9 Urban 138.6 136.1 141.3 30.3 31.3 29.3 113.1 112.4 113.8 79.4 73.5 84.6 Extreme 90.5 89.9 91.1 10.3 na na 95.6 94.3 96.9 21.5 17.8 26.1 Poor Poor 122.6 119.8 125.8 21.5 19.8 23.4 110.1 106.7 113.7 44.3 45.1 43.5 Non-poor 147.7 145.6 149.9 34.9 38 32.1 114.8 115.8 113.9 94.7 87.7 100.5 Rural 93.4 90.2 96.7 9.7 9.9 9.5 100.9 101 100.9 30 23.7 36.5 Extreme 71.9 68.3 75.6 2.2 na 3.7 86.9 85.2 89.1 8 5.7 11 Poor Poor 83.5 79.1 88 6.7 6.6 6.8 98.3 99 97.6 17.2 10.5 24.8 Non-poor 134.1 131.6 137.2 19.7 21 18.3 108.5 106.8 110.2 62.6 63.1 62.2

Annex Page 29

2001 Total

Primary Male Female

Secondary Total Male Female

113.3 101.7

115.0 99.7

111.6 103.7

62.4 14.6

56.6 10.6

68.4 19.7

112.6 114.1 115.1 101.7

112.5 117.8 118.1 102.1

112.6 110.4 112.0 101.2

34.3 88.1 83.2 26.8

30.0 83.4 79.3 19.7

39.2 92.5 87.1 34.6

118.6 113.0 111.2 101.8

120.3 116.7 111.2 98.8

116.8 109.0 111.2 104.4

56.6 95.4 34.3 10.6

53.6 92.7 28.6 7.9

60.2 97.8 40.9 14.4

108.8 117.2

107.6 120.6

110.1 113.9

20.7 65.6

15.6 58.4

26.6 74.1

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table A13. Nicaragua: Net Enrollment Rates 1993 Total

Primary Male Female

Total

1998 Secondary Male Female

Total

Primary Male Female

Total

2001 Secondary Male Female

All 75.6 74.4 76.8 15.5 15.8 15.2 79.6 77.9 81.4 36.8 31 42.3 Extreme Poor 55.3 51.7 58.8 3.6 2.5 4.9 65.1 62.7 67.9 8.1 5.8 11.1 Poor 66.6 64 69.4 9.4 8.7 10.2 75.6 73.5 77.8 18.8 14.5 23.6 Non-poor 87.2 87.7 86.6 22.2 24.4 20.2 84.4 83.2 85.5 54.3 49.6 58.1 Urban 84 84.3 83.6 21.5 22.5 20.6 84.1 82.9 85.3 53.1 49.1 56.7 Extreme Poor 64.7 63.9 65.5 9.9 na na 68.1 65.9 70.5 15.1 13 17.7 Poor 77.8 77.9 77.8 16 14.7 17.5 80.4 79 81.9 30.8 29.6 32.1 Non-poor 87.5 88.1 86.8 24.4 27.1 22 86.2 85.2 87.1 62.8 58.7 66.1 Rural 65.5 62.4 68.7 7.2 7.2 7.1 74.8 72.5 77.2 17.2 11 23.7 Extreme Poor 52.7 48.7 56.9 1.8 na 2.9 64.1 61.7 66.9 5.9 3.5 8.9 Poor 60.5 56 65 5.4 5.1 5.7 73.1 70.5 75.7 12.8 7.2 19.1 Non-poor 86 86.2 85.8 13.3 14.5 12 79.7 78.1 81.4 28.8 22.4 34

Annex Page 30

Total 83.0 70.4 79.3 87.2 86.4 72.2 84.5 87.5 79.0 69.7 76.1 86.2

Primary Male Female 83.4 73.2 78.9 88.5 87.4 67.0 84.7 89.1 78.5 65.8 75.3 86.9

82.6 71.2 79.7 85.8 85.3 72.1 84.4 85.9 79.5 72.8 77.0 85.6

Total 42.9 10.5 24.0 60.2 57.8 19.9 39.9 66.0 22.8 7.5 14.3 42.3

Secondary Male Female 38.5 7.3 21.1 55.9 54.0 11.3 38.6 62.0 19.3 6.1 10.4 39.7

47.5 14.8 27.3 64.2 61.6 29.4 41.4 69.6 26.8 9.5 18.8 45.4

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

TECHNICAL ANNEX 5: SOCIAL POLICY UNDER CONSTRAINTS Improving Human Capital under Fiscal Constraints: Primary Education in Nicaragua Evidence from the 1993, 1998 and 2001 Surveys on Living Standards 1. Introduction Primary education is one of the success stories of Nicaragua’s social policy. Despite significant fiscal constraints Nicaragua has been able to improve its educational performance, as evidenced by three surveys on living standards. This paper reports the main advances in education during the last decade, and lays out the main challenges for the near future. As such, it is based on data from the 1993, 1998 and 2001 Living Standards Measurement Surveys (LSMS), and data from the Ministry of Education (Ministerio de Educación, Cultura y Deportes—MECD) and other sources. The purpose of the paper is to identify key education issues that need to be addressed by the Government and donors, in order to reach the Millennium Development Goals set out for 2015. The paper is organized as follows: Section 2 presents an summary of the problems affecting the education sector, particularly public education, and the actions taken by the Government to address such problems. Section 3 presents the empirical evidence from the 1993, 1998 and 2001 LSMS on educational outcomes and their association with the different poverty levels. This section reviews key educational indicators such as enrollment, repetition, and dropout rates by poverty level, the private costs of public education and the impact of these costs on family expenditures at different levels of poverty. Section 4 reviews Government expenditures in primary education, including an analysis of per student expenditures. Section 5 presents the main conclusions and recommendations. 2. Overview of the Education Sector The education sector of Nicaragua is characterized by the following issues: (i) Inadequate school coverage, especially in poor rural areas, where almost one-third of extremely poor children between 7-12 years of age do not attend elementary school. Less than 30% of preschool-age children attend preschool. Although primary school coverage from grades 1 to 3 is 92%, this rate drops to less than 50% by grade 6. In rural areas a large proportion of primary schools do not go beyond the fourth grade; (ii) Low Teacher Quality. The system of teacher training and retention needs a major reform. Poor teaching quality stems from the poor quality of pre-service teacher training, the high incidence of non-accredited teachers in the system, and the low rates of retention of good teachers. The sector has problems in attracting and retaining good teachers, due mainly to low salaries, but the absence of a good system of teacher accountability makes salaries a weak instrument for improving teaching quality. (iii) Weak administrative efficiency at the central level. There is a weak connection between school autonomy and a centralized MECD, which acts as a centralized ministry outside of the financial autonomy program. (iv) Low Managerial Capacity at the central and local levels. Despite progress in budget planning and in the financial management of fiscal

Annex Page 31

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

transfers to autonomous schools, the managerial performance of MECD’s Program Directors remains low because of lack of training, deficient managerial information in the system, inadequate statistics, and unclear roles and responsibilities. Also, most school directors lack managerial and human resource management skills. (v) Weak Planning, Research, Evaluation, and Statistical Capacity due to lack of technical personnel. (vi) No feedback mechanisms of policy impact on decision making at the central and local levels and low capacity for communicating system performance to decision makers and parents in ways that promote accountability and participation. 2.1 Addressing the Problems of Public Education: The Government’s Goals and Strategies The above problems are known to the Government, which has defined two main goals in education: to increase the coverage of basic education and to improve education quality. To achieve these goals the MECD has defined a strategy that combines the following components: Expansion and consolidation of school autonomy. The objectives of school autonomy are: (i) to increase community participation in school management; (ii) increase local efficiency in resource use, and (iii) increase local accountability. Autonomous schools receive a fiscal transfer that is administered by a local school council in which parents are a majority. This transfer is based on a formula that takes into account the number of students, the location of the school, and the school record for repetition and dropouts. The Government believes that school autonomy will lead to steady improvements in educational performance due to better local accountability and more parental support of learning activities. All secondary school students, and 80 percent of primary school students, are covered by school autonomy. The success of school autonomy has been mixed. Overall, internal efficiency in autonomous schools is better than in centralized schools. Still, there are complaints about the lack of understanding of the rules of autonomy among parents and teachers. Schools with good leadership on part of the school director have shown the most gains in internal efficiency34 . Although secondary schools require a monthly fee from parents, primary school families are asked fees on a voluntary basis. Even this voluntary fee is expected to be waived in the near future, because of the opposition of parents. Rehabilitation and replacement of school infrastructure. In collaboration with the Social Investment Fund (FISE), the MECD has expanded the quality of primary school infrastructure in rural areas. Schools due for rehabilitation are selected with the help of a poverty map based on the 1998 LSMS, but this system is in the process of change, with the MECD assuming more control 3

Fuller, Bruce, and Magdalena Rivarola, 1998. “Nicaragua’s Experiment to Decentralize Schools: Views of Parents, Teachers, and Directors.” Paper No. 5, Working Paper Series on Impact Evaluation of Education Reforms. Development Economics Research Group, The World Bank, Washington DC. 4 King, Elizabeth, Laura Rawlings, Berk Özler, Patricia Callejas, Nora Gordon, and Nora Mayorga de Caldera, 1996. “Nicaragua’s School Autonomy Reform: A First Look.” Paper No. 1, Working Paper Series on Impact Evaluation of Education Reforms. Policy Research Department, The World Bank, Washington D.C. King, Elizabeth, and Berk Özler, 1998. What’s Decentralization Got To Do With Learning? The Case of Nicaragua’s School Autonomy Reform. Paper No. 9, Working Paper Series on Impact Evaluation of Education Reforms. Development Research Group, The World Bank, Washington DC.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

over the choice of schools. Little funding has been earmarked for the rehabilitation and replacement of secondary schools, although recently FISE has given a significant grant to the city of Managua for this purpose. Modernization of central administration and planning. The MECD is in the process of modernizing central administration and planning through two mechanisms: (i) a system for measuring and reporting student achievement, and (ii) an Integrated Management Information System containing education statistics, administrative and budgetary information, and information on student achievement. Achievement testing on a regular basis is now in the process of implementation. Expansion of preschool coverage. The MECD is expanding preschool access through community preschools, hoping to cover close to 30% of preschool age-children by 2001. The community preschools system includes the training of mothers as preschool caregivers, nutritional assistance, and preventive health care. Although preschool enrollment declined during 2000 and 2001, this decline has reversed slightly in 2002. Curricular reform. The MECD has modified its primary school curriculum to make it less encyclopedic and more oriented to basic math, reading, and writing skills. It has also expanded the provision of textbooks and school materials with external funds. However, textbooks are still lacking in more isolated areas. The Ministry is revising the curriculum and teaching methods in teacher training schools, and improving in-service training. Now the MECD is plannin g to revise the curriculum to include learning elements more pertinent to the real life of students, with the aim of improving the link between formal education and real life problems. So far, the Government’s strategy has increased the supply of schools in rural areas, increased the participation of parents in school affairs, and improved per student expenditures. Although other elements of the strategy are in progress and/or their effects will be felt in a few years, a remaining concern now is education quality. MECD and parents recognize that teacher quality, the quality of the classroom environment, and the quality of teaching must improve.

The National Education Plan. The MECD has prepared a long term plan for public education which reflects the views of most stakeholders in the sector and discusses some new areas which had not been covered in previous strategic efforts. The Plan, as it is informally known, emphasizes eight basic principles, which are then translated into strategic objectives. These principles and strategic objectives are presented in Box 1. The Plan is ambitious but it follows the trends in education reform in the rest of Central America and the Caribbean. The MECD was extremely successful in generating a consensus among a diverse group of stakeholders with different—and sometimes conflicting—interests. Close to 3,000 people had an opportunity to give an opinion on the Plan. In part, this success was due to the inclusive nature of the dialogue, in which everyone’s voice was reflected in the interim documents. Another part of the success was due to the generation of discussion without a budget constraint, which in turn resulted in the support of all stakeholders at the Plan’s presentation. The MECD now has begun the second phase of the Plan: setting priorities to configure them to the constraints of the education budget.

Annex Page 33

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Box 1. Principles, Policies and Strategies of the National Education Strategy Principles 1. Education is an obligation of the State and a fundamental human right. This implies universal access and opportunity to all.

Policies The State will promote the demand for education and it will diversify educational services to fulfill demand needs.

2. Education fosters social, environmental, ethical, civic, human, and cultural values that shape national identity and respect of religious, political, ethnic, cultural, psychological, and gender diversity. 3. Education is a fundamental investment for achieving human, economic, scientific, and technological development

The State, in collaboration with civil society, must find the resources to guarantee an integral education leading to human development. Orient education programs toward human capital formation and increase the availability and equity of resources assigned to them.

Strategies 1. Expand and maintain literacy programs and projects. 2. Expand education coverage, especially in rural areas, all the way to sixth grade. 3. Improve the quality and relevance of education. 1. Reinforce the formation of values and the participation of families and the community. 2. Transform schools into centers for the practice of democracy. 1. 2.

3. 4. 4. Parents and civil society have the right and obligation to participate in the education process of their children.

Create favorable conditions for the participation of parents and society in education.

1.

2.

Annex Page 34

Strengthen and expand technical and vocational education. Reform the secondary school curriculum to relate it to the job market and to tertiary education. Reform tertiary education. Promote awareness of the need to fund education at a level of 6% of GDP Strengthen parent’s councils, student government, and local organizations to foster their involvement in education. Consolidate academic and administrative decentralization and school autonomy.

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

5. Teachers are key factors in the education process; they have a right to working and living conditions in accord with their role.

The State and civil society will promote teacher’s well being, raise their professional standards, salary, and working and living conditions.

6. Students are in control of their own learning.

Organize curricula, learning methods, teaching materials and forms of evaluation to better assist students in their learning process.

7. Education is an integrating process; all education subsystems should be linked to form a unique national system.

Promote the development of an integrated system with curricular and operational links among the subsystems. Promote the creation of organizational structures that link all the participatory processes in the development of education policy and accountability.

8. Education must function under a system of administration and management that is coordinated, decentralized, participative, efficient, and transparent.

1.

Update teacher’s skills with in-service training at Normal Schools and Schools of Education. 2. Reform the Ley de Carrera Docente (Teaching Career Law) to improve teacher’s welfare. 3. Implement projects that increase monetary incentives to teachers. 1. Improve and expand school infrastructure to make it more conducive to learning. 2. Reform curricula to allow for more student involvement in the learning process. 3. Implement educational standards that promote education quality and equity. 4. Implement a national system for the measurement and evaluation of academic achievement. 5. Implement an information system to assist student in the evaluation of their aptitudes for work. 6. Provision of textbooks and school materials to all primary students in public schools. 1. Create a commission for the planning and evaluation of curricula in the three educational subsy stems. 1. 2.

Modernize the entire education system. Develop an Information System that ensures an efficient administration and management.

Source: Consejo Nacional de Educación, 1999. “Estrategia Nacional de Educación.” Managua

Annex Page 35

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

3. Education and Poverty: A Review of Sector Performance, 1993-2001 The results of the 1998 and 2001surveys on living standards show that some key outcome indicators related to human capital accumulation have improved substantially since 1993 (Table 1). Despite a significant decline on preschool attendance, the system has shown significant gains in performance5 . Below is a summary of the most important changes in educational outcomes since 1993: §

Literacy increased. The proportion of illiterate people continues to decline. Overall, about 18.7% of the population older than 10 years of age was illiterate in 2001, a figure 2.8 percentage points lower than in 1993. The biggest gains were found among the rural poor, who show a reduction of 6.5 percentage points since 1993.

§

Preschool attendance decreased. The proportion of 4-6 year olds attending preschool is higher than in 1993, but substantially lower than in 1998. Part of the reason is that about one-half of 6year old children attending school enter first grade instead of a preschool program. However, there is still reason to worry for the overall decline in preschool enrollment within this age group. The largest drop in preschool enrollment was found among the non-poor.

§

Primary school attendance increased. The proportion of children 7-12 years of age who attend school increased significantly. As a result, the proportion of children not attending dropped considerably, especially in rural areas, with the biggest gain in primary school attendance found among the poor. This is perhaps the most improved indicator of success in school coverage during the last eight years.

§

Net Enrollment Rates improved. The net enrollment rate—defined as the percent of children of appropriate age enrolle d in primary school—increased a small amount. Between 1993 and 1998 the net enrollment rate remained constant, but improved significantly between 1998 and 2001. The net enrollment rate for boys increased almost three times the girls’ rate during this period.

§

The Gross Enrollment rate showed substantial improvement. Consistent with the figures on school attendance, the gross enrollment rate increased dramatically, gaining 33.7 percentage points since 1993. Most importantly, the gains were distributed among all poverty groups and in both urban and rural areas.

§

School attendance increased dramatically among teenagers. Between 1998 and 2001, the proportion of children between 13-18 not in school dropped significantly across all poverty

§

groups. However, rural areas showed the most dramatic improvements, since the proportion of children 13-18 not attending secondary school dropped by more than 45 percentage points since

5

Table 1 figures highlighted in bold italics indicate areas of significant change.

Annex Page 36

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

1993. This finding is consistent with the large increase in the gross enrollment rate for primary school reported above, since the problem of overage still persists in Nicaragua. §

§

Girls education improved. Overall, the mean years of schooling increased for girls, but not for boys. However, in rural areas the mean years of schooling increased among girls and boys by about 1 year. Moreover, among extremely poor boys in rural areas there was a gain of 2.1 years, which is very significant. Still, girls showed a steady increase in schooling among all poverty groups. School access improved in rural areas. The distance to school dropped slightly in rural areas, although the time required to get to school remained more or less the same. Nonetheless, the average time spent on the way to school is less than 30 minutes across all groups.

Tabl e 1. Comparison of key educational indicators, 1993 and 1998 Group

Illiterate % 4-6 % Not Net Net Gross % Not Mean Mean Mean Distance Distance (10 or attendin attendin Enrollmen Enrollmen Enrollmen attendin Years Years Years Primary Primary more) g pre- g 7-12 t Primary t Primary t Primary g 13-18 School School Schooling (kms) (mins) years school Boys Girls ing ing Female Total Male

All Nicaragua 81.4 79.6 81.4 107.3 82.6 113.3 1.2 33.7 Extreme Poor

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

21.5 18.8 18.7 -2.8

31.3 44.8 28.8 -2.5

21.5 14.3 12.1 -9.4

77.9 77.9 83.4 5.5

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

44.5 37.6 41.3 -3.2

8.3 25.4 22.1 13.8

44.7 32.4 27.7 -17.0

62.7 73.2 10.5

67.9 89.1 71.2 101.7 3.3 12.6 Poor

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

33.8 29.6 29.4 -4.4

17.4 33.8 24.3 6.9

32.3 21.3 18.6 -13.7

73.5 78.9 5.4

77.8 102.3 79.7 112.6 1.9 10.3 Non-Poor

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

10.6 10.4 10.8 0.2

50.9 60.3 34.9 -16.0

7.4 6.1 4.6 -2.8

83.2 88.5 0.3

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

10.6 10.2 10.9 0.3

48.5 57.1 32.4 -16.1

11.3 9.0 6.9 -4.4

82.9 82.9 87.4 1.5

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

29.0 28.4 35.5 6.5

20.2 32.3 18.9 -1.3

35.3 28.5 22.9 -12.4

65.9 65.9 67.0 1.1

1993 1998

17.8 19.6

31.7 43.8

19.9 15.9

79.0 79.0

85.5 113.1 85.8 114.1 0.3 1.0 Urban (All) 85.3 84.1 85.3 113.1 85.3 115.1 0 31.0 Urban Extreme Poor 70.5 68.1 70.5 95.6 72.1 101.7 2.1 33.6 Urban Poor 81.9 80.4 81.9 110.1

Annex Page 37

43.0 43.5 37.2 -5.8

4.5 4.9 4.9 0.4

4.5 4.7 4.5 0.0

4.6 5.0 5.3 0.7

0.9 0.9 0.0

16.1 15.1 -1.0

71.8 70.0 62.2 -9.6

1.9 2.3 2.6 0.7

1.8 2.2 2.4 0.6

2.0 2.3 2.9 0.9

1.7 1.5 -0.2

25.7 23.8 -1.9

57.6 60.7 49.9 -7.7

2.8 3.1 3.6 0.8

2.7 3.0 3.3 0.6

2.9 3.2 3.9 1.0

1.3 1.3 0

21.7 19.9 -1.8

26.9 26.7 25.8 -1.1

6.1 6.2 6.1 0

6.1 6.2 5.8 -0.3

6.0 6.3 6.5 -0.5

0.6 0.7 0.1

12.7 12.4 -0.3

26.6 28.1 25.9 -0.7

5.9 6.2 5.9 0

5.9 6.2 5.5 -0.4

5.8 6.1 6.2 0.4

0.4 0.6 0.2

8.9 10.1 1.2

57.7 61.7 53.3 -4.4

3.0 3.0 3.2 0.2

3.0 3.1 2.8 -0.2

3.0 3.0 3.6 0.6

0.6 1.0 0.4

11.4 17.2 5.8

37.6 48.5

4.1 4.0

4.1 4.1

4.1 4.0

0.4

9.7

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Tabl e 1. Comparison of key educational indicators, 1993 and 1998 Group

Illiterate % 4-6 % Not Net Net Gross % Not Mean Mean Mean Distance Distance (10 or attendin attendin Enrollmen Enrollmen Enrollmen attendin Years Years Years Primary Primary more) g pre- g 7-12 t Primary t Primary t Primary g 13-18 School School Schooling (kms) (mins) years school Boys Girls ing ing Female Total Male

2001 Difference 93-01

19.4 1.6

26.6 -5.1

12.5 -7.4

84.7 5.7

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

7.5 6.7 7.7 0.2

59.1 66.2 36.6 -22.5

6.3 5.1 3.6 -2.7

85.2 85.2 89.1 3.9

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

38.4 29.8 30.4 -8.0

13.0 33.6 24.9 11.9

33.7 20.1 18.1 -15.6

72.5 72.5 78.5 6.0

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

48.8 40.6 43.2 -5.6

5.5 23.6 23.2 17.7

47.3 33.6 28.6 -18.7

65.9 61.7 65.8 -0.1

1993 1998 2001 Difference 93-01

43.6 35.0 35.7 -7.9

10.1 28.7 22.9 12.8

39.0 24.1 22.4 -16.6

79.0 70.5 75.3 -3.7

11.7 8.7 7.2 -4.5

85.2 78.1 86.9 1.7

1993 23.6 24.6 1998 20.2 47.8 2001 20.4 30.7 Difference 93-01 -3.2 6.1 Source: LSMS 1993, 1998 and 2001.

84.4 118.6 2.5 38.2 Urban Non-Poor 87.1 86.2 87.1 114.8 85.9 113.0 -1.2 26.8 Rural (All) 77.2 74.8 77.2 100.9 79.5 111.2 2.3 36.4 Rural Extreme Poor 70.5 68.1 66.9 86.9 72.8 101.8 2.3 33.7 Rural Poor 81.9 80.4 75.7 98.3 77.0 108.8 -4.9 28.4 Rural Non-Poor 87.1 86.2 81.4 108.5 85.6 117.2 -1.5 31.0

12.5 -25.1

4.5 0.4

4.3 0.2

4.7 0.6

0.8 0.4

12.2 2.5

20.8 19.4 3.6 -17.2

6.6 6.9 6.5 -0.1

6.7 7.1 6.1 -0.6

6.5 6.9 6.8 0.3

0.4 0.5 0.1

8.6 9.5 0.9

65.6 61.9 18.1 -47.5

2.5 3.2 3.6 1.1

2.4 3.0 3.3 0.9

2.6 3.4 3.9 1.3

1.5 1.5 0

25.6 23.1 -2.5

75.8 72.6 28.6 -47.2

1.6 2.0 2.4 0.8

1.5 1.9 3.6 2.1

1.6 2.1 2.6 1.0

2.1 1.6 -0.5

30.2 25.8 -4.4

69.9 66.7 22.4 -47.5

2.0 2.6 3.0 1.0

1.9 2.5 2.8 0.9

2.1 2.7 3.3 1.2

1.7 1.5 -0.2

27.8 24.5 -3.3

51.2 49.52 7.2 -44.0

3.8 4.3 5.0 1.2

3.8 4.1 4.8 1.0

3.9 4.6 5.2 1.3

1.2 1.4 0.2

22.3 19.6 -2.7

The progress in literacy, gross school enrollment, school attendance, and mean years of schooling show that the additional funding targeted to the preschool and primary school population has paid off. However, there is plenty of room for additional progress.

3.1 Preschool attendance The proportion of 4-6 year olds in preschool declined significantly between 1998 and 2001 (Table 2). Although the LSMS sample sizes for each group in the table was small, suggesting caution in the assessment of the figures, the differences are too large to ignore. Still, if one counts the proportion of 4-6 year olds attending primary school (mostly in first grade), the proportion of this age group enrolled in school is significant: 56.7%.

Annex Page 38

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table 3. School attendance of children 4-6 years old (% of all 4-6 year olds) Preschool Primary school 1993 1998 2001 2001 All 32.6 45.1 28.8 27.9 Urban 50.3 57.6 32.4 32.4 Rural 13.8 33.7 24.9 23.0 Extreme Poor 8.5 25.4 22.1 17.6 Poor Non-poor

18.6 34.1 52.4 60.5 Source: LSMS 1993, 1998 and 2001

24.3 34.9

24.0 33.2

Another significant point in preschool attendance is the 10 percentage point difference between the poor and the non-poor in 2001. However, the great variability reported from survey to survey within and between poverty groups also suggest a closer examination of the LSMS data.

3.2 Enrollment rates Gross enrollment rates6 have steadily and significantly increased among the poor (Fig. 1). By and large, this is the main success story in Nicaragua’s education sector. In particular, the gains shown by the extreme poor—which significantly narrowed the gap between the poor and the nonpoor—are very encouraging, since they confirm the effectiveness of educational investments and Government commitment for the past decade. Among the non-poor the gross enrollment rate has increased since 1998. The large drop in the gross enrollment rate of the non-poor shown between 1993 and 1998 is a point that merits examination.

6

The gross enrollment rate is defined as the as the ratio of all students enrolled in primary school to the total number of 7-12 year olds in the country. Since the system has many children enrolled outside of this age bracket, this ratio is usually larger than 100%. A ratio lower than 100% indicates problems in education coverage.

Annex Page 39

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Fig. 1 Gross enrollment rates by poverty level 160 140 120

%

100

Primary 93

80

Primary 98

60

Primary 01

40 20 0 All Ext Poor

All Poor

All Non-poor

Source: LSMS 1993, 1998, 2001.

For the first time Nicaragua has gross enrollment rates above 100% across all poverty levels. Although a gross enrollment rate above 100% indicates the presence of overage students, this statistic strongly suggest significant gains in education coverage, since—as it will be seen later— repetition rates have declined, and the proportion of children 7-12 not attending school has been substantially reduced. Rural areas—previously identified as the areas in need of attention—have benefited the most from the Government efforts at expanding coverage, showing a steady improvement over the last eight year (Fig. 2), while urban areas show a trend reversal, increasing again after showing a decline between 1993 and 1998. In the case of the net enrollment rate 7 —which measures the proportion of age-appropriate children enrolled in school—there is also an improvement (Fig.3 ). Again, the gain in performance among the extreme poor narrowed the gap between the poor and the non-poor. In 1998 the net enrollment rate gap between the poor and the non-poor was 8 percentage points. This difference has been narrowed to almost 5 points in just three years. In fact, among the extreme poor, the net enrollment rate increased 10.5 percentage points between 1998 and 2001. Overall, the strength and magnitude of the improvement among the poor helped generate an overall increase in the net enrollment rate at the national level.

7

The net enrollment rate for primary education is defined as the ratio of students between 7 and 12 years to the total number of 7-12 year olds in the country. A ratio of 100% indicates that all children between 7-12 are enrolled in school.

Annex Page 40

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Fig. 3 Net enrollment rates by poverty level 100 90 80

%

70 60

Primary 93

50

Primary 98

40

Primary 01

30 20 10 0 Extreme Poor

Poor

Non-poor

Source: LSMS 1993, 1998 and 2001

Fig. 2 Gross enrollment rates by location 160 140 120 100

Primary 93

80

Primary 98

60

Primary 01

40 20 0 Urban

Rural

Source: LSMS 1993, 1998, 2001

Annex Page 41

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

3.3 Repetition Repetition Rates. Repetition has declined significantly since 1998. In part this is due to the implementation of a program of automatic promotion between grades 1 to 3. In practice, many children repeat the first and second grades at the request of parents or in consultation with teachers, which accounts for the repetition figures reported by the MECD. Nicaragua is in a curious situation: 6-year olds represent the largest age group in the first grade, even though they should be in the last year of preschool. As a result, many children in this age group repeat first grade voluntarily. The presence of so many 6-year olds in first grade ahead of time signals the need to pay significant attention to preschool coverage. LSMS estimates show repetition rates somewhat higher than official averages8 (Table 4) due to differences in definition. If a 6-year old drops out of first grade before the end of the school year, he/she is counted as a drop out. If the same child enters first grade in the same school the following year, he/she is counted as a new student, even though the child used school resources twice. As a result, official MECD figures tend to overestimate drop out rates and underestimate repetition rates in the first grade. First grade repetition is the highest, declining gradually until 6th grade. However, there are gains in performance, since repetition has consistently declined for every grade since 1997. Coupled with the gains in the gross enrollment rates reported earlier, the lower repetition rates strongly suggest significant gains in internal efficiency.

Table 4. MECD and LSMS Repetition Rates for Primary School Grade 1 st 2 nd 3 rd 4 th 5 th 6 th

MECD 1997 LSMS 1998 MECD 2001 21.5% 25.1% 15.4 12.6% 14.3% 8.63 10.4% 8.8% 9.06 8.4% 9.3% 7.4 6.4% 6.2% 5.43 3.5% 4.0% 2.69 Source: MECD, 1999, 2001; LSMS, 1998

Repetition rates among the poor. The evidence from the LSMS confirm MECD figures, since repetition has also declined significantly across all poverty groups. In act, repetition among the extreme poor in 2001 was less than half what it was in 1998, and in rural areas, the repetition rate among the rural extreme poor for 2001 was almost one-third of the rate for 1998 .

8

MECD figures on repetition are from the Dirección de Estadísticas Educativas.

Annex Page 42

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table 5. Repetition rates by poverty level, 1998 Primary 1998 (%)

2001 (%) 8.2

Total Extreme Poor 14.7 Poor 13.5 Non-poor 8.7 Urban Extreme Poor 13.9 Poor 14.5 Non-poor 8.3 Rural Extreme Poor 15.0 Poor 12.9 Non-poor 9.9 Source: LSMS 1998, 2001

6.5 9.4 6.8 7.5 8.9 10.4 5.6 9.0 5.6 8.7 9.6

3.4 School attendance Judging from the figures on non-attendance, system coverage has improved significantly since 1998. Moreover, the progress made in non-attendance since 1993 is remarkable. In 1993 about 21.5 % of 7-12 year old children were not in school (Table 6). This figure is now down to 12.1 %. There is still a large difference between extreme poor children and the non-poor, but that difference is narrowing gradually: non-attendance among the extreme poor declined by 17 percentage points in eight years. Yet, almost one-third of extreme poor children do not attend school. This is still a serious problem that needs to be addressed. Overwhelmingly, the majority of male children between 7 and 12 years of age cited economic problems as a reason for not attending school (Table 7). More than 50 % of poor males cited economic issues as the main barrier for attendance, and in the case of extremely poor males in urban areas, this figure9 climbs to 78 %. Another important reason cited by the urban males in extreme poverty is the lack of interest in school (16.3 %). Therefore, between economic reasons and the lack of interest—which can be interpreted as an indicator of low education quality or as an indicator of lack of knowledge about the returns to education—the issue of non-attendance among urban males in extreme poverty can be improved with well targeted interventions. Among the rural poor, about 22 % of the males cited the need to work in the fields as a reason for non-attendance. 9

It should be noted than in 1998 about 85% of urban extremely poor children cited economic reasons for nonattendance, which suggest some improvement in this area.

Annex Page 43

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table 6. Percentage of children not attending school 1993 1998 2001 7 - 12 yrs

7 - 12 yrs

7 – 12 yrs

All 21.5 14.3 Extreme Poor 44.7 32.4 Poor 32.3 21.3 Non-poor 7.4 6.1 Urban 11.3 9.0 Extreme Poor 35.3 28.5 Poor 19.9 15.9 Non-poor 6.3 5.1 Rural 33.7 20.1 Extreme Poor 47.3 33.6 Poor 39.0 24.1 Non-poor 11.7 8.7 Source: LSMS 1993, 1998, and 2001

12.1 27.7 18.6 4.6 6.9 22.9 12.5 3.6 18.1 28.6 22.4 7.2

Among females the reasons for non-attendance are similar, with one important difference: personal security is a more prominent reason than in the case of males. Rural families are reluctant to send their girls long distances over scarcely populated areas given the high level of civil insecurity in the country. As a result, about 14% of poor girls cited security as a deterrent to school attendance. Table 7. Nicaragua 2001: Reason for Not attending School by gender (7 Extreme Poor Poor Urban Rural Total Total Urban Male Age 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.1 0.0 Not interested 16.3 19.4 18.7 9.7 13.0 Domestic Duties 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.3 0.0 Work in fields 0.0 17.7 13.6 16.6 4.6 No vacancy 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.8 0.0 Level not offered 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.0 1.5 Distance 0.0 8.8 6.7 12.3 0.0 Insufficient Teachers 0.0 3.6 2.8 2.7 0.0 Insufficient Security 0.0 0.7 0.5 7.1 0.0 Family problems 0.0 4.4 3.4 5.1 1.8 Monetary problems 78.4 43.2 51.4 35.3 73.6 Other 5.3 2.2 2.9 6.1 5.5 Female Age 2.6 3.1 3.0 4.0 2.9 Not interested 0.0 25.7 19.8 12.1 10.4 Domestic Duties 0.0 2.2 1.7 5.8 2.0

Annex Page 44

12 year olds only) Non-poor Rural Total Urban Rural

All Total

1.5 14.6 0.2 22.0 0.8 0.6 12.7 4.5 0.8 5.8 32.9 3.7

1.1 14.2 0.2 17.5 0.6 0.8 9.4 3.3 0.6 4.8 43.4 4.2

0.0 14.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 2.9 0.0 24.5 4.8 49.5 4.3

3.2 6.0 0.0 10.0 0.0 5.6 22.5 0.0 20.1 0.0 21.4 11.2

1.6 10.1 0.0 4.9 0.0 2.7 12.5 0.0 22.4 2.5 35.7 7.7

1.8 18.3 3.1

2.1 16.3 2.8

17.7 11.7 13.1

0.0 14.2 3.6

10.6 12.7 9.3

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table 7. Nicaragua 2001: Reason for Not attending School by gender (7 - 12 year olds only) Extreme Poor Poor Non-poor Urban Rural Total Total Urban Rural Total Urban Rural Work in fields No vacancy Level not offered Distance Insufficient Teachers Insufficient Security Family problems Monetary problems Other Source: LSMS 2001

2.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 6.8 88.3 0.0

8.5 0.0 1.5 17.5 4.1 2.0 8.2 26.9 0.4

7.1 0.0 1.1 13.5 3.1 1.5 7.9 41.0 0.3

4.9 2.7 1.6 14.4 4.7 2.8 3.9 37.8 5.2

1.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 5.1 78.5 0.0

6.8 1.3 2.3 17.8 6.4 1.5 6.9 31.5 2.4

5.4 1.0 1.7 13.4 4.8 1.2 6.4 43.2 1.8

10.8 6.4 0.0 5.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 31.9 3.4

5.1 0.0 0.0 34.6 0.0 18.5 5.7 2.9 15.4

Overall, the reasons for non-attendance have remained the same as in 1998, but the proportion of non-attending children has declined, indicating some progress in this area. 3. 5 System Equity: Girls education and attention to indigenous populations Girls education is not a problem in Nicaragua. In general, the gross enrollment rates for females are higher than for males. An exception is the rural area of the Atlantic, where the gross enrollment rate for females is slightly less than for males (Table 8). However, since the net enrollment rate for females is higher, the overall rate of females to males in school is higher in al regions except Managua and the urban area of the Pacific region (Table 9). Table 8. Gross enrollment rates by gender and region Total Male Female Total Managua 119.9 123.8 115.1 Pacific- Urban 114.8 121.4 108.3 Pacific - Rural 122.9 122.9 122.8 Pacific - Total 118.7 122.1 115.3 Central - Urban 106.9 102.3 111.0 Central - Rural 103.9 106.0 101.9 Central - Total 105.1 104.6 105.4 Atlantic- Urban 117.8 118.0 117.4 Atlantic - Rural 105.1 99.6 110.2 Atlantic - Total 110.7 108.1 113.3 Source: LSMS 2001

In the area of girls education one has to be careful distinguishing equity issues on the supply sidewhich are mostly absent—from equity issues from the demand side, which can derive from cultural

Annex Page 45

All Total 8.5 3.8 0.0 16.9 0.0 7.4 2.3 20.3 8.2

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

attitudes, or from non-supply barriers, such as low personal security in rural areas. As the data on non-attendance among females can attest, economic and personal security issues can be barrier to girls access to education on the demand side. The collective evidence from Tables 8 and 9 show that girls have equal access to education and –to a large extent—show better indicators of coverage and literacy. The case of Managua, where girls remain less in school is a point that merits additional analysis. Ethnic equity in Nicaragua is a complex issue due to the confounding factor of difficult physical access to those rural areas populated by ethnic minorities, mixed with the issue of language. The Nicaragua education system uses language other than Spanish to indicate ethnicity. Less than 6% of the population speak a mother tongue other than Spanish, such as English and Miskito. In the urban areas of the Atlantic educational access is comparable to the rest of the country, but in the rural areas of the Atlantic, where ethnic minorities live intermingled with the mestizo mainstream, access is more difficult. Table 9. Nicaragua 2001: Percent literate ( 15-24 years) and ratio of Females to Males(literate and in school) Literate Ratio of Literate Ratio of Girls to Boys in (15-24 Females to Males (15Primary and Secondary years) 24 years) education Managua 96.1 110 87 Pacific- Urban 95.1 97 98 Pacific – Rural 86.1 97 108 Pacific- Total 91.0 97 102 Central - Urban 89.3 126 116 Central - Rural 68.4 98 106 Central – Total 76.8 110 111 Atlantic- Urban 86.9 100 102 Atlantic - Rural 68.3 82 118 Atlantic - Total 76.6 90 110 Note: Literate is defined as those who can read and write. Source: LSMS 2001

In terms of territorial equity—which also suggests a problem with ethnic equity—the Atlantic region shows a disadvantage, since the mean number of years of schooling is significantly lower in this region than in the rest of the country. The rural Atlantic region show significantly lower years of schooling that the rest of the country (Table 10). In the past, the rural Atlantic has posed significant operational challenges to the MECD, since per pupil costs are much higher than in the rest of the country, due to the distances involved, the language differences, and the high dispersion of rural communities10 . 10

In the case of the urban Atlantic, education access has been less of a problem due to the long term involvement of private institutions, such as the Moravian Church.

Annex Page 46

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Table 10. Average Years of Schooling (10-19 years old), 2001 Means years of schooling (10-19 years old) Total Male Female Managua 6.4 Pacific- Urban 5.8 Pacific - Rural 4.6 Pacific- Total 5.2 Central - Urban 5.5 Central - Rural 3.0 Central - Total 4.0 Atlantic- Urban 4.6 Atlantic - Rural 2.7 Atlantic - Total 3.6 Source: LSMS 2001

6.0 5.6 4.2 5.0 5.0 2.7 3.6 4.3 2.5 3.3

6.7 6.0 5.0 5.5 6.1 3.2 4.4 5.0 2.9 3.8

In addition, there have been significant difficulties in recruiting and retaining bilingual teachers in rural areas due to the hard living conditions, the isolation, and the cultural differences. As a result, the rural Atlantic has lagged the rest of the country in system performance. After 1990, the rural Atlantic experienced an influx on non-native populations which settled in the region from refugee camps in the north of Nicaragua. With the new settlements came more assistance in health and education, which have improved the situation somewhat. Thus, the mean years of schooling— which reflect medium to long term problems—are lower than in the rest of the country, but school non-attendance—which reflect short-term responses—show patterns similar to other poor regions in the country (Table 11). Table 11. Nicaragua 2001: Percent Not Attending School Percent not attending school 7 - 12 yrs 13 – 18 yrs 7 - 18 yrs Managua 4.0 23.5 14.5 Pacific - Urban 6.3 28.4 16.6 Pacific – Rural 6.2 46.3 24.8 Pacific – Total 6.3 36.9 20.5 Central - Urban 11.7 26.9 19.0 Central - Rural 25.8 57.9 40.3 Central – Total 20.5 45.3 32.0 Atlantic- Urban 7.7 35.3 19.3 Atlantic - Rural 24.5 55.7 37.3 Atlantic - Total 17.1 46.5 29.3 Source: LSMS 2001

Annex Page 47

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Additional evidence of progress can be found in some indicators of system performance, such as the repetition rate and absenteeism, which in the Atlantic are within the range of the rest of the country (Table 12). The only significant difference is in the proportion of students with no books, which is higher in the Atlantic (urban and rural) than in the rest of the country, reflecting the problem of serving a population with different languages. Table 12. Primary school repetition rates, percent with no books and mean number of days absent Repetition No books Days absent (%) (%) Managua 7.8 6.4 5.5 Pacific- Urban 10.1 9.8 3.7 Pacific - Rural 11.2 5.3 4.0 Pacific- Total 10.7 7.6 3.9 Central - Urban 5.1 9.6 4.2 Central - Rural 7.2 16.5 4.0 Central - Total 6.4 13.9 4.0 Atlantic- Urban 7.4 18.1 5.0 Atlantic - Rural 5.9 24.4 5.5 Atlantic - Total 6.6 21.4 5.3 Source: LSMS 2001

In summary, the issue of equity in education seems to apply to the rural population of the Atlantic, indicating the need for remedial action to improve the mean years of education of the population and their access to bilingual books and pedagogical materials.

Education Expenditures Education expenditures have two components: private and public. Nicaragua’s social sector strategy has addressed both, through targeted subsidies to families in poverty, and through increased educational expenditures.

4.1 The Private Cost of Public Schooling The evidence from the review of the sector’s performance clearly indicates a strong negative link between poverty, enrollment and performance. Although public schooling is free, parents are asked to contribute with some fees—which are supposed to be optional—and to cover the cost of registration, uniforms, school snacks, and transportation. Overall, the average annual expenditure per primary student in a public school by a family was C$ 392 (approx. US$28) in 2001, varying from C$264 (approx. US$19) per student per year among poor families, to C$571 (approx. US$39)

Annex Page 48

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

among non-poor families (Table 13). Among poor families the real per student cost is about the same as in 1998, while for non-poor families the cost has increased 25% from three years ago11 . The cost of public education to poor families is significant, but of lower budgetary impact than in 1998. The total cost of sending a child to a primary public school represents about 2.9 % of the non-food expenditures of poor households. This is substantially lower than in 1998, when the education cost per student represented 6.3 % of the non-food expenditures. Table 13. Annual per student expenditures and shares of education expenses by educational level and poverty group, public schools only, 2001 – Primary School

Annual Household expenses (in Cordobas) Poverty group

All Poor Non-poor

School fees

29.1 20.3 41.3

Registration School Uniforms bus/food

6.2 4.2 9.0

143.4 82.2 228.4

School Supplies

136.9 100.6 187.5

69.5 52.0 93.8

Text books

Total

7.8 5.1 11.6

Total Hh education expenses as a share of Hh nonfood expenses 392.8 2.9 264.4 2.9 571.5 2.8

Percent of education expenses

Total All Poor Non-poor

8.1 2.7 24.3 34.7 27.2 3.1 100.0 8.2 3.2 19.1 34.0 31.9 3.5 100.0 7.9 2.0 31.1 35.6 20.8 2.5 100.0 Source: LSMS 1998. Budget shares are for households with at least one child in school. 14.35 Cordobas = 1US$

Uniforms and school supplies account for 62% of per student expenses, while voluntary fees account for 8% of the total. It is interesting to note two things about voluntary fees: (i) they represent less than 10% of the private cost of public education, but—judging from pres reports— account for most of the complaints about the cost to parents; (ii) fees are slightly regressive, since poor families assign a slightly higher portion of their non-food expenditures to education.

11

In 1998 the per student cost among for all families was C$ 360 (US$ 41), varying from C$ 200 (US$ 18) among poor families, to C$ 528 (US$ 49). See: Arcia, Gustavo, 2000. “Education and Poverty in Nicaragua: Evidence from the 1993 and 1998 Surveys on Living Standards.” Background paper for the Nicaragua Poverty Assessment, The World Bank, Washington DC.

Annex Page 49

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

4.2 Public Financing of Primary Education Total funding for the MECD—and for education in general—increased in dollar terms between 1996 and 2000 (Table14). In 2001 and 2002 the rate of growth in the education budget declined slightly due to the severe fiscal constraints faced by the Government in light of the drastic reductions in international coffee prices, the onset of a drought in 2001, and the need to repay large amounts of short-term internal debt. These events had a substantial negative impact on fiscal revenues and on the rate of growth education budget. By 1998 the MECD was able to spend between around US$15 million per year in activities funded by external donors. This amount represented around 15 % of the MECD budget. For 2002 these funds increased to US$32.7 million, or 30 % of the budget. Table 14. MECD budget 1991-2002 MECD Total 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 Expenditures MECD (C$millions) 298 416 433 515 678 781 1,186 1,378 1379 1,505 Exchange rate 6.12 6.72 7.53 8.44 9.45 10.58 11.77 13.01 13.68 14.35 MECD ('000s of US$) 49 62 57 61 72 74 101 106 101 105 Source: Ministerio de Hacienda y Crédito Público. Exchange rate: Central Bank.

Although the budget allocations to education have increased, funding had remained relatively stable as a proportion of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). As shown in Fig. 4, Nicaragua allocated between 4.3 % of GDP to education in 1999. This proportion has been maintained since that year despite severe fiscal constraints. Fig. 4. MECD Budget as Percent of GDP 5.00% 4.50% 4.00% 3.50% 3.00% 2.50% 2.00% 1.50% 1.00% 0.50%

Source: Office of the Finance Director, MECD

Annex Page 50

20 02

20 01

20 00

19 99

19 98

19 97

19 96

19 95

19 94

19 93

19 92

19 91

0.00%

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

In 1999 and 2000 the Government faced a serious crisis in the private banking sector, forcing it to finance a bail out with short-term bonds. These bonds, whose value is of around US$ 900 million, had a maturity of three years. Now that payments are due the Government had to reduce its operating expenses by 15% in order to maintain is fiscal deficit in check. However, the education budget was protected as much as possible, suffering a lower reduction than the rest of the Central Government. The fiscal problem posed by the short-term internal debt is still an obstacle in the current negotiations between the Government and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). However, both the Government and the IMF are trying to find a way to refinance the debt and schedule repayment at a more reasonable pace. MECD expenditures in 2002 are expected to reach C$ 1,505 million, or approximately US$ 105 million. Of these expenditures, about C$ 1,100 million are for primary education. About 65% of the primary education budget is assigned to teacher salaries, and about 15% is for infrastructure (Fig. 5). The current budget shares for primary education are now better distributed than in the early 90s when teacher salaries amounted to 92 % of recurrent expenditures 12 , versus 76% in 2002.

Fig. 5. Public Primary Education Expenditures, 2002

Teachers 65%

Admin.Exp 3% Food 6% Materials 5% Training 5% Scholarships 1%

12

Capital Exp. 15%

Arcia, Gustavo, Miriam Quispe-Agnoli, and Carlos Gargiulo, 1994. "Recuperación de costos para la capacitación de maestros y la producción y distribución de material educativo." (Cost Recovery in Teacher Training and in the Production and Distribution of Educational Material). Research Triangle Institute, Research Triangle Park, NC, 1994.

Annex Page 51

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

4.3 Education Funding from External Sources. A significant portion of Nicaragua’s public expenditures in education come from external sources. Some of these funds come from large projects in basic education (i.e.: APRENDE I and II, with World Bank funding; and BASE I and II with USAID funding), secondary education, and adult education.

Funding Source

MECD sources of external funding, 2000-03 (US$) 2000 2001 2002 (Projected)

World Bank, Basic Education (APRENDE II)

2003 (Programmed)

2,234,131.00

6,049,536.00

14,959,673.00

22,000,000.00

World Food Program (School Lunch)

527,176.00

1,937,000.00

1,824,803.00

1,982,250.00

UNICEF - Basic Education

368,507.00

299,318.00

214,181.00

659,119.00

3,569,566.00

3,750,398.58

1,327,596.13

4,697,467.62

39,946.00

27,670.00

607,434.00

European Union -- Support to Education (Project ASEN y PRRAC) Inter American Development Bank - Education Reform organization of American States USAIND - Basic education (BASE II) Luxenbourg - Teacher training Japan - Primary scholl construction

3,500.00 3,229,392.00

3,720,579.00

723,321.00

58,550.00

75,300.00

27,650.00

4,620,909.00

8,919,364.00

Spain (Project AECI) TOTAL

14,608,231.00

7,157.00 2,957,710.00

2,851.00

Finland--Bilingual ed., Atlantic Region

2,119.00

192,327.00

166,233.00

223,753.00

692,009.00

24,957,674.58

19,334,998.13

33,797,592.62

Exchange rates: 2000: C$ 13.10 = 1 US$; 2001: C$13.40 = 1 US$; 2002: C$14.20 = 1 US$; 2003: C$14.98 = 1 US$. Source: Office of External Projects. MECD

Most of the external funds have been allocated to improvements in basic education quality and coverage, through the distribution of textbooks and educational materials, the construction or rehabilitation of rural schools; teacher training; curricular reform, and the development of new instructional model (i.e.: Escuelas Modelo). As Table 15 shows, external funding for 2002 is significantly lower than in 2001. Moreover, external funding will also decline further in 2003.

Annex Page 52

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

4.4 Government Expenditures per Primary School Student Nicaragua has made significant progress in improving primary education funding, even in the face of severe fiscal problems. Total per student expenditures for primary average US$ 97, which are significantly lower than per student expenditures in neighboring countries, but much better than in 1998 13 . In 1998 the average recurrent expenditure per student was approximately US$ 55, which led the Government to aggressively seek additional funding for recurrent expenditures. Tabl e 16. MECD: Average per student cost by type of school, 2002 Total cost Total cost

Recurrent cost

Type of public school Cordobas US$ US$ Centralized 1,304 91 Autonomous 1,447 101 Model School—Centralized 1,977 138 Model School—Autonomous 1,855 129 Multigrade—Centralized 1,304 91 Multigrade—Autonomous 1,447 101 Model School—Multigrade Autonomous 598 42 Model School—Subsidized private 1,312 91 Subsidized private 825 58 Average per student expenditure 1,388 97 Source: Estimated from data from the Office of the Director of Finance, MECD

79 84 125 112 79 84 24 89 55 83

Capital cost 12 17 12 17 12 17 17 3 3 14

As a result, recurrent expenditures per student have increased to US$ 83, allowing for better teacher pay and for a better distribution of non-salary expenditures in books and pedagogical material.

13

In comparison, recurrent expenditures for 2000 in El Salvador and the Dominican Republic, with much larger GDP per capita than Nicaragua, hover around US$130 per primary school student. Source: Arcia, 2000. Op. cit., pp-19-20

Annex Page 53

Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

5. Conclusions and Policy Recommendations The public education sector of Nicaragua has made remarkable progress in improving primary education among the poor. Additional progress has been made in the area of educational attainment in rural areas, especially among the extreme poor Still, the problems of education quality and access remain large. The following matrix (Table 17) summarizes the main problems associated with the supply and demand for public education, and the strategic alternatives open to the MECD. Table 17. Summary of Supply and Demand Problems and Strategies in Public Education Supply Problems Main Determinants Possible Strategy Low access above the 4th grade in • Low per student expenditures § Expand multigrade schools rural areas, and inadequate § Increase budget for materials in teachers and materials infrastructure § Continue infrastructural • High proportion of defective improvements infrastructure • High population growth in rural areas Low quality of teaching § Create a new • Inadequate training salary/performance career • Low incentives tied to track performance § Improve leadership and • Lack of a teacher evaluation, managerial training of school selection, and retention system directors § Reform system of teacher training to attract better entrants Low managerial and technical § Reform MECD based on • MECD still centralized capacity of MECD decentralization pilot • Low managerial and technical § Expand current financial, capacity at municipal and school statistical, and management levels information systems • Insufficient capacity for § Establish staff performance education policy analysis at measures and incentives MECD Demand Problems Main Determinants Proposed Strategy High drop out rates above the 4th • Need to work § Means based scholarship grade; high non-attendance among • Inadequate curricula programs extreme poor § Expand provision of school • Educational expenses materials § Consolidate new curricula § Expand school feeding programs Low parent participation • Weaknesses in school § Strengthen school autonomy training at local level autonomy program system of • Lack of parents experience in § Implement academic achievement testing governance issues and reporting § Strengthen leadership training of school directors

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Supply side issues. In the area of quality there is a pressing need to measure student achievement and to report those measures in order to generate more awareness of geographical or group priorities, and to complement the climate of local accountability framed by the school autonomy program. Relatedly, the MECD must continue its efforts to expand the scope and quality of training on the school autonomy program to make autonomy more effective for the poor. Also, the MECD must continue working on improving teacher quality and begin a process of teacher quality measurement—however imperfect—to be able to monitor the effectiveness of its training, selection, and reward methods for teachers. Demand side issues. In terms of access, there is a need to look at the gaps in primary grades in rural areas, where the number of schools that do not offer a program above the 3rd or the 4th grade is still large. The MECD must begin an aggressive expansion of multigrade programs and multigrade teachers in rural areas to alleviate the demand problem.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

TECHNICAL ANNEX 6: SCHOOLING IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM IN THE ATLANTIC COAST Objective of the Project To improve educational processes in the Nicaraguan Caribbean Coast focusing in the primary bilingual education or multicultural.

Goals 1. Provide funds to improve access, quality, academic and/or linguistic achievements of students in schools in the Nicaraguan Caribbean Coast through the following activities: a. analysis of their reality b. create a plan for encourage changes in organization, administration and execution of educational processes c. create a plan to evaluate the learning process d. create a plan to evaluate the results of the project 2. Attend directors and teachers so that they commit to their professional development, to the academic and technological innovation, the implementation evaluating processes of learning of the program and to allow the dissemination and multiplication of its process and results

Selection of School Initiatives 1. Select school initiatives based on the following criteria: • Development of a plan to increase the registration and the retention of students in the schools • Development of the communicative abilities in L1 and L2, programs that incorporate communication skills and not the development of grammatical knowledge • Academic development in L1 (for grades 1 to 3) with integration of the oral expression, reading and writing. • Read to learn in L1 and L2 in 4-6 grades. • Oral expression and written in L1 and L2 • Thematic units that integrate subjects • Flexible promotion • Differentiated instruction (attention for linguistic and academic development)

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

•

Development of the academic abilities in L1 and L2 of teachers in “escuelas modelos” by means of implementing programs at distance that include the following elements: Ø Audio-tapes Ø Videos Ø Learning modules Ø Direct instruction to promote interaction

•

Development of a team of instructors that assist others teachers in the school with the proper training Development of the director as a leader Elaboration of easy to make didactic materials Integration of incentives for director and teachers (monetary, technological and materials for their classrooms and/or continuation of their professional careers) Programs that provide children with meals (breakfast and/or lunch) Programs that integrate the community in the educational processes. These processes should be specifically identified and can incorporate the following activities: Ø Develop of didactic material, especially with elements found in the local environment Ø Provide the community with student lunches Ø Provide assistance in the classroom with regard to the transmission of traditions, values and other ethnic -cultural elements of the community Implementation of constructivist methodologies and strategies Technological innovation Ability to continue with the educational process once the project is finish.

• • • • •

• • •

Organizational and Administrative processes 1. Provide funds for school initiatives by means of proposals presented by the following entities: Schools Councils, Organisms of the Civil Society (OSC) and the project of the World Bank.

Responsibilities of the Involved Entities in the Project 1. The school council is responsible to elaborate the analysis of its schools reality and to develop a plan to promote school innovations including its organization, administration, and implementation of the initiative and the evaluation of the learning and the results of the project. 2.

The OSC assumes the responsibility of assisting the schools councils (not less than three schools) to fill the application to request the funds of EFA, to present the application, to make any changes if necessary, and to involve to the community in the process of the preparation,

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

implementation and continuous evaluation of results. The organism also assumes a roll to supervise attendance, services provided, materials, etc. obtained with funds of this project. 3. • • • •

• • • •

The project of the World Bank has the responsibility of designing the budget, the evaluation of the program and the dissemination of the results to promote the expansion of the program. The relationship among the schools, the OSC and the project of the World Bank is that of a team that although each one of them has a different role, they are carried out in a continuous interaction and mutual assistance. The schools working intimately with the OSC in the preparation and execution of the activities of the project, but the financial responsibility is of the project of the World Bank, that is to say that the OSC and the schools do not receive funds directly, but rather services, equipment and materials. Representatives of the schools, OSC, and the project of the World Bank revise the budget each semester. This process is evaluated annually. By means of the OSC, the schools requests services, equipment and materials directly to the OSC, which continues the process by making a direct request to the project of World Bank.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Central and Regional MECD

Group of schools

NGO Organización of the Civil Society

World Bank

The central and regional MECD supervise all the schools activities and participates in their evaluations. The educational commissions and the secretaries of education in the regional governments’ participate in the selection of the educational initiatives of EFA and in the dissemination of the results of these projects for their replica.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Administration of the Fund The schools receives services, equipment, materials and incentives (financial and professionals) The OSC receives a percentage of the funds administered by the schools based on the accomplishment of the goals of the school initiatives. The MECD receives allowances, means of transport and other expenses incurred in the supervision work, training for teachers and evaluation of the projects. It also receives the necessary equipment to develop its duties. The project administrator (World Bank), has the responsibility of the financial administration and the supervision of the whole project.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

TECHNICAL ANNEX 7: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATION PLAN 2001-2015 The objectives of the National Education Plan are to provide the country with a reference framework as a guideline for the changes in the educational system, to face the challenges to overcome poverty and to strengthen the modernization of the State in order to contribute in an equitable manner to a sustainable development of the country. The Plan is searching specifically to define the principles of the Nicaraguan education for the next fifteen years, promoting a participatory process for the articulation of the different education subsystems among themselves, formal and informal, and with the social and economic environment. Given the reference framework nature of the current plan, it does not incorporate projects and programs as such, which should be thought and created by the stakeholders of the educational system in a coherent way due to their dynamic and changeable characteristics. Likewise, the Plan is conceived as a State -Nation Plan with the aim to guaranteeing the continuance, governance and legitimacy of the educational policies for the next fifteen years and to frame the allocation of the internal resources and the international assistance within the Plan. The Plan has been created in a participatory way, involving all types of organizations and taking as a reference the National Strategy for Education, the need of a greater social and human capital for the its sustainable development and the alleviation of poverty as well as the strategies of the Government in order to give priority to education as an indispensable means for the reduction of the said poverty. The internal analysis of the education system shows deficiencies in coverage and lack of physical and financial capacity to attend the population in the compulsory school age range, as well as to absorb the vegetative increase of the population. Poverty and extreme poverty are some of the main causes for the absence and desertion at school. There is an underassessment of the training given to technicians on behalf of the Nicaraguan society. 14 One of the most felt problems is the lack of an appropriate curriculum, which does not answer the needs of the regions, specially the rural areas and the autonomous regions of the Atlantic Coast. Due to the weak macroeconomic conditions during the last decades, teachers do not have adequate wages nor a social recognition of their work, which do not favor any motivation for performance.

14

Source INATEC, 1999.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

The expenditures and investments in basic and primary education are continuing being too low. It is necessary to increase national and international resources in order to have a positive impact on the coverage and quality of the education, specially in the most vulnerable socioeconomic sectors. The type and quality of the current education in Nicaragua has diverse impacts on the population incomes, consequently, in the poverty levels according to the type of sector and regional locations where people live. However, the educational levels attained have a positive influence on the income, having a more positive effect in the formal sector than in the informal, in particular with lower levels of education. 15 The level of poverty has a strong and negative influence on the access to the different levels of the current educational system. The poorer the less opportunities to have access to the educational programs. In fact, the continuance of the pupils in the current educational system is a funnel according to the poverty. In conclusion, the analysis and type of the current educational system is not encouraging because it reproduces the structure of poverty and tends to keep the economic and social disparities. The continuation and expansion of the same type of education will not contribute substantially to solve the serious problem of poverty and of human and social capital.

The plan is based on nine general principles of the Nicaraguan education which are: Principle No. 1: The education is a fundamental human right. The State has the unavoidable obligation to guarantee equal opportunities of access and promotion to all, as it has been established in the Constitution.

Principle No. 2: The education creates and forges a human being and its social, environmental, ethic, civic, humanistic and cultural values, and is addressed to the strengthening of our national identity. Reaffirms the respect to a diversity of religions, policies, ethnic groups, cultures, psychologies and genders and to the rights of others to live in peace and harmony. In this sense, the education will contribute to create and strengthen our Central American identity.

Principle No. 3: The education will be a comprehensive, continuous and permanent process, organized in a national system articulating the different subsystems, ways and levels of the educational chores. 15

Interaction of socioeconomic and sociodemographic factors with education, Silvio D’Franco, 2000.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Principle No. 4: The education will be governed according to an articulate, decentralized, participative, efficient, transparent, administrative and managerial system, as a guarantee of the social impact of education, without adversely affecting the autonomy of the university.

Principle No. 5: The school is the meeting place for men and women teaching and learning and the center where the technical and pedagogical process of management and participation are integrated.

Principle No. 6: The education is an investment for a person and is fundamental for the human, economic, scientific and technical development of the country; therefore, a close relationship between education and work should be established.

Principle No. 7: The pupils are the architects of their own learning, in permanent interaction with their teachers and fellow students at school and with the environment.

Principle No. 8: The teachers are key factors and the main protagonists of the educational process; they have the right to living and working conditions according to the dignified mission they exercise.

Principle No. 9: It is the duty and the right of parents, institutions, organizations and other members of the Civil Society to actively participate in the planning, management and evaluation of the educational system, within the national, multicultural and multiethnic reality.

On the basis of the analysis, the National Strategic Plan for Education and the principles, the strategic guidelinesof the Educational System are: §

To increase the quality of learning.

§

To safeguard dignified conditions and give refresher courses to teachers.

§

To give emphasis to innovation, science and technology.

§

To promote more relevance and diversity to the education.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

§

To increase coverage, access and equity to the education.

§

To strengthen institutional modernization and educational management.

More specifically, it is necessary to design and organize the educational system in such a way that it will allow the individuals to stay within the system and to integrate themselves into a useful way to our society with contents, abilities and skills to learn, with attitudes and values for their personal, social and productive lives. For all the students, each year of education will be, at the same time, a means and an end in itself, in such a way that they will get the expertise that will be useful for the rest of their lives. The education should be focused in competence that will also serve the informal sector from a regional, local and cultural context. In addition, the basic education should guarantee the satisfaction of the needs to learn, both in their instrumental aspects (writing, reading, calculus), as in the theoretical and practical knowledge, values, skills and abilities that will make possible the insertion of the individuals into the social life. The education should be implemented as a social and economic means through the new national educational system, where the needs of the different groups of the country are taken into account, specially those of the poorest, with the extension and the diversification of the education, with lateral outlets and regional relevance, in addition to safeguarding a fairness access and the continuance of the educational system. In order to implement the above, not only the internal factors of the school affecting the performance and provoking the desertion should be focused but also the strategies guaranteeing the necessary transfers and interventions in the family and in the communal environment so that the investment in education can be carried out for the benefit of poorest. It is also important to safeguard the quality of learning as part of the relevance for the productive insertion and the democratic exercise of the graduates of the education system at all levels and modalities. The National Educational Plan requires to contemplate educational programs and initiatives and non traditional training, allowing to improve the entrance into the existing working positions through the relevant instruction and incorporating at the same time the non formal methods and experiences of the education. It is of the utmost importance to implement a permanent training to qualify and keep the labor force up-to-date at all levels, trying to attain a connection between the supply and demand of knowledge and skills, specially in the most dynamic sectors of the economy. To implement the education, it is fundamental to boost scientific and technological innovations at different levels, specially at the higher and technical educational subsystems, which will allow to narrow the gap between education, work and a sustainable development.

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Republic of Nicaragua

Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports

Teachers and principles are the key elements at any school; therefore it is indispensable to implement for them permanent training courses and to recognize their social and economic status. The student should be the center of attention and the builder of his own learning. The Plan is aimed at creating the governance mechanisms, emphasizing the overview of the country, the participation of the population specially of parents the decentralization and the flexibility in order to adapt them to the new changes. In summary, the Plan is searching for the creation of a relevant system for the development of a strong and sustainable society, with more fairness, in order to attain deep and permanent democratic structures. To achieve this goal, it is necessary to have a comprehensive basic and technical education with an enlarged coverage. The higher education should play a key role to promote the generation, adaptation and adoption of knowledge and technologies that will contribute to the development and to the alleviation of poverty. If it is true that the State, at all different levels, is very much responsible for the planning, administration and funding of the educational system, the attainment of the objectives, strategies and goals of a plan of this nature will only be possible with a great national commitment to education, which once implemented should become a territorial, sectorial and inter-sectorial commitment with the design of programs and projects financed with internal and external funds.

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LETTERS OF SUPPORT