Low Performance and High Satisfaction: The Information Paradox of Bad Schools

Oft times, we realize certain foods are harmful to our health and yet we choose to do these things in spite of it. It doesn't matter if it's alcohol and cigarettes or pizza doughnuts and pizza, we don't pay attention to the messages from the media telling that we shouldn't. But what happens in the realm of education? If parents receive news that their children aren't doing well, they'll take actions towards the institution or government? But not always. A decade ago, the entire education community -- including think tanks, donors, and NGOs - were primarily concerned with encouraging children to attend school. Millions of kids have since entered primary school and this is an impressive accomplishment. In the past, however, these people realized that their schools weren't teaching the children well, and they began to look for ways to make learning more effective. However parents and communities in emerging economies don't appear to be averse to this And this absence of desire could prove to be among the main barriers to teaching children to read and counting. The publication of Varkey Foundation's Parent Survey, we gain more information on the issue. The survey surveyed 27,500 parents in 29 countries to answer a variety of questions regarding their children's education. The results, which indicate the existence of a significant gap between parents' feelings about schools and the information we have about the learning outcomes (see the chart below) may be cause for concern. This is especially evident when it comes to emerging countries, as the most ineffective education systems around the world, like in India are among the most high levels of satisfaction from parents regarding their school. This contrasts with education systems that do well, like South Korea, where parents are less satisfaction with their schools. The case of India, Kenya, and other emerging economies, there is a gap between actual satisfaction and learning outcomes is striking: In a survey of 500 parents conducted with the help of the Varkey Foundation in Kenya, 92 % of them believed that the quality of instruction at the school where their child was fair or good and 71 percent believed that the schools were preparing their child for the future. Additionally 51 percent rated schools in the government as fair or excellent. However, Uwezo is an annual household-based survey that evaluates the current levels of children's numeracy and literacy and numeracy, tested 130,000 students for their most current survey finding that 30 percent of grade 3 children were able to complete work in grade two, compared to 25 percent children living in rural areas. Of the 1,000 parents who were surveyed in India of which 87 percent responded, 87 percent were satisfied with the education in their children's schools and 88 percent believed they prepared them for their future. However, ASER is a sister organization to Uwezo has tested 560,000 kids at the end of 2016 and discovered that half of students in grade five were unable to read a grade two text. Simply put, thousands of kids in India and Kenya are graduating from primary school each year, innumerate and functionally illiterate however their parents are content with their school. One reason for this could be the Varkey survey method. Varkey utilizes an online questionnaire which makes sense that in nations where Internet penetration is not as high it is the most representative of a more educated and wealthy urban populations. In contrast it is true that Varkey's Uwezo or ASER surveys are much larger as they are household-based and representative. It's likely that parents who were surveyed with Varkey Foundation Varkey Foundation across India and Kenya sent their children to more prestigious fee-based institutions (about 10% of 27,500 parents who were surveyed by Varkey have children in the private school system).