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Access to education is one of the highest priorities on the development agenda. High-profile international commitment to progress—such as the second Millennium Development Goal of achieving universal primary education—has helped galvanize policy-makers into action. Significant results have already been achieved in school enrollment. Yet care must be taken that the need for simple, measurable goals does not lead to ignoring the fact that it ultimately is the degree to which schooling fosters cognitive skills and facilitates the acquisition of professional skills that matters for development. This report shows that differences in learning achievements matter more in explaining The task at hand is imposing. As shown by the PISA survey, disparities in secondary education between developing countries and OECD countries are even larger when one considers not only access but also learning achievements. Things are not much better at the primary level. In recent surveys in Ghana and Zambia, it turned out that fewer than 60 percent of young women who complete six years of primary school could read a sentence in their own language. Reducing disparities in access to, and in the quality of, education are two goals that must
cross-country differences in productivity growth than differences in the average number of years of schooling or in enrollment rates. A development-effective educational strategy should thus focus not only on sending more children to school, as the second Millennium Development Goal is often interpreted, but also on maintaining or enhancing the quality of schooling.
be pursued simultaneously for any education reform to be successful. Considerable progress has indeed been made recently in increasing enrollment, but a reversal could occur if parents were to realize that the quality of schooling is not guaranteeing a solid economic return for their children. There are many reasons why school quality may be deficient. Countries should investigate what the precise causes are in their own context and should be encouraged to experiment in finding the best way to correct weaknesses. Tools such as effective teacher certification, public disclosure of the educational achievements of schools and teachers, local school control by parents associations, and, more generally, all measures contributing to the accountability of teachers and head teachers, can be useful starting points for refl ection. Education reforms take time to mature and bear fruit. Engaging in such reflection and experimentation is therefore urgent for development.