NUMBER 142 ED Precis 1199 Evaluation Department Apnl 1997 Shared Goals Essentialfor Success: Education Reform in Malaysia Unless the Bank and its clients are in The Bank preferred to concentrate out simultaneously, the investment clear agreement over the policies to be on primary education, where social components were completed in six pursued under a project, there will be retums were highest. It feared that years, a considerable feat for all tensions and limited results. In two if the government rapidly expanded the government agencies involved. education projects in Malaysia, unre- more expensive higher education, solved issues over the rationalefor the it would draw budget resources The loans were only a small projects resulted in the government not away from primary education. At part of the government's total complying with all the loan covenants, the same time, the Bank encour- spending for education but they and diminished the projects' impact. aged the government to improve made important contributions to Because the Bank and the government the efficiency of primary education the country's educational goals. were pursuing different policy goals, and to lower costs-goals that The projects built schools, teacher misunderstandings emerged over the the government considered less training colleges, education re- responsibilities of Bank and borrower urgent than expansion and quality source centers, and other facilities. staff during supervision and monitor- improvements. They trained personnel, education ing. An OED audit of the projects* managers, and technical specialists found that they met their investment When the two projects were ap- at the Ministry of Education, es- targets, but did not succeed in reducing proved (in 1987 and 1989, respec- tablishing the essential infrastruc- costs or increasing efficiency in the ba- tively) these differences were still ture for expanded access to basic sic education subsector. The audit unresolved, although the projects education and for a better environ- draws lessons forfuture projects. did reflect agreement between the ment for teaching and learning. Bank and the borrower on priorities They helped to raise enrollment In the 1980s, the Bank attempted for basic education. The projects ratios and management capacity what at the time were two innova- sought to expand and improve pri- (see table). tive models of sector lending in mary and secondary education and Malaysia. The first and second pri- to improve the efficiency of educa- The borrower did not comply mary and secondary education sec- tional management. But conten- with five critical actions listed in tor projects were designed to support tious actions to contain spending the supplemental letters of the the government's New Economic and achieve cost efficiency in the loan agreements. These involved Policy by combining financial assis- end were specified only in supple- the budgetary and cost efficiency tance with support for stronger mental letters of agreement rather policy actions. In this context, pub- than in the main loan covenants. *PerfiQTnanct audit report. "Ma- lic education and training were seen No sanctions were planned in case laiisia: First and Second Primary as important tools to reduce pov- the borrower failed to comply with nd Secor7t,r Education Sector erty and provide better opportuni- its legal obligations, and tensions ProjectI.," by Linda A. Dove, Re- ties for the poor. over priorities continued until the port No. 16352, February 27, projects were closed in 1993. 1997. Available to Bank executive But the government and the Bank directors and stafffrom the Inter- saw strategies for education differ- Investments versus policy issues nal Documents Unit andfrom re- ently. The government's policy ,gional itnformation service centers. sought to develop education at all Despite the projects' complexity, Precis ;written by S/tfanno Petrucci. levels, including higher education. and the fact that they were carried _ grams, while their shortcomings Educational trends 1986-95 stemmed from issues and actions Enrollments left unresolved at project design, % increase the seemingly incompatible priori- Primary 21.8 ties of the Bank and the borrower, Lower secondary 24.4 and differing views of the Bank's Upper secondary 59.3 Post secondary 6.7 Teacher education 11.8 The Bank may have undermined Ratios the efficacy of its assistance strat- 1986 1995 egy by supporting several educa- Student:teacher 22:1 19:1 tion projects (seven between 1980 Student:classroom 48:1 36.4:1 and 1992) without an overall agree- ment on a policy framework for assistance. By the same token, issues on which the two parties matters outside the Bank's author- the borrower should not have had differed during project prepa- ity. As a result, the government signed legal agreements about ration-such as reducing teacher- consistently refused Bank requests which it had explicit reservations student and teacher-class ratios, to do sectorwide work and release and which it had little will or consolidating small schools, multi- details of its education budget. capacity to fulfill. grade teaching, and smaller design Also, the Bank's micromanagement standards for classrooms. How- during supervision created confu- * Before projects are approved, ever, some of these actions were sion between the government's the Bank's internal quality assur- indeed difficult to carry out, given monitoring and the Bank's super- ance procedures should ensure that the rapid growth in school enroll- visory responsibilities. management has fully addressed ments that was taking place at issues raised by project review- the time. As a result of these differences, ers-especially the projects' justifi- the projects did not provide the cation, the borrower's commitment, During implementation of the empirical, analytical, and objective and the lessons from previous projects, Bank staff focused more tools needed to develop new poli- projects. on physical problems than unre- cies and programs. The studies solved policy issues, trusting in that were meant to support the * When lending to countries, such time-and future operations-to development of sector policies and as Malaysia, that have well-devel- resolve differences. While the Min- actions on quality, cost efficiency, oped policies and plans, the Bank istry of Education enthusiastically and equity were mostly unsatis- should limit the scope of its opera- invested in the expansion and factory. Project design did not in- tions to supporting specific, cir- improvement of the school sys- clude a framework, process, or cumscribed policy goals within the tem, it deferred consideration of mechanism for developing action country's assistance strategy and cost issues. plans based on the studies' find- for which the borrower actively ings, or for disseminating the seeks help, thus building a relation- Although the parties avoided findings to senior government ship of trust and joint endeavor. confrontation, misunderstandings decision makers. nevertheless emerged over respon- * To nurture autonomy in self- sibilities. The government viewed Lessons directed project management ca- the Bank's role as narrower than pacity, the Bank should maintain the Bank itself did. When the Bank The projects' achievements clear distinctions between the re- raised general policy issues out- stemmed mostly from the govern- sponsibilities of its own staff and side the projects' scope, the bor- ment's firm commitment to its the borrower's staff in supervision rower viewed it as intruding into own educational goals and pro- and monitoring. OED Precis is produced by the Operations Evaluation Department of the World Bank to help disseminate recent evaluation findings to development professionals within and outside the World Bank. The views here are those of the Operations Evaluation staff and should not be attributed to the World Bank or its affiliated organizations. This and other OED publications can be found on the Internet, at http:// www.worldbank.org/html/oed. Please address comments and inquiries to the managing editor, OED, tel: 1-202/458-4497, fax: 1-202/522- 3200, e-mail: eline1worldbank.org April 1997