Farewell India

My internship at ASER CENTRE has finished. In this post I present what I really learned during the internship.

Data is not enough: One of my tasks was to analyze data from an evaluation in basic Math and Language of students in India (called ASER) done for the years 2010, 2011 and 2012.  I found that there is consistent evidence of female disadvantage in Mathematics. For example, in the age group 10-12, the percentage of students that attained the highest level is on average 3 percentage points higher for males than for females. In the age group 13-16 years old, the gap in learning attainment increases over time, and between 2010 and 2012 almost doubles: while in 2010 the difference between male and female students that attained the highest level was 3 percent in 2012 this gap grows to almost 6 percent.

After reviewing literature and data sets for six weeks, we finally went to the field.  There I really interact with that social norms and beliefs that affect the gender gap. For example, the fact that a teacher said “Girls are dumb; they can’t even speak properly”   reflect how challenging is improving access and learning outcomes for girls. Policymakers have to take into account these realities to do effective policies.

(Girls I met in the field trip)

The school and the house: I strongly believe that education starts before a child is enrolled in school. Many of the bias against women professional development are generated at home. Policymakers sometimes think that improving educational outcomes requires and intervention at school and with kids.  Evidence show, for example, that enhances women’s empowerment at home increases learning outcomes for girls.

Girls are not Brides: Last week I came across with this initiative (http://www.girlsnotbrides.org/where-does-it-happen/). The effects of marriage in educational outcomes are well documented, but it is not the same to read in a paper that to listen for an 11 years old girl (already married) that her plans in live is to wait until she is 18 years old to move with her husband. Understanding the dynamics of arranged marriage is a cornerstone of any strategy that aims to reduce the gender gap.

I hope you have enjoyed my posts. I am very grateful with the Women and Public Policy Program ant the Culture Bridge Fellowship for supporting this experience, that will have a strong impact in my professional development.

Back to the Basis

After six weeks of reviewing literature regarding gender gap in India and "looking for evidence" in the data, we decided that we were prepared to go to the "field" and determine whether our hypothesis about gender gaps were certain. In Rajasthan I understood certain aspects of the gender gap that the papers and data did not show me.

For the field work we prepared four instruments: a survey for students, parents and teachers and a guide for class observation. These instruments aimed to explore certain aspects that are usually considered plausible explanations for gender gap, such as the son's preference, parental education or teacher's perception. To apply these instruments, the six-member team was divided in three groups, each group had a native Hindi speaker. This post will describe my experience at the classroom and interviewing the teacher.

Ritambhara and I went to "Rajkiya Madhyamik Vidyalaya", a middle school in Ajmer. It was my first experience as an observer in a classroom, but the guide we had was very helpful. The objective of the classroom observation was to determine whether the teacher gave equal treatment to boys and girls during the class. The guide included questions such as: "Does the teacher seem to look or talk to both boys and girls when lecturing or explaining concepts?" or "Does the teacher use both female and male examples when explaining concepts?"

(Classroom observation: even though it was an English lesson, I had problems following all the session because the teacher spoke in Hindi most of the time.)

We observed an English lesson. In this class, the girls were seated at the left side of the class while the boy at the right side. One could tell that the teacher really put effort in enhancing the learning of both boys and girls. He had a routine: one question to the left side of the room, one question to the right side of the room. After the class, we interviewed him. We asked him to give us names of the best students and  leaders of the class, he considered both girls and boys in the list.

A very different experience from the other team: a teacher told them that "girls were dump" or that "it is bad  for girls to be outspoken when they grow". These quotes reflect that gender gap is a complex problem and its roots are in social norms and beliefs. A real challenge for policy makers; it's easy to solve problems such as lack of school infrastructure, you just allocate resources and build a school. But what do you do when people believe girls do not deserve the same opportunities as boys?

The Working Mom

After working for five years for the Peruvian government, I realized that it is quite difficult to be a “good mother” and a decision-making professional at the public sector. Organizational practices at the (Peruvian) government are very harmful for someone’s personal life: you have to be available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.  If one day I have children, I don’t want to leave home at 8 am and return at least at 10 pm. When I discuss these issues with female friends that are also public servants we get to the sad conclusion that –if we have children- we must give up to our dream of transforming the public sector.

 

Our conclusion may be wrong; there are many options to consider before giving up to such a dream. I am also sure that feminists think this conclusion is a betrayal to their cause. I won’t discuss these issues here. I want to talk about all those women that not even have a choice to choose. They have to leave home early every day and return very late, and even sometimes they are back just for the weekend. For example, in Lima or Delhi they work as maids, in many cases without formal contracts and of course, without social security.

 

A working mom is one of the possible reasons for the gender gap in education in India. Evidence for rural suggests that being the oldest sibling have effects in educational outcomes for girls. A plausible explanation is that –while mom is not at home- they take care or their little siblings and of the household duties. I don’t why to oversimplify the analysis, it is important to take also into account social norms that affect the role of women in Indian society and the parent’s preferences.

I don't have a "policy recommendation" for this issue. I just want to invite you to think about this "invisible labor force" that in many developing countries have neither labor rights nor defenders.

Jai Hind! (Long Live India)

I spent many hours trying to figure out how to express what I felt and thought last week when I visited the Learning Centers that Pratham runs in urban slums of New Delhi. After several attempts, I decided to let someone else do it: the children I met and a famous Irish poet.

 “Jai Hind! Good morning, Madame”, the boys and girls said as I entered to their classrooms. An Indian intern explained me that “Jai Hindi” translates to “Victory to India” or “Long Live India” and it is a battle cry of the Indian Army.  At first I thought that the kids were just repeating a quote without understanding the meaning. However, in one of the classes one of the teachers asked them to draw “something they like”. Several of them drew the Indian flag:

I realized that these children love their country.  And it is not fair for them that their country doesn't give them the opportunities to develop. But "who" is their country? "Who" can make something for them? Of course, anyone with the intentions and commitment to do it. 

However, working as a public servant in my country, I became a strong believer that from the public service it is possible to significantly change these children's lives,  to scale-up effective initiatives that positively affect their well-being. For example, to multiply by a hundred the number of Learning Centers that Pratham created.

(Trying to understand the hindi lessons.)

For this, we  need public servants that love their country and their future. These children are the future of India; we need public servants that love these kids. Public servants that are aware of the the huge responsibility they have with these children. Because, as in the poem of Butler Yeats,  these children spread their dreams under the country -under their feet-.

  

“…

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dream.”

“Cloths of Heaven”, William Butler Yeats.

Colorful India

Why India and Peru are similar?

I feel that India is very similar to my country. In the last decades, international community has shown enthusiasm about their future perspectives due to their outstanding economic performance. Nevertheless, their governments still are not able to transform that economic success in better opportunities for their citizens. For example, Peru is considered the “Latin America’s rising star” due to the fact that in the last eight years the economy has grown at an average rate of about 7%, the highest rate in the region (after Panama which is a much smaller country). However, in rural areas, more than a third of the children suffer chronic malnutrition and scarcely five percent of the students attending public schools achieve the expected results in mathematics.

In a similar way, with the conformation of the BRICS (the association of the five major emerging national economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), India was under the "spotlight" and expectations regarding it's role in global affairs were raised. Nowadays, the enthusiasm about India’s economic growth has declined. But what really worries is that –in comparison to China- India has not made significant reforms to improve the quality of basic services.  The Nobel Prize Amartya Sen is better than me to explain this point: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/20/opinion/why-india-trails-china.html?_r=0

For me, high economic performance -due to natural resources or innovation- and low living conditions for the people (or poverty) is a puzzle. In fact, when I travel around my country, I feel that the famous Italian-born Peruvian scientist Antonio Raimondi was right when he said –more than a century ago- that “Peru was a beggar sitting on a bench of gold”. It took me just two trips to figure out that India is also a beggar sitting on a bench of gold. I will try to show you my point through some pictures of my trips to Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.

What can be do to transform the "gold" in better living conditions?

White: Taj Mahal

Green: Ranthambore National Park

Orange: Resting tiger at Ranthambore

 (Photo credit: Jaime Archundia)

Yellow: "Snake charmer". Amber Fort, Jaipur.

Rainbow: Worshipers walking towards the Ganesh Temple 

  (Photo credit: Jaime Archundia)

Son's preference

As kids, my sister and I always complained that my brother was our “parent’s favorite”. We had some material “signals” of this. While my sister and I shared a room, he had a room for himself and all the benefits from that: a TV for himself, a bigger bed and a bigger closet (of course in that time we didn’t understand that it is completely natural that same gender siblings share the room). In the first week of my internship at Pratham I have realized that I will never say again that he is the favorite, after all my parents gave us the same opportunities.

There is strong evidence in rural India that a girl would pursue more education if she is “born again as a boy”. As a 2010 Pratham report suggests: “in rural India, over 15% of children in the age group 15-16 are out of school, with more girls out of school than boys. In educationally backward states like Rajasthan, almost one out of every three girls in this age group is not in school. Similar patterns are visible in industrialized states like Gujarat as well, where the overall proportion of out of school children in the age group 15-16 is 23.5% but the fraction of girls in this age group who are not enrolled in school is 29%. Putting the pieces of the picture together for the current Indian context, we can see that a substantial fraction of children, especially girls, are not in school after age 14 and a significant proportion of this age group is still struggling through upper primary grades.”

Numerous studies have been developed to identify possible explanations for the gender gap in rural India. Among the most common explanations is that parents treat daughters and sons in a different way, commonly known as the “son’s preference” argument. Parents may prefer to invest in sons because they act as old-age security, while girls leave the parent’s house after marriage and thus, the returns to a daughter’s investment are reaped by her in-laws’ family. Some papers suggest that this attitude is also exhibited by mothers; they invest in their sons to win them as allies and insurance against an uncertain future in a patriarchal world. The result is less investment in health, nutrition and education of the girls.

In the next posts I will discuss other explanations for the gender gap. Sadly, most of the studies argue that the discrimination against girls is difficult to explain. However, what I can argue strongly is that, even thought my complaints, my parent's do not have a "son's preference". In fact, my siblings and I studied at high quality schools and colleges and even had the chance to study a master's degree (as the youngest sibling, I am the only one that have not completed it yet). I hope my siblings read this post and never say again that my parent's prefer one of us!

(My siblings and I)

Why Education?

I believe that education is an effective tool to fight poverty. A well-educated individual is a productive worker who receives a higher salary. Beyond the material effects, a well-educated individual is a better neighbor, a better citizen and a better parent. In spite of this, developing countries face serious issues regarding the access and quality of education. For example in rural India, the Annual Status of Education Report conducted in 2010, shows that 53% of students of Grade 5 could read a Grade 2 level text and 36% could solve a three digit by one digit division problem. My country -Peru- faces similar educational challenges: the National Evaluation of Students of 2011 shows that 5.8% of students achieved the expected results in reading comprehension and 3.7% achieved the expected results in mathematics. 
 

How to improve quality of education is a puzzle. After one year in the MPA/ID and many papers read, it is time to look for answers where education is developed: in the schools. During this summer I will work as an intern in Pratham, an organization that under the mission "Every Child in School and Learning Well" is engaged in improving the quality of education in India. The project in which I will participate has the objective to -through quantitative and qualitative analysis and field visits- identify effective interventions to address the gap gender in the access to post primary educational opportunities for girls. 

 

During the internship I will share in this blog my experiences and thoughts. I will like to thank to the Women and Public Policy Program and the Culture Bridge Fellowship for supporting this experience. Join me in this adventure!