Global Policy Forum

By Liz McGregor

Years of under-funding and churning reform have left education systems vulnerable and in disarray. The teaching force is demoralised and fractured. Sound familiar? Take Britain's problems and multiply them a thousand-fold and you get somewhere close to the conditions in developing countries. On top of endless reforms imposed from above, they have to contend with salaries below the poverty line (if they're paid at all), no resources to speak of and the most virulent epidemic of modern times.

An alarming report from Voluntary Services Oversees (VSO), released this week to coincide with World Teachers' Day on Saturday, reveals shocking conditions in the secondary schools of some developing countries. It highlights derelict, overcrowded classrooms where teachers often absent themselves for long periods because they have to take second jobs to supplement inadequate salaries. It tells of parents having to make extreme sacrifices to send their children to school, then finding they are barely being educated at all.

The report details case studies in secondary schools in three countries - Zambia, Malawi and Papua New Guinea - but says the same problems apply in primary schools. Education in developing countries is at a critical juncture, the report warns.

A lot of the blame, unfortunately, can be laid at the door of often well-meaning, postcolonial northern interventions. The World Conference on Education 2000 in Dakar, Senegal, reconfirmed international commitments made in Jomtien, Thailand, 10 years earlier to Education For All. This included a commitment that, "by 2015, all children, particularly girls, children in difficult circumstances and those belonging to ethnic minorities, have access to and complete free and compulsory primary education of good quality."

Political will was mobilised and a massive increase in school enrolment was achieved. However, the quality of education these children are getting is frequently so poor that they will leave school with the expectation of being able to participate fully in society and the economy but without the knowledge and skills to do so.

VSO identifies profound teacher demoralisation as the key problem. Teachers, particularly in poor countries with no other resources, are pivotal to education, and policy has so far ignored their views and needs.

Public spending constraints imposed by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) have decimated education budgets in the past two decades. In most developing countries, up to 95% of education budgets go on teachers' pay, but cuts have taken salaries in many instances to below the poverty line. In June 2001, the average net monthly salary of teachers interviewed in Zambia was US$44 (£28), rising to $77 (£49) for a secondary head. A basket of food for a family of six in Zambia cost an estimated $85 (£54).

Absenteeism is a particular problem in Zambia and Malawi, where teachers frequently have to take second jobs in order to feed their families. In Zambia, what is known as "remote teaching" is becoming commonplace: the teacher writes notes on the board or gets a school prefect to read out of a textbook while he or she earns money elsewhere.

Poverty has also diminished teachers' status in the community, which has added to their demoralisation. It was not always thus: in the 1940s, 50s and 60s, teachers were held in high esteem, reflecting in part the fact that secondary schooling was only available to a tiny minority. Teachers were seen as purveyors of modernity, progress and development and remunerated accordingly.

However, the subsequent cut in salaries has taken its toll on public perception of teachers' role and contribution. Ironically, this comes at a time when their dependency on the community has increased: teachers need credit in local stores and might even depend on supplies of cheap local produce to survive.

Another major cause of dissatisfaction is the barrage of educational innovations - very often developed by northern donors. In some countries, donor lending and grants for education have almost exclusively taken the form of project funding, dependent on expatriate expertise and skewing decisions about mainstream education delivery. But expats leave; and because the reforms are mostly imposed on local teachers with no consultation, they are not sustainable. In all three countries, teachers had tried to implement curriculum reforms about which they had not been consulted and which were sometimes inappropriate or badly planned as a result.

"There are no bottom-up communications," said a teacher in a Papua New Guinea high school. "I have not been consulted on anything in nine years about what teachers feel. They just do it in the top offices and then send it down."

Another common complaint was the lack of teaching materials. With no textbooks or other equipment, teachers felt inadequate and struggled to manage. Many schools were dilapidated and neglected; typically old, dusty and equipped with, at most, a chalkboard and a few desks and chairs. They leaked in the rainy season, were stifling in summer and freezing in winter.

Most of the schools studied were in remote areas, far from shopping, entertainment and health facilities. Some could be reached only by plane. Teachers' housing was similarly dire, often lacking electricity, running water and decent sanitation. Teachers felt they were the lowest of the low; the neglected and forgotten profession.

And, of course, they are not immune from the ravages of the Aids epidemic. In Zambia and Malawi, HIV/Aids is having a major impact on teachers: unable to afford anti-retroviral drugs, they have little defence against an illness that still carries debilitating stigma. They also need time off to care for sick relatives and attend and arrange funerals. This is especially true of female teachers. "In a situation where teachers' morale and motivation is already very fragile, the intensifying effect of living in a society deeply affected by HIV may prove critical," says the report.

The good news, however, is that policy-makers are learning from their mistakes. There has been a significant shift in the debate about the role the international community plays in supporting educational developments in the south. Dakar and its aftermath have ushered in a new era where it is generally agreed that education strategies must be nationally designed and owned by governments. Donors are agreeing to contribute directly to government budgets, eschewing the project-based funding of the past 20 years.

A new action plan has been approved by the World Bank which promises to mobilise donors so that the Education For All commitments can be met properly. Worryingly, though, the bank appears to be wedded still to neoliberal policies: the plan proposes a ceiling on teacher salaries as a proportion of national education budgets. Quite apart from the fact that this disregards principles of national sovereignty and rights of collective bargaining, it implies a failure to get to grips with a fundamental cause of the current malaise.

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