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4. Outline and assessment of the evidence
Headline finding:
Pupils attending private school tend to achieve better learning outcomes than pupils in
state schools. However, studies aiming to identify these effects are typically faced with
the problem of effectively accounting for social background factors and whilst several
studies attempt to do so, many also recognise that it may be difficult to ascertain whether
achievement advantage can be fully ascribed to private schools. It is important to note
that many children may not be achieving basic competencies even in private schools.
Numerous quantitative studies have investigated the relationship between school type on
the one hand, and student achievement on the other, in diverse country contexts.
International comparisons have shown that these effects are not uniform either across or
within education systems, and are likely to be context dependent (see: Rutkowski and
Rutkowski 2008). Given the heterogeneity of private schools across the developing world,
and the variety of research methods used to examine them, it is widely acknowledged that
empirical findings in this area are difficult to interpret conclusively, let alone be
generalisable (Chudgar and Quin 2012; Goyal 2009; Hartwig 2013). There are examples of
well- and under-performing schools in both sectors, and probably in all countries.
Supporting evidence
Some recent quantitative studies have rigorously shown a significant achievement
advantage for students attending private, fee paying schools even after social
background is taken into account. Much of this research comes from India 6 , some of it
using nationally representative data. For example, both Desai et al. (2008) (using National
Council of Applied Economic Research, NCAER, data) and French and Kingdon (2010) (using
Annual Status of Education report, ASER, learning data) compare the difference in
achievement levels of two or more children from the same household who attend private
and public schools, adjusting for each child’s grade and gender. Using this ‘fixed family
effects’ method, they control for most (observable and unobservable) factors that are
shared among children within the household. Both find a significant positive private school
achievement advantage based on standardised test scores. The size of the effect was
appreciable –about one fifth to one third of a standard deviation in the above two studies.
Moreover, the size of the private school effect was greater for children in the low income
strata.
These findings regarding the private school effect are corroborated in other statistical
analyses from India. Using cross-sectional data from Orissa, Goyal (2009) also finds a small
but significant private school premium (as measured by mean test score differences in
mathematics and reading) that cannot, he argues, be entirely explained through
unobservable differences. Kingdon (2008) similarly finds a raw achievement advantage of
private school pupils in urban India, although concludes that this is significantly reduced
after controlling for personal endowments, and in practice only a minority of the
difference in achievement can be explained through the influence of the school. Pal
(2010) used data from five states of rural India and finds that the presence of private
school has a significant positive impact on village-level, class 5 pass rates. In a relatively
6 Two RCTs in the context of Colombia have also shown a significant private school advantage in the
short term, however these studies were pre-2008 and were not included in the review (Angrist et
al. 2002, 2006).
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