A Dime a Day: The Possibilities and Limits of Private Schooling in Pakistan

The authors of this article state that Pakistan is severely offtrack in its progress toward the Millennium Development Goals relating to education for all. Its educational performance is poor, both in absolute terms and relative to the average income of the country. Pakistan has received global attention because of the widespread perception that the stress on its education system is radicalizing more and more young people through madrassa-based religious education. In this article, using new and hitherto unexamined data sources, the authors show that the real story in Pakistan is not the growth in religious schooling but that in self-owned, nonreligious, for-profit private schools. This rise in private schooling is decentralized, market based, and totally unaided by government subsidies or support. In 2000, 35 percent of children enrolled in school at the primary level were in such private schools, and that percentage has been growing rapidly. Importantly, this growth rate is higher in rural compared to urban areas and high among the poorest segments of the population. The authors first present details on the country context and their data sources. Next, they examine the growth of private-sector schooling in Pakistan. Then they document fees and costs for private schools and examine teacher profiles and wage differentials between public and private schools. They then discuss the limits to private schooling, focusing on the characteristics of villages in which private schools do and do not locate. Finally, they conclude with a discussion of educational policy, caveats, and opportunities for future research in this area. (Contains 7 figures, 7 tables, and 21 footnotes.)