IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/injoed/v97y2023ics0738059322001730.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Low-fee private preschools as the symbol of imagined ‘modernity’? – Parental perspectives on early childhood care and education (ECCE) in an urban informal settlement in Zambia

Author

Listed:
  • Okitsu, Taeko
  • Edwards, D. Brent
  • Mwanza, Peggy
  • Miller, Scott

Abstract

This paper explores (1) the public and private options available at the ECCE level, (2) parents’ expectation for ECCE, and (3) preferred and actual choice of preschools in an urban informal settlement in Zambia. The findings reveal strong demand for ECCE among the urban poor. This demand overwhelms low-fee private (LFP) preschool options due both to an insufficient number of public preschools as well as parents’ relative preference for the LFP options. Typically, LFP preschools offer highly academic oriented curriculum with English as a medium of instruction, divergent from the government’s play-based and mother-tongue based curriculum. By adopting critical cultural political economy approach as an analytical framework, we found that urban poor parents increasingly view investing in LFP preschools as an important household strategy to ‘transform’ their children into ‘modern’ citizens, eventually exiting from their stigmatized lifestyle and marginalized social status.

Suggested Citation

  • Okitsu, Taeko & Edwards, D. Brent & Mwanza, Peggy & Miller, Scott, 2023. "Low-fee private preschools as the symbol of imagined ‘modernity’? – Parental perspectives on early childhood care and education (ECCE) in an urban informal settlement in Zambia," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:injoed:v:97:y:2023:i:c:s0738059322001730
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ijedudev.2022.102723
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0738059322001730
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2022.102723?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Heckman, James J. & Moon, Seong Hyeok & Pinto, Rodrigo & Savelyev, Peter A. & Yavitz, Adam, 2010. "The rate of return to the HighScope Perry Preschool Program," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(1-2), pages 114-128, February.
    2. Bob Jessop, 2001. "Institutional Re(turns) and the Strategic – Relational Approach," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 33(7), pages 1213-1235, July.
    3. Joshi, Priyadarshani, 2019. "The growth, roles and needs of the private education system: Private stakeholder perspectives from Nepal," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 57-67.
    4. Nishimura, Mikiko & Yamano, Takashi, 2013. "Emerging Private Education in Africa: Determinants of School Choice in Rural Kenya," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 266-275.
    5. Singh, Abhijeet, 2015. "Private school effects in urban and rural India: Panel estimates at primary and secondary school ages," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 16-32.
    6. Stern, Jonathan M.B. & Smith, Thomas M., 2016. "Private secondary schools in Indonesia: What is driving the demand?," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 1-11.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hu, Yujie & Sherlock, Phillip & Huang, Jing & Knopf, Herman T. & Hall, Jaclyn M., 2024. "Unveiling spatial mismatch in childcare supply and demand: An excess commuting analysis of home-to-childcare distance in subsidized families," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Soham Sahoo, 2017. "Intra-Household Gender Disparity in School Choice: Evidence from Private Schooling in India," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 53(10), pages 1714-1730, October.
    2. Gooptu, Sayoree & Mukherjee, Vivekananda, 2023. "Does private tuition crowd out private schooling? Evidence from India," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    3. Elizabeth M. Caucutt & Lance Lochner & Youngmin Park, 2017. "Correlation, Consumption, Confusion, or Constraints: Why Do Poor Children Perform so Poorly?," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 119(1), pages 102-147, January.
    4. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/6s39gt704s95upu27ma7s3p6q8 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Meroni, Elena Claudia & Piazzalunga, Daniela & Pronzato, Chiara D., 2018. "Use of Extra-School Time and Child Behaviours: Evidence from the UK," IZA Discussion Papers 11606, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Nandi, Arindam & Sahoo, Soham & Haberland, Nicole & Ngô, Thoại D., 2023. "A glass ceiling at the playhouse? Gender gaps in public and private preschool enrollment in India," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    7. Anna Herzog, 2022. "Imaginaries, directionalities, agency and new path creation [Imaginaries, directionalities, Akteurshandeln und Pfadkreation]," Review of Regional Research: Jahrbuch für Regionalwissenschaft, Springer;Gesellschaft für Regionalforschung (GfR), vol. 42(3), pages 279-307, December.
    8. Sakaue, Katsuki, 2018. "Informal fee charge and school choice under a free primary education policy: Panel data evidence from rural Uganda," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 112-127.
    9. DeMalach, Elad & Schlosser, Analia, 2024. "Short- and Long-Term Effects of Universal Preschool: Evidence from the Arab Population in Israel," CEPR Discussion Papers 18781, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    10. Robert Rogers & Doan Hai Ma & Tra Nguyen & Ngoc Anh Nguyen, 2019. "Early childhood education and cognitive outcomes in adolescence: a longitudinal study from Vietnam," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 27(6), pages 658-669, November.
    11. Kasper Brandt, 2018. "Private beats public: A flexible value-added model with Tanzanian school switchers," WIDER Working Paper Series 81, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    12. Marine de Talance, 2017. "Quality Perceptions and School Choice in Rural Pakistan," Working Papers hal-01663029, HAL.
    13. Holla,Alaka & Bendini,Maria Magdalena & Dinarte Diaz,Lelys Ileana & Trako,Iva, 2021. "Is Investment in Preprimary Education Too Low ? Lessons from (Quasi) ExperimentalEvidence across Countries," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9723, The World Bank.
    14. Roland Fryer & Steven Levitt & John List & Anya Samek, 2020. "Introducing CogX: A New Preschool Education Program Combining Parent and Child Interventions," Framed Field Experiments 00718, The Field Experiments Website.
    15. Henning Hermes & Philipp Lergetporer & Fabian Mierisch & Frauke Peter & Simon Wiederhold, 2023. "Discrimination on the Child Care Market: A Nationwide Field Experiment," Working Papers 225, Bavarian Graduate Program in Economics (BGPE).
    16. Sallin, Aurelién, 2021. "Estimating returns to special education: combining machine learning and text analysis to address confounding," Economics Working Paper Series 2109, University of St. Gallen, School of Economics and Political Science.
    17. Orazio Attanasio & Helen Baker-Henningham & Raquel Bernal & Costas Meghir & Diana Pineda & Marta Rubio-Codina, 2022. "Early Stimulation and Nutrition: The Impacts of a Scalable Intervention," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 20(4), pages 1395-1432.
    18. Apps, Patricia & Mendolia, Silvia & Walker, Ian, 2013. "The impact of pre-school on adolescents’ outcomes: Evidence from a recent English cohort," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 183-199.
    19. Emma Tominey, 2010. "The Timing of Parental Income and Child Outcomes: The Role of Permanent and Transitory Shocks," CEE Discussion Papers 0120, Centre for the Economics of Education, LSE.
    20. Goel, Deepti & Barooah, Bidisha, 2018. "Drivers of Student Performance: Evidence from Higher Secondary Public Schools in Delhi," GLO Discussion Paper Series 231, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    21. Andrew M. Wood, 2004. "Domesticating Urban Theory? US Concepts, British Cities and the Limits of Cross-national Applications," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 41(11), pages 2103-2118, October.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:injoed:v:97:y:2023:i:c:s0738059322001730. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/international-journal-of-educational-development .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.