IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wbk/wbrwps/1106.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Improving women's access to higher education : a review of World Bank project experience

Author

Listed:
  • Dundar, Halil
  • Haworth, Jennifer

Abstract

World Bank project experience on what works to improve women's access to tertiary education is so limited that it may be premature to draw firm conclusions. Many of the projects with interesting multiple interventions are ongoing. But two conclusions emerge. First, the most essential factor for successful intervention seems to be a strong demand for educated women in the labor market combined with a high private demand for higher education by women (and their parents). How well a project succeeds depends on the extent to which project components are sensitive to the local situation in terms of these factors. Projects with often only a single intervention were successful in societies where the formal labor market is growing and there are few social constraints or qualifications to inhibit women's participation. Projects with single interventions are unlikely to succeed with such pervasive social factors as low secondary enrollment rates for women, high direct costs for female education, and heavy cultural restrictions in the labor market. Second, the link between programs offered and labor market demands is critical. High secondary enrollment rates, heavy private demand for women's education, and the availability of student places do not necessarily guarantee an increase in women's participation in higher education - unless the programs are dovetailed to meet the specific demands of the labor market. It is not enough to overcome social barriers through policy interventions. Projects must take an integrated view of social and labor market constraints. The Bank seems to be moving in a positive direction as more projects are addressing and taking action against gender inequities today than they did in the 1970s. Of the projects introducing gender-specific interventions, 62 percent were developed in the past five years (1987-92). Some recent Bank projects have multiple, interrelated interventions. Initial project results indicate that this combined (package) approach, made country-specific, could well increase female participation in higher education.

Suggested Citation

  • Dundar, Halil & Haworth, Jennifer, 1993. "Improving women's access to higher education : a review of World Bank project experience," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1106, The World Bank.
  • Handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:1106
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2000/07/19/000009265_3961004075720/Rendered/PDF/multi_page.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lee, Valerie E. & Lockheed, Marlaine E., 1989. "The effects of single-sex schooling on student achievement and attitudes in Nigeria," Policy Research Working Paper Series 206, The World Bank.
    2. Verspoor, Adriaan, 1991. "Lending for learning : twenty years of World Bank support for basic education," Policy Research Working Paper Series 686, The World Bank.
    3. Schultz, T.P., 1990. "Returns To Women'S Education," Papers 603, Yale - Economic Growth Center.
    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. Rico, María Nieves, 1997. "Female human resources development: growth and equity as priorities," Asuntos de Género 5859, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL).

    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. Papageorgiou Chris & Pérez-Sebastián Fidel, 2005. "Matching Up the Data on Education with Economic Growth Models," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-22, April.
    2. Eisenkopf, Gerald & Hessami, Zohal & Fischbacher, Urs & Ursprung, Heinrich W., 2015. "Academic performance and single-sex schooling: Evidence from a natural experiment in Switzerland," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 123-143.
    3. Schindler, Dirk & Schjelderup, Guttorm, 2012. "Debt shifting and ownership structure," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(4), pages 635-647.
    4. Geeta Gandhi Kingdon, 1998. "Does the labour market explain lower female schooling in India?," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(1), pages 39-65.
    5. Pushkar Maitra, 2003. "Schooling and Educational Attainment: Evidence from Bangladesh," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(2), pages 129-153.
    6. Jere R. Behrman & Andrew D. Foster & Mark R. Rosenzweig & Prem Vashishtha, 1999. "Women's Schooling, Home Teaching, and Economic Growth," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(4), pages 682-714, August.
    7. Doris, Aedín & O’Neill, Donal & Sweetman, Olive, 2013. "Gender, single-sex schooling and maths achievement," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 104-119.
    8. Gustav Ranis & Frances Stewart, 2000. "Strategies for Success in Human Development," Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 1(1), pages 49-69.
    9. Lincove, Jane Arnold, 2009. "Determinants of schooling for boys and girls in Nigeria under a policy of free primary education," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 474-484, August.
    10. Cristina Echevarria & Karine Moe, 2000. "On the Need for Gender in Dynamic Models," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 6(2), pages 77-96.
    11. Antunes, Micaela & Martins, Rita, 2020. "Determinants of access to improved water sources: Meeting the MDGs," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    12. Pommeret, Aude & Smith, William T., 2005. "Fertility, volatility, and growth," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 87(3), pages 347-353, June.
    13. Barro, Robert J. & Lee, Jong-Wha, 1993. "International comparisons of educational attainment," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 363-394, December.
    14. Geeta Gandhi Kingdon & Jeemol Unni, 2001. "Education and Women's Labour Market Outcomes in India," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(2), pages 173-195.
    15. Johnson, David & Hayter, John & Broadfoot, Patricia, 2000. "The Quality of Learning and Teaching in Developing Countries: Assessing Literacy and Numeracy in Malawi and Sri Lanka," Education Research Papers 12868, Department for International Development (DFID) (UK).
    16. Harold Alderman & Jere Behrman & Victory Lavy & Rekha Menon, "undated". "Child Nutrition, Child Health, and School Enrollment: A Longitudinal Analysis," CARESS Working Papres 97-21, University of Pennsylvania Center for Analytic Research and Economics in the Social Sciences.
    17. Echevarria, Cristina & Merlo, Antonio, 1999. "Gender Differences in Education in a Dynamic Household Bargaining Model," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 40(2), pages 265-286, May.
    18. Suzanne Duryea & Jere R. Behrman & Miguel Székely, 1999. "Schooling Investments and Macroeconomic Conditions: A Micro-Macro Investigation for Latin America and the Caribbean," Research Department Publications 4184, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
    19. Vegard Skirbekk & Hans-Peter Kohler & Alexia Fürnkranz-Prskawetz, 2003. "Completing education and the timing of births and marriage: findings from a birth-month experiment in Sweden," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2003-017, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    20. Jere R. Behrman & Ryan Schneider, 1993. "An International Perspective on Pakistani Human Capital Investments in the Last Quarter Century," The Pakistan Development Review, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, vol. 32(1), pages 1-68.

    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:wbk:wbrwps:1106. 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: Roula I. Yazigi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dvewbus.html .

    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.