cases and in others led to reduced spending. The (regulatory) role of the central ministries of education has not been adequately re-defined in the face of decentralization. 2.33
Two decades of effort in decentralization have improved the capacities of subnational governments and brought communities closer to their schools, turning the latter into stronger institutions. However, inside schools, principals and staff often continue to lack the skills, incentives and authority to perform up to potential. Throughout the region, even though the rhetoric of active learning pedagogy has been mainstreamed, actual classes continue to be taught to a large extent using traditional methods, the adaptation of teaching strategies to the diversity of student needs remaining a distant objective.
2.34
The experience of some countries with privately run but publicly financed schools is relevant in this regard. While quality and capacities in the private sector vary enormously, privately managed schools, including those that serve low-income populations, have been found often to produce, on average, the same product with fewer resources than the public sector. Private schools in some cases tend to have motivated principals and teachers, and parents actively engaged in matters related to the school. Private schools also have supervision and pedagogic support mechanisms and resources that help improve teaching. The lessons learned from management models in the private sector hold promise for schools in the public domain.
2.35
The third institutional change referred to above relates to the strengthening of capabilities in testing and evaluation. Seventeen Latin American countries, up from four in 1990, today have programs to test and evaluate student learning, and procedures to publish the results. A growing number of countries are participating in regional and international assessments of student learning. Test data are increasingly used as the empirical baseline for analytical studies. Some countries have made progress in improving their education and school statistics and making them available to the public online or in other formats. Others, however, are still not able to collect and issue basic statistics in a timely fashion. Throughout the region, the use of test results and data in evaluating teacher performance, planning the training and placement of teachers, and taking equity and quality enhancing measures remains the exception rather than the rule. This holds true in schools as well as in training institutions.
2.36
The key issue of management of the teaching force remains unsolved in most public school systems in LAC. Teachers have low expectations of their students; their own training is inadequate, particularly in the sciences and mathematics; and they spend most of their classroom time on routine tasks or enforcing discipline. Their training is de-linked from the actual curricula and classroom situations as they typically arise. In-service training programs, where they exist, have not resulted in measurable changes in behavior and improvements in classroom learning. Incentive systems only exceptionally reward improvements in teacher competence and classroom practice. 14