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No Small Matter: The Importance of Investing in Young Children Globally1
Claudia Costin, in her keynote address, spoke on the importance of integrating the three sectors of education, health, and social protection to promote healthy childhood development. Children should be at the center of policy making, she stated, noting that “investing in young children is one of the smartest investments a country can make.” She stated that the first years of life are crucial to healthy development, and it is important that children receive “regular mental, social, emotional, and physical stimulation along with health care and proper nutrition to keep their development on track.”
Costin argued that too few children benefit from early childhood programs. Policy makers do not always fully recognize the importance of this investment, and parents are not always aware of the benefits of early childhood education. Less than 50 percent of 3- to 6-year-olds are enrolled in preprimary education (Levin and Schwartz, 2012), Costin stated, and only 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent of gross national product in developing countries is spent on it (Engle et al., 2011). Costin also described an effort in Brazil to ensure that every child is enrolled in an early childhood program by 2016. However, full enrollment is not enough. She noted that program quality should be high, as studies indicate that poor-quality programs can be detrimental to development. Further, Costin emphasized the importance of program affordability; in many low-income countries,
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1 This chapter summarizes information presented by Claudia Costin, Senior Director for Education at the World Bank Group.
private-sector programs do exist, but families cannot afford them. Costin noted that this holds true for other aspects of child development as well. For example, she stated that nearly one in four children under age 5 are physically stunted, and she identified the urgent need for change (United Nations, 2014).
The World Bank Group supports governments in making investments for young children through multiple entry points in the areas of health, social protection, and education. As described by Costin, these practices work together to provide loans, grants, and policy advice in the following areas: food fortification, community nutrition, food security, promotion of breast feeding, prenatal care, immunizations, newborn health, child survival, preprimary education, and school readiness. With regard to school readiness, Costin noted that preschool education is not only about preparation for future education; it also creates happy and healthy children in the present.
Costin also discussed the World Bank’s focus on family support and inclusion. Specifically, she highlighted investments in social assistance and conditional cash transfers (CCTs). As an example, she described Brazil’s Bolsa Familia program,2 which the World Bank supplements with additional money under conditions related to attendance at crèches and preschools, parental participation in teacher meetings, and parental education.
Costin noted that the World Bank Group has invested nearly $4 billion in multisectoral child-centered projects. In the past 14 years, there has been an upward trend in investment, with a significant increase in 2011. These investments include analytical work that is essential to the work of the World Bank. They assess what is effective and ineffective and can provide evidence for scaling up, as described by Costin. The World Bank also created a guide for policy makers making recommendations for early childhood. It covers nutrition, health, sanitation, social protection, and education (see Figure 2-1). She pointed out that the guide includes interventions focused not only on children, but on maternal health, parental health, and education. Finally, she described an e-learning course the World Bank has developed that provides information to policy makers on why investing in children matters and how to implement early interventions.
Costin expressed concern about the sustainable financing of programs for children, particularly in low-resourced countries, noting that stop-and-go efforts are not beneficial to young children. Making such programs inexpensive and affordable so governments can continue to invest is one approach. However, according to Costin, not all countries should take this
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2 The Bolsa Familia cash transfer program is discussed in Chapters 4 and 5.
FIGURE 2-1 World Bank Group Early Childhood Guide for Policy Makers.
NOTE: The idea of presenting interventions by sector and/or age has been used by a number of previous authors.
SOURCE: Denboba et al., 2014.
low-cost approach. Countries that have already made quality investments in young children should continue to do so. Another major challenge is the difficulty in coordinating across government ministries when child development is often managed by different institutions, stated Costin. Even when heads of agencies come to common understanding, bureaucracies do not always come together easily.
Costin closed by underscoring the need for impact evaluation. She explained why institutions such as the World Bank invest in analytical work and impact evaluation versus investing directly into action, and emphasized that knowing what works serves as a guide for future
investment. She shared two examples of evaluations the World Bank has completed in Mozambique and Brazil. The first tested the impact of low-cost preschool programs on children’s enrollment in and readiness for primary school. After the program, the children were better prepared for the demands of schooling and more likely to start primary school at age 6. The Minister of Education of Mozambique expanded the model to reach 80,000 children in its third year, and the World Bank is working to evaluate the scale-up (World Bank, 2014). The second evaluation, Costin described, is exploring the impact of full-time daycare participation of Bolsa Familia beneficiaries. Costin emphasized that one important aspect of the program is that there is a priority for children with disabilities. These children are fully mainstreamed and provided with additional support. Moreover, this program is available for children of both working and nonworking parents, positing that there are teenage mothers who need to return to school. The evaluation is ongoing, but she noted that there have been some promising and consistent preliminary results.
In the discussion following the keynote presentation, Costin addressed questions from the audience regarding the loss of positive impact as interventions go to scale. She noted that it is easier to maintain high quality in a pilot, or single setting, but when multiple settings and layers are involved, some loss of quality is expected. However, to ensure that this decline in quality does not decrease all expected outcomes, she asserted that programs at scale should be monitored. Additionally, Costin noted that in order to reduce inequities, resources should reach the most vulnerable children.
Costin also discussed the implementation of programming in areas affected by disaster and conflict. She described Schools of Tomorrow, a program she once worked on that brought preschools into violent areas in Rio de Janeiro. Through her work in this program, Costin and her colleagues determined that the provision of good quality education was not enough in violent areas. Additional resources for schools, including better pay for teachers, were also needed. In this way, programs can address some externalities not related directly to the educational programs to maintain program fidelity.
Finally, she explored the process of converging the different perspectives and goals of the multiplicity of stakeholders of young children, including multiple ministries. In discussing how to integrate the pieces, she mentioned two possible approaches: (1) household visits, in which issues around health, social protection, and education could be addressed, and (2) community centers where parents can come together
to share information and receive support from professionals. Costin also noted that a central coordinating entity high in the government can help to integrate the missions of various government agencies, highlighting Colombia and Brazil as examples.
Denboba, A. D., R. K. Sayre, Q. T. Wodon, L. Elder, K., L. B. Rawlings, and J. Lombardi. 2014. Stepping up early childhood development: Investing in young children for high returns. Washington, DC: World Bank Group.
Engle, P. L., L. C. Fernald, H. Alderman, J. Behrman, C. O’Gara, A. Yousafzai, M. C. de Mello, M. Hidrobo, N. Ulkuer, I. Ertem, and S. Iltus. 2011. Strategies for reducing inequalities and improving developmental outcomes for young children in low-income and middle-income countries. Lancet 378(9799):1339-1353.
Levin, H. M., and H. L. Schwartz. 2012. Comparing costs of early childhood care and education programs: An international perspective. Hacienda Publica Espanola 201(2):39-65.
United Nations. 2014. Millennium development goals report 2014. New York: United Nations.
World Bank. 2014. In Mozambique, helping kids get a strong start. http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2014/06/26/in-mozambique-helping-kids-get-a-strong-start (accessed March 15, 2015).
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