Daniel Suryadarma

Improving Student Performance in Public Primary Schools in Developing Countries: Evidence from Indonesia

Abstract This paper investigates the correlates of student performance in mathematics and dictation tests among schoolchildren in Indonesia. This is the first such study to use a new nationally representative sample of Indonesian primary‐school students. Our dataset includes unique data on teacher absenteeism collected through direct observation, the first ever in Indonesia. We find that teacher absenteeism is indeed a significantly negative correlate of student performance, while quality of school facilities predicts better performance. We also find a significant non‐monotonic concave relationship between the pupil–teacher ratio and student’s mathematics performance. Finally, we discuss the policy implications of the results.

How corruption diminishes the effectiveness of public spending on education in Indonesia

This paper takes advantage of a regional corruption measure to assess the impact of corruption on the effectiveness of public spending in the education sector in Indonesia, one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Two sets of outcomes are considered: school enrolment rates and school performance in national examinations. Public spending appears to have a negligible effect on school enrolment in highly corrupt regions, but a statistically significant, positive and relatively large effect in less corrupt regions. In contrast, public spending has no significant effect on school performance. The main lesson from this paper is that pouring more public funds into the education system is unlikely to bring about improvement unless it is accompanied by efforts to improve governance in the sector.

A Reassessment of Inequality and its Role in Poverty Reduction in Indonesia

This study provides an overview of inequality trends in Indonesia for the period from 1984 to 2002. Different from previous studies on inequality in Indonesia, we use data on household consumption expenditure that takes into account price differentials across regions. We found that, although all measures indicate a decrease in inequality during the economic crisis, it actually increased for those below the poverty line. We also found that because inequality during the peak of the crisis in 1999 was at its lowest level in 15 years, the poverty rate decreased very rapidly during the recovery between 1999 and 2002.

The Measurement and Trends of Unemployment in Indonesia: The Issue of Discouraged Workers

This study provides an overview of the concepts used to measure unemployment in Indonesia and their consequences for the measured unemployment trends. One finding shows that BPSs decision in 2001 to relax the definition of labor force by including discouraged workers has resulted in an artificially high open unemployment rate and disguises the actual decline in traditionally-measured open unemployment rates post-crisis. Another finding indicates that discouraged workers in Indonesia are not confined only to the poor and those who are denied access to the proper job market. We recommend that, if Indonesia still wants to utilize a broader definition of the labor force, the measurement of open unemployment should adhere to the ILOs recommendation of only including those discouraged workers who are still willing to work. The discouraged workers who are unwilling to work should be left in the out of labor force category.

Patterns of Teacher Absence in Public Primary Schools in Indonesia

This paper uses the first nationally representative survey of teacher absence collected through direct observation to determine the patterns of absence among full-time teachers in public primary schools in Indonesia. Based on the survey data, the authors found a national teacher absence rate of 19%, with almost half of the absences due to unacceptable reasons. In general, highly educated teachers, contract teachers, and less experienced teachers have higher absence rates. There are also significantly higher absence rates in schools with inadequate facilities. In contrast, teachers who take on extra jobs outside teaching are not associated with more absences while being dissatisfied with income is actually correlated with lower absence. Finally, given that sanctions on shirking teachers are rarely implemented, they do not seem to lower cases of teacher absence.

Destined for Destitution: Intergenerational Poverty Persistence in Indonesia

We estimate intergenerational poverty persistence in Indonesia using a panel dataset. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first such study looking at the issue in the Indonesian context. Different from the majority of studies on this issue, we include controls for several household and individual characteristics, including for living arrangements. Moreover, to circumvent data issues that plague earnings data in developing countries, we use chronic poverty status as a long-term parental welfare measure. We find there is a substantial intergenerational mobility away from poverty among children from poor households. However, the risk of continuing to live in poverty as adults is 35 percentage points higher for children from chronically poor households than for children from households which are not chronically poor.

Measuring Unemployment in Developing Countries: The Case of Indonesia

Measuring unemployment in developing countries is not straightforward due to the presence of a large number of discouraged workers. Including them into the labor force is sometimes appropriate in order to reflect the true state of unemployment. However, the decision must be based on careful research. This study provides a case study of Indonesia, whose decision to include discouraged workers into its labor force resulted in an artificially high unemployment rates and disguised the actual post-crisis decline in unemployment in Indonesia. The discouraged workers can be classified based on their willingness to work. If Indonesia still wants to include discouraged workers into the labor force, only those willing to work should be included. Copyright 2007 The Authors; Journal compilation 2007 CEIS, Fondazione Giacomo Brodolini and Blackwell Publishing Ltd..

The Effect of Childhood Migration on Human Capital Accumulation: Evidence from Rural-Urban Migrants in Indonesia

Developing countries are experiencing unprecedented levels of urbanization. Although most of these movements are motivated by economic reasons, they could affect the human capital accumulation of the children who follow their parents to the cities. This paper estimates the causal effect of permanently migrating as a child from a rural area to an urban area on human capital outcomes. To our knowledge, this paper is one of only several papers, especially in the context of a developing country, which is able to estimate the causal effect of migration. We utilize a recent survey of urban-rural migrants in Indonesia and merge it with a nationally representative survey to create a dataset that contains migrants in urban areas and non-migrants in rural areas who were born in the same rural districts. We then employ a measure of district-level propensity to migrate, calculated from the Indonesian intercensal survey, as an instrument. We find that childhood migration to urban areas increase education attainment by about 4.5 years by the time these individuals are adults. In addition, the childhood migrants face a lower probability to be underweight by about 15 percentage points as adults. However, we find no statistically significant effect on height, which is a measure of long-term nutritional intake, and we only find a weak effect on the probability to be obese. Therefore, our results suggest a permanent, positive, and large effect of childhood migration on education attainment and some health measures. In addition, our results can rule out any negative effect on health.

Corruption, Public Spending, and Education Outcomes: Evidence from Indonesia

This paper takes advantage of a new corruption measure across regions within a country to measure the influence of corruption on public spending efficacy in the education sector in Indonesia, one of the most corrupt countries in the world. I find that public spending has a negligible effect on education outcomes in highly corrupt regions, while it has a statistically significant, positive, and relatively large effect in less corrupt regions. I do not find any direct effect of corruption on education outcomes, hence implying that one channel through which corruption adversely affects the education system is through reducing the effectiveness of public spending.

Gender differences in numeracy in Indonesia: evidence from a longitudinal dataset

This paper uses a rich longitudinal dataset to measure the evolution of the gender differences in numeracy among school-age children in Indonesia. Girls outperformed boys by 0.08 standard deviations when the sample was around 11 years old. Seven years later, the gap has widened to 0.19 standard deviations, equivalent to around 18 months of schooling. I find no evidence that households invest more resources in girls relative to boys. However, there is suggestive evidence that schools play a role in fostering the gender gap in numeracy. Given the importance of numeracy in later life, there may be some scope for public policies to address the widening numeracy gap between genders.