Objective: Strengthen technical education institutions in the Northern Zone in order to improve skills that are required in the labor market, and ultimately increase employment opportunities and income.

1. Evaluation results from the
strengthening of 20 secondary schools
and scholarship program
Larissa Campuzano
Closing the Gap: Strengthening the ties between policy and evaluation | July 28, 2016

2. • With financing from MCC, the government of El Salvador implemented two
interventions aimed at improving secondary education in the Northern
Zone.
• Strengthening 20 secondary schools
• Scholarships for secondary education
• Objective
• Strengthen technical education institutions in the Northern Zone in order to improve
skills that are required in the labor market, and ultimately increase employment
opportunities and income.
• Design of the Program
• CIDE, the provider of the technical assistance contracted by FOMILENIO, did a needs
assessment and based on that proposed an improvement program for every school.

3. Strengthening 20 Secondary Schools in the Northern Zone.
• From 2009-2012 $9 million was invested in:
• Improved infrastructure: Classrooms, sanitation services, labs, etc.
• Implementation of 2 technical secondary degree programs as part of the
MEGATEC model (which were linked to ITCHA)
• Civil Engineering in 2 institutions
• Alternative tourism in 2 institutions
• Implementation of 7 certificate program in 10 schools
• Training for teachers, directors, MINED and parents (540 beneficiaries)

4. • Scholarships in 17 of the strengthened secondary schools
• Investment of $3.2 million in scholarships
• Disbursed 3,409 scholarships to secondary students between 2009 and 2012
• Scholarships of $400 annually for students of secondary school. Applicants must:
• Be a Salvadorian resident of the Northern Zone
• Have limited economic resources
• Have passed 9th grade in the previous three years with a minimum grade point average
• Be interested in studying in one of the degree programs selected to be included in the
scholarship program.
• The scholarships were offered to students in their first year of secondary
education and were renewable for the duration of the program (up to two years)
as long as they passed the previous year.

5. • The Impact Evaluation of the strengthening of the secondary schools was
based a matched comparison group
• What is the impact on educational and labor outcomes of students of
strengthening 20 secondary schools (including the offering of
scholarships)?
• We compared the results of students in the 20 improved secondary schools with
students from 20 other schools that were no improved, but were similar before the
intervention.
• However, we cannot know if they were similar in unobservable characteristics
• We collected data on:
• Student-level data in the schools for the 2010, 2011, and 2012 school years
• Income, employment, higher education, a year after the students should have finished the
program, 2013.

6. Impact Evaluation Timeline

7. Results: Positive impacts on enrollment

9. • Impact evaluation of the scholarship program was based on random
assignment.
• What is the impact on student educational and labor outcomes of
offering scholarships to students in the strengthened secondary
schools?
• We compare the results of the students that were randomly chosen to
received scholarships at the start of their secondary education in 2010 with
students that had applied for the scholarship but were not randomly selected
to receive one.
• We surveyed students in the sample in 2011, 2012 and the end of 2013 to
gather indicators on education, income and employment.

10. Impact Evaluation Timeline

14. • Better communication and consultations with schools could have
avoided design problems.
• More involvement by MINED in the teacher training could give better
continuity to the program.
• The scholarships could be a tool to incentivize boys to complete
secondary school.
• Future scholarship programs could experiment with varying the
amount of the scholarship based on the educational costs of the
students.