**Table 4** . Evaluations of the impact of school-level services provided by the private sector to government schools

|**Impact**<br>**evaluation study**|**Private sector**<br>**entity involved**|**Description of school-level services**<br>**provided by private sector **|**Beneficiaries of services**|**Findings of impact evaluation**|
|---|---|---|---|---|
||Pratham|Balsakhi program: A teacher provided by<br>Pratham to children falling behind in basic<br>literacyand numeracyin Grades 3 and 4.|India: Government schools<br>in Mumbai and Vadodara<br>cities|After two years, increase of 0.28 standard<br>deviations in test scores for Balsakhi and 0.47<br>standard deviations in test scores for|
|Banerjee et al.<br>(2007)|Pratham,<br>Media-Pro|Computer-assisted learning program:<br>Instructors from Pratham teaching students<br>to use computer software (off-the-shelf,<br>internally developed, and developed by<br>Media-Pro)to improve math.|India: Government<br>elementary schools in<br>Vadodara city|<br>computer-assisted learning, mostly among<br>students with initial weakest scores. Impact<br>faded to about 0.1 standard deviations one<br>year after services.|
|||Information to beneficiaries on existing<br>education-related institutions||In all three activities, no impact on community<br>|
|Banerjee et al.<br>(2010)|Pratham|Community members trained to engage in<br>a testingtool for children<br>Volunteers trained to hold remedial<br>readingcamps for children|India: Government primary<br>and secondary schools in<br>Uttar Pradesh|involvement, teacher effort, or learning<br>outcomes inside the school. Substantial<br>improvements in reading skills in remedial<br>reading activity.|
|Banerji and<br>Walton (2011)|Pratham|Combination of (1) Pratham training and<br>academic support to government school<br>teachers; (2) specially designed learning<br>materials; (3) village volunteer support to<br>children in need|India: Government primary<br>and secondary schools in<br>Bihar and Uttarakhand|Significant improvements in reading, writing<br>and math test scores, with largest gains among<br>students with weakest initial scores.|
|Borkum et al.<br>(2013)|Akshara<br>Foundation|Akshara providing libraries with books and<br>educational activities.|India: Government primary<br>schools in Bangalore|No impact on student test scores after 16<br>months.|
|He et al. (2008)|Pratham|English language instruction methods<br>consisting of a specially designed machine<br>or flash card based activities implemented<br>either indirectly through a teacher training<br>program or directly by externally<br>supervised teaching assistants.|India: Government primary<br>schools in Mumbai|After one year, all implementation strategies<br>yielding gains of about 0.25-0.35 standard<br>deviation in students’ knowledge of English.<br>Weaker students benefiting more from teacher<br>directed activities while stronger students<br>benefiting more from the more self-paced<br>machine-based activities.|
|He et al. (2009)|Pratham|_Shishuvachan_curriculum that focuses on<br>comprehension facilitated by teacher-<br>student interaction centered around<br>storytelling and classroom games.|India: Government primary<br>schools and pre-schools (as<br>well as some Pratham pre-<br>schools) in Mumbai|Gains of 0.12 to 0.70 standard deviations in<br>performance on basic literacy assessment.<br>More effective as a supplement to existing<br>instruction rather than as a primary means of<br>instruction. Larger gains for students with<br>weaker initial readingability.|

_Source:_ Authors’s literature review.

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