2012). Evidence of the effect of school-based management on student learning is more mixed and has generally employed weak evaluation techniques, though some recent research shows promising impact on Spanish in 3<sup>rd</sup> grade (Santibañez **,** Abreu-Lastra, and O'Donoghue, 2014).

In Argentina, the literature on the impact of the institutional setting on learning outcomes is also mixed. Regarding longer schools days, one study in Buenos Aires shows some positive results on secondary school graduation rates (Llach, Adrogue and Gigaglia, 2009), but impacts on learning weren’t estimated. Another study shows that schools in large cities had higher average test scores than other schools, and that top achieving schools were in large and medium-sized cities, while schools in villages and small towns had higher variation than schools in cities (AbdulHamid, 2007). Pupil-teacher ratios appear to have no effect (Fresoli et al., 2007).

One question that has garnered much attention in Argentina is whether the observed performance gap of private schools over public schools is attributable to the private nature of the school. Both Marchionni et al. (2013) and Albornoz et al. (2015), examining PISA 2009 and PISA 2009 and 2012 data respectively, conclude that when controlling for peer effects the performance advantage of private schools disappears. Formichella (2011), using data from PISA 2006, also finds that private school outperformance is in large part accounted for by having students who are more prepared to learn. The high segmentation of students, which is, to a lesser extent, also present in public schools, features prominently in the literature, and seems to be an important element behind the inequality of learning in Argentina (Kruger, 2011).

# **III. Country Context and Trends in Argentina’s Learning Outcomes**

_3.1 The Education Sector in Argentina_ Argentina was one of the first countries in the region to achieve universal primary education, and more recently saw rapid expansion of secondary education from 55 percent in 1999 to more than 75 percent in 2012 (UNESCO UIS, 2015). Today, the education system serves about 11 million students,<sup>2</sup> nearly 4 million of whom are enrolled at the secondary level. Among secondary school students, 39 percent are in private schools, a proportion unchanged since 2007 (DINIECE, 2015). Upper secondary school, covering grades 10, 11, and 12, consists of general and vocational tracks and serves students aged 15 to 18. The majority of these are enrolled in a general track, with only about 16 percent following a technical track (DINIECE, 2011). Therefore, among the students sitting for the PISA test, the vast majority are following a general track, with only a few having spent some months on a vocational track prior to testing.

At the primary level, where about 4.5 million students are attending school, private schools have seen their numbers increase from 29 percent of students in 2007 to 36 percent in 2014 (DINIECE, 2015). There’s much speculation about what is behind this growth. Some analysts cite supply-driven financing policies (Narodowski, 2002, and Narodowski and Moschetti, 2015), while others focus on demand-side factors relating to family choice of schools. This includes proximity to a school, regardless of whether it is public or private (Gomez Schettini, 2007), or matters relating more to perceptions of the services offered (Cafiero, 2008), including better equipment or better quality of instruction. Still other factors could relate to issues of accountability in private schools, with teachers striking less, and schools therefore more likely to stay open, or simply perceptions of frequent teacher absenteeism in public schools (Tosoni and Natel, 2010).

> 2Not including adult education.

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