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Quality and Efficiency of Education

Curriculum reform and expansion of the system

Political and socio-economic changes have led to successive reforms of the country’s education system.  Before 1975, the country adopted a French-based education system that required 13 years of education (6+4+2+1) with 4 or 5 major examinations.  After 1979, the Ministry of Education, in consideration of the country’s urgent needs, executed a 10-year education system (4+3+3) and then expanded it to an 11-year education system from 1986 to 1996. 

The Ministry has continued to improve the education system. The curriculum was reformed, new textbooks were developed and new teaching skills were provided to teachers to prepare ground for the introduction of a new 12-year education system (6+3+3) in the 1996-97 school year. The new system has increased the number of learning hours for every grade in the cycle of primary education.

In the framework of this new 12-year education system, one school year lasts 38 learning weeks, with 5  learning per day per week, 6 periods of learning per day, and each period of learning lasting 45 minutes. Under the old curriculum, one school year lasted only 32-33 weeks, and pupils attended only 4 hours of learning per day. In consideration of the shortage of classrooms, the Ministry allowed school to teach only 5 periods per day and each period of learning lasted only 40 minutes.

According to a survey jointly launched in March 1999 by the Department of Planning, MoEYS, and World Bank Project, the new curriculum should apply 1,140 periods of learning which is equal to 855 teacher-pupil contact hours. The teaching and learning hours stipulated by MoEYS are 950 periods of learning hours or 633 teacher-pupil contact hours but, in practice only 825 periods of learning hours of 533 teacher-pupil contact hours are available.

In fact, the amount of practical teaching and learning hours are far lower than what is stipulated by the Ministry as a good number of schools teach level less than 5 periods of learning per day. Many prolonged holidays also affect effective learning hours.

Internal efficiency

As the scale of our new system of education is quite similar to that of neighboring countries in the region, the MoEYS hopes to be able to reduce the repetition rate and increase learning hours. As yet, the repetition rate in Grade 1 is very high at 40.9%, but the promotion rate is 48.4%.  In general, Grade 1 students have the highest repetition rate.

In the current school year, dropout rates are very high, especially in Grade 1, Grade 2 and Grade 3 at 10.7%, 14.0% respectively. There is growing fear that these dropouts might become illiterates.

The pupil-teacher ratio is about 48.1 to 1 nation-wide through 37 to 1 in urban primary schools. The shortage of classrooms is very critical for schools in the urban areas at 87.3 pupils per classroom, thus forcing some schools to conduct 3 shifts per day.

The enrollment rate is relatively low and the learning achievements or internal efficiency of the education system is very low.  The low enrollment rate and internal efficiency result in great loss of resources in terms of finance, materials and equipment, and time to the country as a whole.  The Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport is striving hard to solve these problems.

Non-formal education

In parallel with the development of the formal education system, the MoEYS also focuses on the non-formal education system, which is an indispensable component of the education system, particularly in the attempt to increase literacy rates.

In Cambodia, the definition of a literate person is someone who has the ability to read and write to a certain extent only.  The literacy rate of those 15 years and over is 67%. Compared to other developing countries in the region, the literacy rate in Cambodia is relatively high. In the light of previous literacy campaigns, the literacy rate rose to 68.7%: 81.8% for males and 58% for females. However, the literacy rate in rural and remote areas is far lower than in the towns.  To improve the situation, the Royal Government has reshaped the National Literacy Committee with the view of further intensifying nationwide literacy activities.

 Higher education

Higher education is a sub-sector that has objectives and operations quite different from other education sub-sectors. The General Department of Higher & Technical Education and Vocational Training is in charge of coordinating higher education development while concerned ministries handle management aspects by their respective specializations.  The Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport directly supervises six higher education institutions and the Ministries of Health, Agriculture and Culture & Fine Arts supervise three others.

The MoEYS is doing its best to use all available resources and seeking financial, technical and material assistance from different sources to improve education quality at all education levels. With these efforts, the MoEYS hopes that it can bring about a positive change to the national education system, especially higher promotion rate in lower grades.

1 Rate are a bit lower than the previous years’ figures due the larger size of school-age population and the integration of a number of municipalities, districts or “khans”.

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