OECD Reviews of School Resources: Uruguay 2016

This report for Uruguay forms part of the OECD Review of Policies to Improve the Effectiveness of Resource Use in Schools (also referred to as the School Resources Review , see for further details). The purpose of the review is to explore how school resources can be governed, distributed, utilised and managed to improve the quality, equity and efficiency of school education. School resources are understood in a broad way, including financial resources (e.g. expenditures on education, school budget), physical resources (e.g. school infrastructure, computers), human resources (e.g. teachers, school leaders) and other resources (e.g. learning time).

Uruguay was one of the countries which opted to participate in the country review strand and host a visit by an external review team. Members of the OECD review team were Paulo Santiago (OECD Secretariat), co-ordinator of the review; Beatrice valos (Associate Researcher at the Centre for Advanced Research in Education at the University of Chile); Tracey Burns (OECD Secretariat); Alejandro Morduchowicz (Education Lead Specialist at the Education Division of the Inter-American Development Bank) and Thomas Radinger (OECD Secretariat). The biographies of the members of the review team are provided in . This publication is the report from the review team. It provides, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the use of school resources in Uruguay, current policy initiatives, and possible future approaches. The report serves three purposes: i) to provide insights and advice to Uruguayan education authorities; ii) to help other countries understand the Uruguayan approach to the use of school resources; and iii) to provide input for the final comparative analysis of the OECD School Resources Review.

The scope for the analysis in this report includes early childhood education, pre-primary education and school education. At the request of Uruguayan authorities, the focus areas of the Review of School Resources in Uruguay are: i) the governance of school resource use, including the role of school leadership; ii) the funding of school education (including planning, distribution, incentives and monitoring); and iii) the teaching profession. The analysis presented in the report refers to the situation faced by the education system in March 2015, when the review team visited Uruguay.

Uruguays involvement in the OECD review was co-ordinated by the National Institute for Educational Evaluation (INEEd). The national co-ordinators were Cecilia Llambi, then Associate Researcher at INEEd, from December 2013 until August 2015; and Cecilia Oreiro, Researcher at INEEd, from August 2015 onwards. An important part of Uruguays involvement was the preparation of a comprehensive and informative Country Background Report (CBR) on school resource use authored by Cecilia Llamb (Co-ordinator), Luca Castro, Melissa Hernndez and Cecilia Oreiro from the National Institute for Educational Evaluation (INEEd). The OECD review team is very grateful to the main authors of the CBR and to all those who assisted them in providing a high-quality informative document. The CBR is an important output from the OECD project in its own right as well as an important source for the review team. Unless indicated otherwise, the data for this report are taken from the Uruguayan Country Background Report. The CBR follows guidelines prepared by the OECD Secretariat and provides extensive information, analysis and discussion in regard to the national context, the organisation of the education system, the use of school resources and the views of key stakeholders. In this sense, the CBR and this report complement each other and, for a more comprehensive view of the effectiveness of school resource use in Uruguay, should be read in conjunction.