Three essays on education in Oromia

The study is composed of three essays on Education in Oromia; (i) Challenges and Significance of Education in Oromia; Evidence from History, Economy and Social Development Indicators; (ii) the Effect of Family Size and Birth Order on Children's Education Achievements and Delayed Enrollment in Oromia; and (iii) Impact of Education on Livelihoods in Rural Oromia. The first essay investigates education discrimination against Oromia by the rulers of the Ethiopian empire. The descriptive analysis compares overall education level and share of education in the total public expenditure of Ethiopia to the rest of the world, in which Ethiopia ranks among the worst. The assessment suggests that although Oromia is a backbone of the Ethiopian economy, all the social development indicators ranked Oromia low compared to the rest of the administrative regions, in particular Amhara and Tigray. The comparison is based on health and educational facilities, school enrollment, gender disparity and literacy and fertility rates during Imperial, Derg and current regimes. The second essay investigates the effect of family size and birth order on child academic achievement and duration of delayed enrollment in Oromia. The former is estimated by ordinary least squares and logistic regressions and the latter uses survival analysis. The results suggest that family size has a positive effect on children's education achievements and duration of delayed entry, and birth order has the opposite. Previous studies suggested that controlling for birth order effects eliminates the family size effect but this is not the case in Oromia. Among other things, wealth and head's of education have positive effects on children's academic achievement and a negative effect on duration of delayed enrollment. The last essay investigates returns to education in farm and non-farm activities in rural Oromia. The results suggest that only 4-6 years of schooling have a positive effect on farm activities but schooling does not affect non-farm activities. The breakdown of output measured by crop type shows education has a significant effect on cereal but not on cash crop production mainly through use of fertilizers and improved seeds. The finding also suggests that female productivity is higher in farm activities than male productivity and the reverse in non-farm activities.