The effects of school-based decision making on educational outcomes in low- and middle-income contexts

This Campbell systematic review assesses the effectiveness of school-based decision-making. The review summarises findings from 17 impact studies and nine studies of barriers and enablers. Decentralizing decision-making to schools has mainly small to moderate positive effects in reducing repetition, dropouts and increasing test scores. These effects are restricted to middle-income countries, with fewer and smaller positive effects found in low-income countries or in disadvantaged communities. A two page plain language summary is also available.