Cost-effectiveness analysis as methodological approach to an evaluation ofalternative school networks - A simulation study

The renewed re-organization of the school system to be undertaken in the ne xt few years, necessitated by the dramatic decline in the birthrate in the new Laender, may lead to severe inefficiencies if the implications of schoo l-organizational solutions are not adequately taken into account. In the pr oject "Application of optimization procedures within the framework of schoo l network planning", we therefore try to simultaneously register the financ ial, pedagogical, and regional-political consequences of different planning approaches through a simulation model and an ex-ante evaluation by means o f a cost-effectiveness analysis. Mecklenburg-Vorpommern was chosen as site of the investigation. The research project provides systemic knowledge for a priority-guided allocation of resources we cannot do without in view of t he problems connected with managing the educational system, - problems that are caused by the decline in the number of students, by the shortage of pu blic funds as well as by teh complexity of the situations in which decision s have to be taken.