In this episode, RISE Research Fellow Julius Atuhurra speaks to Anustup Nayak, Project Director for Classroom Instruction and Practice, at Central Square Foundation (CSF) in India. Anustup retraces his educational path in India, Africa and the US, and links to his career in foundational learning.

He reflects on the FLN context in India and why he is hopeful about the future. Anustup gives an in-depth explanation of CSF’s work and their broad collaboration with state governments and other similar minded actors to improve the teaching and learning experience in the classroom.

They also touch on Anustup’s involvement with some of the work strands at RISE and his ideas about future directions. Anustup reflects on India’s position as both the 'hotbed' for FLN problems and ‘go to’ place for solutions to the global learning crisis.  

Links

• Central Square Foundation (webpage)
• Demystifying the Science of Teaching: A 'Structured Pedagogy' Approach to Improving Foundation Learning (article) by Anustup Nayak and Priyanka Upreti
• A Million Children Learning – Improving Elementary School Education at Scale (article) by
• RISE Community of Practice (webpage)
• CSF’s Experience of Working with the RISE Diagnostic Framework in North India (blog) by Jasmine Dhingra, Isha Shingte, and Garima Grover
• How to Rapidly Improve Learning Outcomes at System Level? (blog) by Luis Crouch
• RISE Annual Conference 2022 (event)
• Michelle Kaffenberger (webpage)
• Understanding Education Policy Preferences: Survey Experiments with Policymakers in 35 Developing Countries (working paper) by  Lee Crawfurd, Susannah Hares, Ana Luiza Minardi and Justin Sandefur
• System (In)Coherence: Quantifying the Alignment of Primary Education Curriculum Standards, Examinations, and Instruction in Two East African Countries (working paper) by Julius Atuhurra and Michelle Kaffenberger

Guest biography

Anustup Nayak

Anustup Nayak leads the Classroom Instruction and Practices (CIP) team at CSF. In his role, he works with multiple CSF partner organizations and state government agencies to support the implementation of the FLN mission. Prior to working at CSF, his work involved supporting and scaling up an entrepreneurial venture named XSEED Education. Anustup joined CSF to pursue his passion to improve...