This episode is a recording of a panel conversation that took place at the University of Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government during the RISE Annual Conference in September 2023. For the purposes of clarity and length, this podcast is an edited version of the conversation.

The panel featured Nompumelelo Mohohlwane from the Department of Basic Education in South Africa; Rachel Hinton from the UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office; and former RISE Research Director, Lant Pritchett. This conversation was moderated by Laura Savage from the International Education Funders Group.

The panel looks back at the questions that existed at the start of RISE and whether enough has been learnt ten years later. They reflect on the difference between the motivating questions for RISE and the What Works Hub for Global Education. They go on to debate what commitment to learning really means and what cultural shifts are needed for it to materialise, and connected to this, what implementation science really means. The conversation ends with a reflection on the meaning of the thematic shift from systems to implementation.

Links

• Nompumelelo Mohohlwane (webpage)
• Rachel Hinton (webpage)
• Lant Pritchett (webpage)
• Laura Savage (webpage)
• Contract teachers – Why do they work in an NGO setting but not with government? (journal article)
• South Africa Department of Basic Education Research Agenda, 2019 – 2023 (report)
• South Africa’s 5-year NDP “Medium-Term Strategic Framework 2019 – 2024” (report)
• South Africa’s Presidential Youth Employment Initiative (report)
• Rewriting the Grammar of the Education System: Delhi’s Education Reform (A Tale of Creative Resistance and Creative Disruption) (book)
• State of education research (slide in video)
• Smart Buys Report 2023 (report)
• The RISE Podcast: Denis Mizne on Transforming Brazil’s Education System to Deliver Learning (podcast)
• World Development Report 2018 (report)
• Applying

In this episode, RISE research fellow Julius Atuhurra speaks to Dr. Adedeji Adeniran, the Director of Research at the Centre for the Study of the Economies of Africa (CSEA)–a Nigerian think tank. Adedeji explains CSEA’s education research journey that has evolved from an initial focus on education financing to studying more nuanced topics, including: education system diagnosis, data quality, community engagement, policy analysis tools, and curriculum effectiveness. He highlights the need to fully grasp what transpires inside the classroom and how that is influenced by interactions happening outside the classroom. He also explains RISE Nigeria’s primary focus on demand-side actors and discusses findings from their recent study on primary-level curriculum effectiveness in Nigeria.

Links

Adedeji Adeniran (webpage)

Instructional Alignment in Nigeria using the Surveys of Enacted Curriculum (working paper) by Adeniran, Onyekwere, Okon, Atuhurra, Chaudhry, and Kaffenberger

The State of Global Learning Poverty: 2022 update (report) by UNESCO, UNICEF, FCDO, USAID and BMGF

Understanding Education Policy Preferences: Survey Experiments with Policymakers in 35 Developing Countries (working paper) by Crawfurd, Hares, Minardi, and Sandefur

Imagine a World Where Innovations Could Save the Lives of 2 Million More Mothers and Babies. BMGF 2023 Goalkeepers Report (report) by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Financing Basic Education in Nigeria: What are the Feasible Options? (working paper) by Onyekwena, Uzor, Oloko, and Adeniran

Improving Basic Education Outcomes in Nigeria. Effectiveness, Accountability and Equity Issues (working paper) by Onyekwena, Adekunle, Eleanya, and Taiwo

Understanding cost-effectiveness and benefit-cost analysis using data on school feeding and education assistance programmes in Nigeria (journal article) by Uneze and Tajudeen

Is Nigeria Experiencing a Learning Crisis: Evidence from curriculum-matched learning assessment (journal article) by Adeniran, Ishaku, and Akanni

Is Nigeria on track to achieving quality education for all? Drivers and implications (working paper) by Adeniran, Onyekwena, Onubedo, Ishaku, Ekeruche

Policy Deliberation, Social Contracts, and Education Outcomes: Experimental Evidence from...

This episode features RISE Research Fellow Yue-Yi Hwa in conversation with Jennifer Opare-Kumi, a final-year doctoral researcher at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford.  They cover a breadth of issues including the potential for targeted instructional programs to contribute towards improved child mental health outcomes, why mainstreaming children’s mental health during early learning might improve their educational and other life outcomes, and the need to adopt an expanded view of the ‘learning crisis’ currently affecting countries in the global south.  

Links

• Jenn Opare-Kumi (webpage)
• Foundational Learning and Mental Health: Empirical Evidence from Botswana (working paper) by Jennifer Opare-Kumi
• Cognitive and Socioemotional Skills in Low-Income Countries: Measurement and Associations with Schooling and Earnings (journal article) by Alice Danon, Jishnu Das, Andreas de Barros, and Deon Filmer (RISE Pakistan)
• Socioemotional and Academic Learning Before and After COVID-19 School Closures (working paper) by Stephen Bayley, Darge Wole Meshesha, Paul Ramchandani, Pauline Rose, Tassew Woldehanna, and Louise Yorke (RISE Ethiopia)
• Researching Socio-Emotional Learning, Mental Health and Wellbeing: Methodological Issues in Low-Income Contexts (working paper) by Stephen Bayley, Darge Wole Meshesha, Louise Yorke, Paul Ramchandani, and Pauline Rose (RISE Ethiopia)
• Measuring the impacts of teachers in Vietnam: teacher value-added and student cognitive and non-cognitive skills (paper in progress) by Pedro Carneiro, Paul Glewwe, Anusha Guha, and Sonya Krutikova
• Youth Impact’s page on Teaching at the Right Level in Botswana (webpage)
• Teaching at the Right Level Africa (webpage)
• Pratham’s Combined Activities for Maximized Learning (CAMaL) teaching-learning approach (webpage)

Guest biography

Jennifer Opare-Kumi

Jennifer Opare-Kumi is a Doctoral Researcher at the Blavatnik School of Government. Driven by a passion for efficient, evidence-based policy making, she researches ways to improve education and mental health outcomes for young people in the Global South through government and non-governmental interventions and policies.

Yue-Yi Hwa

Yue-Yi Hwa is a Senior Education Specialist on the evidence translation and synthesis team at the What Works Hub for Global Education. Previously, Yue-Yi was a research fellow and research manager for Research on Improving Systems of Education (RISE), where she focused on synthesising research on teachers and management. She has also been a research fellow for the Penang Institute in Kuala Lumpur and a secondary school English teacher in Selangor, Malaysia. She holds an MPhil in comparative government from the University of Oxford and a PhD...