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News, ideas, and analysis from J-PAL staff and affiliated professors. Subscribe to our newsletter to receive monthly email updates.

Four children sit in a circle playing the number comparison game

Scaling a playful math curriculum to help children learn: Introducing the Every Child Counts Implementation Toolkit

The world is facing an urgent foundational literacy and numeracy (FLN) crisis, worsened by Covid. As organizations and governments around the world mobilize to address this crisis, J-PAL South Asia has been working since 2020 to scale Every Child Counts, a unique curriculum that builds on fifty...
Students before classes at a primary school in the village of El Arr in northern Sudan

Building girls’ agency at scale: Lessons from life skills programs in Africa

Last year, J-PAL published a policy brief and implementation guide synthesizing evidence from sixteen randomized evaluations of life skills programs for adolescent girls. The findings show that such approaches can be particularly effective in boosting self-efficacy (confidence in achieving certain...
Preschool in Brazil

Quality early childhood education: The role of teacher training

With nearly all Brazilian children aged 4 and 5 now enrolled in preschool, new questions are emerging about how to ensure quality in this stage of education. According to Brazil’s National Institute for Educational Studies and Research, 93 percent of children in this age group attend preschool...
Lazare Kovo

African Scholar Spotlight: Lazare Kovo

We speak with Solomon Lazare Kovo from Emory University about how growing up in Benin shaped his passion for development economics. He explains how rigorous impact evaluations can help answer big policy questions, especially on gender gaps, learning, and employment.
Students and teacher in classroom

The Evidence Effect: Evidence for more effective social policy in Europe and North America

Generating rigorous evidence on the effectiveness of programs designed to reduce poverty is not just the work of lower and middle-income countries. Countries across Europe and North America are also grappling with how to best tackle deep-rooted and pressing social challenges. These include...
A student at a school solving math problems in Udaipur, India

Researcher Spotlight: Harini Kannan on partnering with government to scale evidence-informed programs across India

In this episode of the Researcher Spotlight Series, host Sambhav Choudhury speaks with Harini Kannan, research scientist at J-PAL South Asia. Harini shares her journey from being inspired by budget speeches as a child to pursuing a career in development economics.
Child writing in his notebook at school

Setting an early foundation for children’s learning: using insights from cost-effectiveness analysis to inform decisions

Ensuring children have strong basic skills in reading, writing, and mathematics – together known as foundational literacy and numeracy – is considered critical for their future academic success and later life outcomes. While research has generated insights on what works for improving literacy and...
Students in Ghana engage with hands-on activities designed to support foundational learning.

From training to impact: Strengthening foundational learning in Ghana

This is the second blog post in a series highlighting how UNICEF and J-PAL are working together to strengthen evidence use in education. The first blog post reflected on insights from global experts working to adapt and scale evidence-based education programs. This post builds on the first by...