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

Tutor and student study together in Gaborone

20 for 20: The tutor is calling - Targeted instruction by phone boosts learning across six countries

By
  • Noam Angrist
  • Amanda Beatty
  • Colin Crossley
Youth Impact tested a phone-based adaptation of Teaching at the Right Level for mathematics that became ConnectEd, a one-on-one tutoring program that uses phones to connect high-quality instruction with students and parents. With ConnectEd, every week grade 3 to 5 students receive math problems...
Two girls doing schoolwork at desk

Affiliate Spotlight: Selim Gulesci on entrepreneurship, gender, and the policymaking process

This affiliate spotlight features reflections from Selim Gulesci on his research surrounding gender, labor, and economics, and touches on his new role of Scientific Advisor for J-PAL Africa’s Girls’ Education and Empowerment portfolio.
Pregnant woman with smartphone

Leveraging technology to improve child-caregiver interactions at scale

By
Can technology be used to improve child-caregiver interactions and support child development? Traditional parenting interventions are often costly and tightly controlled, which limits their large-scale implementation. A low-cost intervention called Crianza Positiva, delivering text and audio...
Students sitting at desks for first day of high school exams at Vittorio Alfieri state high school in Turin

J-PAL at 20: Promoting more inclusive education in Italy

This blog post, part of J-PAL Europe's series on research and activities across Europe, looks at a series of randomised evaluations in Italy that explore this question with a particular focus on students from immigrant families. As school systems across Europe welcome increasingly diverse...
Young girls in elementary school, Harar, Ethiopia, Africa

Advancing the Agenda in Girls' Education Research

By
Girls’ education remains a global priority for donors and governments. Many researchers suggest that the research community should coalesce around a set of coherent research priorities to help close gender gaps in education. This article outlines some crucial next steps to advance the research...
J-PAL affiliate Marc Gurgand speaks at a lectern and looks at a row of panelists.

J-PAL Europe launches IDEE to advance evidence generation and use in the French education system

This blog discusses the conference hosted by J-PAL Europe and IDEE in November 2022, which aimed to bring together stakeholders—primarily policymakers, practitioners, and researchers—and increase understanding about how impact evaluations can be used in education settings.
Teacher with children in a classroom.

The next generation of rigorous education research: J-PAL launches the Learning for All Initiative

In response to the current crisis in education and the increasing demand for actionable evidence, and with the generous support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Douglas B. Marshall Jr. Family Foundation, and Echidna Giving, J-PAL is launching the Learning For All Initiative to identify...
A child plays in a yard in Botswana

A state-of-the-art, cheap, scalable method to measure child and adult (multilingual) speech in early childhood interventions

By
  • Alessandra Cassar
  • Diana Contreras Suárez
  • Alejandrina Cristia
  • Pauline Grosjean
  • Sarah Walker
We describe a state-of-the-art, cheap, easily scalable method, relying on inexpensive hardware together with open-source technology to measure speech. We describe how the hardware is better suited than alternatives to field settings and large-scale interventions, and how the software is more precise...