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Browse news articles about J-PAL and our affiliated professors, and read our press releases and monthly global and research newsletters. For media inquiries, please email us.

Foundational Learning Key To Improving Learning Outcomes

Children in sub-Saharan Africa, including Nigeria, experienced a learning crisis that worsened due to prolonged school closures and other disruptions to the education system during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence-based approaches that will accelerate the learning of foundational skills, such as...

MIT Professor says the pandemic exposed the need to update U.S. government technology

NPR
NPR's Sacha Pfeiffer talks with MIT economics professor David Autor about how outdated U.S. government technology contributed to fraud in pandemic aid, like the Paycheck Protection Program.

Economics is more than just theory for Seema Jayachandran — it’s a way to help people

Vox
Seema Jayachandran, economist, is one of Vox's Future Perfect 50. These are the people making the future a better place for everyone.

Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak wants to find out what makes antipoverty programs effective

Vox
Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, economist, is one of Vox's Future Perfect 50. These are the people making the future a better place for everyone.

The fading American Dream in numbers, and what you can do about it

The fading of the ‘American Dream’–along with similar ideals in other developed nations–reflects a fundamental change in the American economy, argued renowned economist Raj Chetty, in a presentation using big data to pinpoint causes and put forward possible solutions.

Economist Chris Blattman has reshaped our understanding of violence and poverty

Vox
Chris Blattman, economist and political scientist at the University of Chicago, is one of Vox's Future Perfect 50.

Development programs don’t always work. Rachel Glennerster figures out how and why.

Vox
Rachel Glennerster, economist, is one of Vox's Future Perfect 50. These are the people making the future a better place for everyone.

Does tutoring work? An education economist examines the evidence on whether it’s effective

With reading and math scores plummeting during the pandemic, educators and parents are now turning their attention to how kids can catch up. In a Q&A, Susanna Loeb, an education economist at Brown University, shines a light on the best ways to use tutoring to help students get back on track.