Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test the impact of offering frequent HIV testing on rates of marriage and pregnancy. Offering high-frequency, opt-out HIV testing to young women and their partners changed beliefs of partner’s sexual safety, accelerated marriage, and increased the probability of pregnancy.

Researchers introduced text message reminders to evaluate their effect on Kenyan patients taking their antiretrovirals consistently and not skipping doses. Patients who received weekly text messages were more likely to take their medicine 90 percent of the time and were less likely to skip doses for more than 48 hours than their counterparts in the comparison group.

Training teachers to improve teacher quality and student learning is a common strategy taken by policymakers. In Nepal, researchers conducted a randomized evaluation of a government teacher training program for math and science teachers to evaluate the impact on student learning in secondary schools.

Despite making great strides in expanding access to education, developing countries like India continue to lag in measures of actual student learning. To understand how quality of education mediates learning, this randomized control trial evaluates a pedagogical intervention training science teachers in rural Uttar Pradesh, India. The curiosity-based curriculum emphasizes practical techniques along with foundational principles on effective answer-seeking, guided research, constructive feedback, and peer-to-peer communication. The researchers assess whether active teaching approaches increase student recall of course material, curiosity, student engagement, critical thinking, and other soft skills foundational to developing students’ intrinsic motivation to learn.

Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test the impact of providing information to students on their decision to pursue courses and majors in economics at a public university in the United States. The intervention increased male students' likelihood of studying additional economics courses when compared to female students, but the intervention did not impact students’ decision to major in economics, irrespective of gender.

Researchers evaluated the impact of exposure to and incentives to consume discordant media on political attitudes and behaviors in Turkey. Participants changed their media consumption habits, trusted discordant media sources more, and had less polarized attitudes towards the government, but did not change how much they trusted people with opposing political views.

Researchers are examining the impact of a socioemotional learning curriculum on student mental health, academic achievement, and other social outcomes.

Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test the impact and cost-effectiveness of fully online and blended STEM classes in Russia on student test scores. Students in online and blended courses achieved similar scores to students in traditional in-person courses at a lower cost.

In this study, researchers explored the impact of a soft-skills training program on youth employment.

Researchers partnered with a local non-profit, Walter, to evaluate the effectiveness of two school-based social cohesion interventions for immigrants’ children in Finnish schools.

In Colombia, researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test the impact of a messaging-based program via WhatsApp focused on financial education, couples’ communication, and information provision on financial capability, women’s empowerment, and intimate partner violence.

Researchers partnered with Opportunity International Savings and Loans Limited (OISL) to conduct a randomized evaluation to test the impact of high-frequency interactive voice response (IVR) calls on people’s use of mobile banking services and their financial behaviors in Ghana. People who received the IVR calls were more likely to use mobile banking and make on-time loan repayments, increasing their access to subsequent loans; however, they were not more likely to save.

To understand the causal impact of poverty reduction on children’s health, nutrition, sleep, and healthcare utilization, among other outcomes, researchers randomly assigned new mothers to receive an unconditional cash transfer of $333 (high-cash group) or $20 per month (low-cash group) in the Baby’s First Years study. Children in the high-cash group had higher produce consumption at age two, but no impacts were found on health, sleep, or healthcare utilization at age three.

Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test the impact of an entertainment-education short film informational campaign (i.e. edutainment campaign) designed to inform adolescent girls and parents of the costs of child marriage on the norms and perceptions about child marriage in Indonesia. The edutainment intervention was effective in changing the perceptions of girls and parents towards child marriage.

Researchers investigated the role of online networking groups (via WhatsApp) and free legal aid on improving business innovation, practices, sales, and profits among growth-oriented women-owned firms in Ghana. They found that online networking groups meaningfully encouraged business innovation, improved participants’ business practices, and boosted firm profits.