Sub-Saharan Africa research

Difficulty transitioning from school to higher education or work remains one of the key barriers facing girls in disadvantaged contexts, with far-reaching implications for their futures and wellbeing. In this report, the first in a three-year research project on girls’ transitions into higher education or work, we seek to understand the challenges facing these girls and highlight promising interventions to support their transitions – including in challenging contexts where marginalisation persists.

Following research into climate change and education in Kenya, Education Development Trust (EDT) are undertaking research to better understand the relationship between climate and environmental change and education in Rwanda. This working paper outlines emerging findings from a survey with school leaders across the country.

What impact does climate change have on education, especially in areas which are vulnerable to climate disasters and extreme weather events? In this report, we explore the impact of climate change on schools and learning in Turkana County, Kenya, and consider how to engage learners and schools in building resilience to climate change in the future.

Globally, there are 70.8 million forcibly displaced persons. Among these are 25.9 million refugees, over half of whom are children. Effective teacher management is key to ensuring inclusive, equitable, quality education for these young people, and teachers constitute the most important factor affecting student learning.

Following Covid-19-related school closures across Rwanda, our Building Learning Foundations team commissioned an inequity impact assessment of the country’s primary-age school population to investigate how children from different backgrounds and contexts have fared during the period of closures, and to inform plans for school reopening.

The Covid-19 crisis has tested education systems in unprecedented ways. In this report, we summarise ten key lessons from the pandemic, which should be used to inform planning for the long-term reconstruction and recovery of education systems. These lessons are drawn from a thorough global review of evidence and policy throughout school closures and plans for reopening around the world, with a particular emphasis on examples of good practice.

Globally, there are 70.8 million forcibly displaced persons. Among these are 25.9 million refugees, over half of whom are children. Effective teacher management is key to ensuring inclusive, equitable, quality education for these young people, and teachers constitute the most important factor affecting student learning. In crisis and displacement situations, the role of teachers is particularly significant: they are sometimes the only resource available to students. This report investigates teacher management in refugee contexts in Ethiopia, and is the first in a series of country reports. It contributes to a burgeoning body of evidence about teachers in refugee contexts and aims to provide policy guidance to support ministries of education.

This report examines four not-for-profit school chains, run by non-governmental organisations in low-income contexts. These are Fe y Alegría, the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (better known by its acronym BRAC), Gyan Shala and Zambia Open Community Schools.

This report captures what might be learnt from a selection of the world’s most interesting examples of technology-assisted in-service professional development in lower-income countries and from wider reflections about the potential of technology to enhance the professional learning of teachers.

Education Development Trust and IIEP UNESCO joined forces to conduct a much-needed review of the main aspects of management relating to teachers of refugees – from recruitment to certification and professional development as well as incentives and retention.