When the pandemic struck, households faced economic shocks that persisted after schools reopened due to loss of employment. In the wake of this, many LCPS, like many other businesses, struggled to stay afloat, leading to permanent closure of some schools. The risks that parents could no longer affo...

CGD's Lee Crawfurd and Aisha Ali make the case for free secondary education, arguing that experiences of free primary education shows how free secondary education could work. And Robert Osei and Kwabena Adu-Ababio say free school is pro-poor for countries that can afford it. But Cambridge University...

Each year over two million secondary-school students across Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Liberia and The Gambia sit coordinated tests known as the WASSCE. In a new CGD working paper, undertaken by researchers from CGD and IEPA-Ghana, we look at English and maths papers in West Africa’s leading high...

There may be no government response that can fully mitigate COVID-19’s impact and maintain fairness for 2020’s exam candidates. But high-stakes exams are unfair every year, not just during a pandemic: large differences in home support and access to resources are not new. Exams reinforce income inequ...

Politicians often claim elite schools are vehicles for social mobility. We look at the evidence on effects on the kids who attend elite schools—and on the kids who don’t—to explore whether they live up to their hype. We suggest they produce at best a small bump in learnin...