Education

CGD’s work in education focuses on the role education can play in building more equal and prosperous societies.

CGD’s education program focuses on broad welfare goals and seeks to understand the role education can play in addressing inequity. Despite the tremendous progress that has been made in getting girls and boys into school, education has not yet fulfilled its promise of being the great societal equalizer. Gender inequality remains acute and deeply rooted in the economic, political and social spheres in developing countries. Intergenerational mobility is declining, not increasing. Poor children get educated in bad schools where they do not acquire basic numeracy and literacy skills while rich children attend good schools.

Our research examines the mechanisms through which education can give children equal life opportunities and build the human capital that nations need to prosper.

Featured Work

Chart showing that changes in wage allocations to teachers went up in Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, but fell in Europe and Central Asia for primary school. For secondary they stayed equal in Africa, rose in Latin America, and fell less sharply in

October 13, 2020

Blog Post

What Do Past Shocks Tell Us About the Choices We’ll Face...

Shelby Carvalho and Susannah Hares

September 14, 2020

Publication

Link It, Open It, Use It: Changing How Education Data Are...

Jack Rossiter

Two schoolchildren in uniforms. Photo licensed via Getty Images.

May 29, 2020

Publication

Planning for School Reopening and Recovery After COVID-19

Shelby Carvalho et al.

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Contact

Sharmili Satkunam
ssatkunam@cgdev.org

Related Working Groups

The ‘Learning at Scale’ Advisory Group

Related Education Content

July 5, 2011

Blog Post

In School Not Learning

Lant Pritchett and Matt Andrews

This post originally appeared on Owen Abroad.

George Bush famously asked, ‘Is our children learning?’. That’s also the question by Uwezo, a coalition of NGOs working in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. Their report published today makes dismal reading about the quality of schools.

First, a word about the report. This is not a study by the World Bank, or a group of donors. It is a study by Uwezo, an East African initiative hosted by three NGO networks: TEN/MET in Tanzania, WERK in Kenya and UNNGOF in Uganda, with overall quality assurance and management support from Twaweza. They conducted their own survey (standardized across the countries) to test the literacy and numeracy of more than 100,000 children, the largest ever survey of its kind in the region. When citizens themselves are telling us about whether their public services work, we should be paying attention.

May 3, 2011

Blog Post

The New Education Strategy at the World Bank: Time for a...

Abhijit Banerjee et al.

Last Friday I spoke at this event “

April 21, 2011

Blog Post

The New Education Crisis

Charles Kenny et al.

Last year, the Center for Global Development convened a roundtable of education experts to discuss global education p

April 18, 2011

Publication

Averting the Looming Global Education Crisis (Open Letter...

cgdev

Desmond Bermingham recaps the consensus from a CGD discussion about what to do about a hidden crisis in global education. He offers his top-12 tasks for delivery on global commitment to give all children a good education.

February 27, 2011

Publication

Solow’s Return: Inventions, Ideas, and the Quality of Life

Charles Kenny

In his latest essay, Charles Kenny seeks to revive Solow's model of exogenous growth; growth driven by the global diffusion of new technologies and ideas. He suggests that when it comes to quality of life improvements, institutions may be less important than exogenous factors, like new vaccines, oral re-hydration therapies, or improvements in hygiene and education practices.

February 25, 2011

Publication

Getting Better in Pictures

Charles Kenny

Charles Kenny attempts to dispel development pessimists' fears in this essay summarizing his latest book Getting Better: Why Global Development Is Succeeding - And How We can Improve the World Even More (Basic Books). According to Charles, better health, education, greater access to civil and political rights, infrastructure and even beer, are all signs historic progress being made in the developing world.

February 16, 2011

Blog Post

Aid to Egypt: Should the United States Build 10 World...

Nancy Birdsall, Michael Clemens and Lant Pritchett

That’s what Tom Friedman recommends in his New York Times

December 15, 2010

Publication

Learning about Schools in Development - Working Paper 236

Charles Kenny

There are more schools worldwide than ever before, but are children really learning? Charles Kenny investigates the broken link between schools and learning and suggests some proven methods for improving outcomes in education.