Podcast

The RISE Podcast: Adedeji Adeniran from CSEA Nigeria Reflects on the Learning Crisis and Adopting a Systems Lens to Study and Address It

Talking about CSEA’s education research in Nigeria, Adedeji Adeniran underscores the value in opening the classroom black box and embracing a system’s approach to effectively diagnose the learning crisis affecting the Sub-Saharan Africa region.

Authors

Image of Adedeji Adeniran

Adedeji Adeniran

RISE Nigeria

Centre for the Study of the Economies of Africa (CSEA)

Image of Julius Atuhurra

Julius Atuhurra

RISE Directorate

Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford

In this episode, RISE research fellow Julius Atuhurra speaks to Dr. Adedeji Adeniran, the Director of Research at the Centre for the Study of the Economies of Africa (CSEA)–a Nigerian think tank. Adedeji explains CSEA’s education research journey that has evolved from an initial focus on education financing to studying more nuanced topics, including: education system diagnosis, data quality, community engagement, policy analysis tools, and curriculum effectiveness. He highlights the need to fully grasp what transpires inside the classroom and how that is influenced by interactions happening outside the classroom. He also explains RISE Nigeria’s primary focus on demand-side actors and discusses findings from their recent study on primary-level curriculum effectiveness in Nigeria.

Links

Guest biography

Adedeji Adeniran

Adedeji Adeniran is the Director of Research at the Centre for the Study of the Economies of Africa (CSEA). He holds a PhD from the University of Witwatersrand, South Africa. He also holds a Masters’ and Bachelor’s degree in Economics and Educational Management/Economics from the University of Ibadan. He previously worked as a seasonal Lecturer in the Department of Witwatersrand, as a Data Analyst at the Analyst Data Services and Resources(ADSR) and as a Teaching Assistant in the Department of Economics University of Ibadan. His research interests cuts across macroeconomics,development finance,public economics and policy analysis and experimental economics.

Julius Atuhurra

Julius Atuhurra is a Research Fellow for the RISE programme at the Blavatnik School of Government. His work focuses on educational development, specifically curricula effectiveness analyses and iterative adaptation of local solutions to the learning crisis in developing countries. He recently completed a two-year postdoctoral research fellowship at Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS). Prior to that, he worked at Twaweza East Africa, a regional civil society organisation operating in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. Early in his career, Julius worked at Uganda’s national tax body from where he moved to Japan to pursue postgraduate studies and subsequently altered his career path switching focus from public finance to international development. 

Attribution

The continuation of the RISE Podcast has been made possible through funding from the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. The Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford supports the production of the RISE Podcast.

Producers: Julius Atuhurra and Katie Cooper

Audio Editing: James Morris

RISE blog posts and podcasts reflect the views of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the organisation or our funders.