Wednesday February 10th, 2021
9:30 AM-11:00AM EST
via WebEx
We are pleased to share with you the sixth webinar in the “Envisioning India” series, co-sponsored by the Sigur Center for Asian Studies and the Institute for International Economic Policy. This is a platform for dialogue and debate. We invited you to engage with us in this series of important discussions.
The “Envisioning India” series is organized under the stewardship of IIEP Co-Director James Foster, Oliver T. Carr, Jr. Professor of International Affairs and Professor of Economics, and IIEP Distinguished Visiting Scholar Ajay Chhibber. The sixth event, “Schooling in India’s New Education Policy and Impact of COVID on Learning Outcomes” featured Karthik Muralidharan and Rukmini Banerji. The discussion was moderated by Professor James Foster, with an introduction by Dr. Ajay Chhibber.”
Improving the quality of education is a critical investment for enabling “inclusive growth” in India. It matters both for growth at the aggregate level, and for enabling citizens to broadly participate in this growth process at the individual level. India’s National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 is the first major overhaul of education policy in nearly 35 years. Karthik discussed the main learnings from two decades of research on school education in India and present key principles for the way ahead.
Rukmini provided her perspective on these issues based on her work on learning outcomes at Pratham since 2005 and will also present findings from the 2020 Annual Survey of Education Results (ASER) the first ever phone based ASER survey. Conducted in September 2020, the sixth month of national school closures, the survey explores provision of and access to distance education mechanisms, materials and activities for children in rural India, and the ways in which children and families are engaging with these remote learning alternatives from their homes.
About the Speakers:
Dr. Rukmini Banerji is the CEO of Pratham Education Foundation. Trained as an economist, Dr. Banerji completed her B.A. at St. Stephen’s College and attended the Delhi School of Economics (DSE). She was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University and earned her Ph.D. at the University of Chicago.
Dr. Banerji worked as a programme officer at the Spencer Foundation in Chicago for several years before returning to India in 1996 to join Pratham as part of the leadership team. There, she led the organisation’s research and assessment efforts, which have included the internationally acknowledged Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) since 2005, and served as director of the ASER Centre in New Delhi for 10 years.
In 2008, she was the inaugural recipient of the Maulana Abul Kalam Shiksha Puraskar Award conferred by the Government of Bihar, India. Over the years, she has represented Pratham and ASER Centre in various national and international forums and is a member of committees both in India and abroad. She writes frequently on education in India and enjoys creating books and stories for children.
Karthik Muralidharan is the Tata Chancellor’s Professor of Economics at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). He is a Research Associate of the NBER, and on the Board of Directors of the Poverty Action Lab at MIT where he is co-chair of the education research program. His research spans development, public, and labor economics with a focus on improving the quality of public expenditure – especially in the social sector.
Born and raised in India, Prof. Muralidharan earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from Harvard University (summa cum laude), an M.Phil. in economics from Cambridge University (ranked first), and a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University.
About the Moderator:
James E. Foster is the Oliver T. Carr, Jr. Professor of International Affairs, Professor of Economics, and Co-Director of the Institute for International Economic Policy at the George Washington University. He is also a Research Associate at the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative at Oxford University. Professor Foster’s research focuses on welfare economics — using economic tools to evaluate and enhance the wellbeing of people. His work underlies many well-known social indices including the global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) published annually by the UNDP in the Human Development Report, dozens of national MPIs used to guide domestic policy against poverty, the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI) at USAID, the Gross National Happiness Index of Bhutan, the Better Jobs Index of the InterAmerican Development Bank, and the Statistical Performance Index of the World Bank. Prof. Foster received his PhD in Economics from Cornell University and has a Doctorate Honoris Causa from Universidad Autonoma del Estado Hidalgo (Mexico).
