Evidence to Inform and Improve Education: The African Education Research Database

• In Event: Bridging the Research to Policy and Practice Gap – Evidence to Impact

Proposal

Problem statement, relevance and context

The literature provides evidence that production and use of research in/about Africa is dominated by academics and publishers in the Global North - even in African Studies (Briggs & Weathers, 2016). However, a meta-analysis of 170 Canadian-funded research studies undertaken over the period 2010 –2015 in the Global South, using a different crateria for quality, identified Southern research as being of higher quality than Northern research. Therefore, the authors concluded that “when a problem is local, locals appear best placed to address it.” (McLean & Sen, 2019). However, there is also evidence that the work of African academics receives insufficient attention in research, policy and practice debates and decision-making in Africa (Mitchell, Rose & Asare 2020).

Inquiry, findings and contribution to the field

To redress the problems above, this presentation will describe the empirical process for creating the African Education Research Database (AERD, https://essa-africa.org/AERD), the first comprehensive catalogue of education research in Africa. The process involved key informant interviews, a systematic literature research, and the bibliographic analysis of ~4000 publications covering early childhood through to tertiary education that have been produced by education researchers based in institutions across 48 African countries. The database is searchable by country, research methods, languages and keywords and serves as a unique resource to:
• make African education scholars and their work more visible
• facilitate greater appreciation and use of research by Africans
• identify gaps for further research by Africans
• facilitate the use of research evidence to inform educational policy, practice and decision making (Rose, Downing, Asare, & Mitchell, 2019).

Creative approaches are needed to ensure impactful use of the AERD. Possibilities include packaging the research for a policy audience and promoting uptake of this resource within the research communitee. Developing the AERD and engaging with education stakeholders have also highlighted other barriers that the education research community in Africa face. Data-sharing is urgent, given that the COVID-19 pandemic has reduced opportunities to collect new data. Education data custodians therefore need to increase public access to data, to reduce the cost and time for conducting research and generating evidence to improve education delivery and impact.

This panel will enable discussions about how to better identify and eliminate data barriers, and what can be learnt from other sectors, in order to develop an action plan for impact in education.

Authors

• Pauline Essah, Education Sub Saharan Africa – ESSA

• Pauline Rose, University of Cambridge