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Session Submission Summary

Education Sub Saharan Africa: Promoting the Visibility of Education Research in a Context of Fragile Peace

Wed, April 1, 1:15 to 2:30pm, Hilton, Floor: Fourth Floor - Tower 3, Union Square 3&4

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

Africa is entering an era that will shape its destiny as the continent of the future. However, to realise this potential, the continent must prioritise key areas such as strengthening peace and addressing systemic challenges within its training and education systems (Continental Education Strategy for Africa 2016-2025 (CESA, 16-25)). Hence, the link between peace and education is central to the CESA, which also acknowledges that a peaceful and secure environment is a fundamental prerequisite for access to education and effective learning. Conversely, a quality education fosters peace by promoting diversity, non-violent conflict resolution, and equips young people against radicalisation, particularly in fragile contexts such as sub-Saharan African countries. Consequently, ongoing efforts to enhance education in African countries directly (or indirectly) contribute to strengthening peace on the continent.

In this context, by providing decision-makers with evidence needed to improve learning at all levels and equipping young Africans with skills to achieve their ambitions in life, education research plays a crucial role in fostering peace in Africa. Unfortunately, the education research space in Africa, despite its strong growth over the past two decades, faces unique challenges in living up to the continent’s potential. These challenges include its lack of visibility in the international education policy debates, African researchers’ limited access to global scholarly knowledge, scarce funding, and few international collaboration opportunities.

This situation raises questions about what concrete actions it will take to enhance the field of education research in Africa. How to raise the visibility of locally produced education research in Africa? How can school leadership help improve learning and enhance peace in Africa? This panel reports on evidence from three applied research projects conducted by Education Sub Saharan Africa (ESSA), in partnership with other organisations, to improve teaching and learning, to raise the visibility of African education research and researchers, and to enhance the education research field in Africa.

The first paper synthesises evidence on school leadership research in sub-Saharan Africa, examining its role in advancing both education quality and inclusion, with a focus on Tanzania, Malawi, and Sierra Leone. It highlights comparative lessons and strategic entry points for reform, including strengthening implementation fidelity, institutionalising sustainable professional development, and embedding gender equity in leadership pipelines. These findings contribute to global debates on how to translate leadership policies into meaningful improvements in teaching, learning, equity, and peacebuilding.

The second paper on the African Education Research Database (AERD) proposes a bibliometric analysis of knowledge produced by Africa-based education researchers from various perspectives. It posits that addressing challenges observed in the education systems across African countries, including unequal access to education and learning poverty, will require evidence generated from Africa by Africans, that considers the socio-cultural contexts to inform educational policy and practice. It exploits the AERD, a catalogue of more than 6500 peer-reviewed journal publications focusing on sub-Saharan Africa, to propose an assessment of the field in Africa. Among others, the analysis underscores the scholarly strength and relevance of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)-based education research, as well as an assessment of the most thematic areas discussed by African education researchers.

The third paper aims to address the question of what it will take to enhance the field of education research in Africa. Moreover, it discusses interventions needed for a mature field that improves education quality and strengthens peace across the continent. To achieve its goal, this paper combines data from a bibliometric analysis with key informant interviews, focus group discussions and co-creation workshops organised across the continent, while adopting a field-building framework. The resulting situational analysis, SWOT analysis and TOWS matrix reveal some urgent needs that require attention. These include promoting education research not just for academic promotion but to have a meaningful impact on local education policies and practices; ii. addressing the disconnection between researchers and decision-makers and iii. promoting inclusion, gender equity, capacity building programmes and South-South peer learning networks.

Overall, these three applied research projects bear promising outcomes for education knowledge production, policies and practices in Africa. Specifically, while the results of Presentation 1 support school leadership knowledge and policy to improve learning outcomes, Presentation 2 raises the visibility of African education research and researchers, identifies and addresses researchers’ needs in terms of capacity, seed grants and mentoring. Presentation 3 proposes urgent interventions that are being tested in selected countries. These efforts not only contribute to education and educational policies, but they also contribute to social inclusion and strengthen peace in sub-Saharan Africa.

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