Last night I saw the fabulous Brazilian movie *The Blue Trail* (*O Último Azul*) in the theater. I loved it. Highly recommended.

It's not as common as it should be, but @andrewzeitlin.io has at least two papers comparing programs to cash. One is a training program (www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...) and the other is a nutrition program (arxiv.org/abs/2106.00213).

I agree that this is usually the best counterfactual.

Ten Reasons Not to Measure Impact—and What to Do Instead (SSIR) Impact evaluations are an important tool for learning about effective solutions to social problems, but they are a good investment only in the right circumstances.

I simultaneously believe that we need more rigorous, credible evaluations of social policy AND that some current evaluation systems would be better transformed into good monitoring. I just assigned my students my favorite reading on this topic. ssir.org/articles/ent...

We have a great event on education tomorrow (Wednesday, 4/15) at @cgdev.org. We'll hear from government ministers from Zambia, Sierra Leone, and Grenada, plus the CEO of the Global Partnership for Education. (I'm even sharing some evidence.)

Register here cgdev.org/event/sustai...

I just watched *Grand Theft Hamlet* with my Shakespeare-averse 19-year-old, and we were both mesmerized from start to finish.

letterboxd.com/daveevans/fi...

Out-of-work actors make art by staging Hamlet within the game Grand Theft Auto: Online during the COVID pandemic. Exceptional.

We asked 3 questions to a panel of experts

• What do we know about ending school-related violence?

• How can that knowledge can be translated into effective, scalable programs?

• Why there isn’t more action from donors & govts?

Here is what we learned www.cgdev.org/blog/how-red...

We asked 3 questions to a panel of experts

• What do we know about ending school-related violence?

• How can that knowledge can be translated into effective, scalable programs?

• Why there isn’t more action from donors & govts?

Here is what we learned www.cgdev.org/blog/how-red...

"Even under conservative assumptions, PASEC's benefits exceed its costs by a comfortable margin. Counting just one successful reform in one country per decade with a very conservative learning improvement, yields a benefit-cost ratio of around 31:1." www.cgdev.org/blog/pisa-sh...

Thank you! Some of the same problems that made me write that are still, unfortunately, current.

Researchers say that a given result ‘fails to replicate’, with important consequences for the author(s), when in fact they’re just learning different things about the world & nothing has gone wrong.

What we talk about when we talk about replication onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1... by @mclem.org

The building blocks of a national strategy to tackle child poverty www.elgaronline.com/edcollchap/b...

Five takeaways on cash transfers and child poverty www.elgaronline.com/edcollchap/b...

Not a criticism. It's just interesting to see the intellectual ancestors of subdisciplines and areas of thought. These authors quote Sen like Bill Easterly quotes Adam Smith.

Very cool! Do you feel like it's translated to a big boost in language ability, or mostly just cognitive stimulation, or something else?

The authors in this edited volume *really* like Amartya Sen.

Can giving youth & their families better information about the benefits of education change their lives?

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

@AcostaAminaM & I review interventions in Africa, Asia, Latin America & the Caribbean.

Now out in International Journal of Educational Development!

So many x-posts (tweets) and blog posts as a result of avoiding papers and book ideas...

Today I learned a new word from Nobel Prize winner Claudia Goldin

The story of my professional and personal life in fewer than 30 words.

The best I tend to hope for is to engage in "productive procrastination" (www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/on-y...) in which at least I'm doing something *else* productive while procrastinating the one-hour tasks.

a picture of a woman with the words there 's no turning back now below her ALT: a picture of a woman with the words there 's no turning back now below her

I just submitted final proofs for an accepted paper. It's always the scariest moment in the publication process for me.

Like Easterly, I tend to be dismissive of buzzwords in international organization documents. But as Easterly suggests, perhaps even the introduction of concepts not previously embraced via "meaningless buzzwords" can signal the beginning of a change.

I'll be participating in three sessions at #CIES2026 at the end of the month. Come and say hello!

FOREVERGREEN — Academy Award®–Nominated Animated Short Film | Now Streaming for a Limited Time YouTube video by Forevergreen Film

And the one that I couldn't figure out how it had gotten nominated was Forevergreen. Not bad, just *fine*. www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4EP...

The Girl Who Cried Pearls 2025 YouTube video by MOVIE FLIX

The film that won the Oscar, The Girl Who Cried Pearls, was also great and is also available on YouTube. (The animation is exceptional.) www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mSf...

“Retirement Plan” (2026 Oscar Nominee) | The New Yorker YouTube video by The New Yorker

This weekend I saw all the Oscar nominated animated shorts. I enjoyed almost all of them.

My favorite, "Retirement Plan," is available free on YouTube. youtu.be/2Mqa4zfJdx4?...

“A common finding from previous studies is that measures that ignore intrahousehold inequality understate the level of child poverty.”

from Batana, Cockburn, and Magejo (2025) www.elgaronline.com/edcollchap/b...

"Changing Perceptions of Educational Returns in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Meta-Analysis" is now forthcoming at International Journal of Educational Development!

You can read the working paper here www.cgdev.org/publication/...

I was just reviewing the video of a panel I moderated, and it turns out I like my own moderation much better at 2x speed. www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWlo...

I learned a great deal from Easterly's *Violent Saviors: The West's Conquest of the Rest*. Recommended.