BackgroundImproving the health of school-aged children can yield substantial benefits for cognitive development and educational achievement. However, there is limited experimental evidence on the benefits of school-based malaria prevention or how health interventions interact with other efforts to improve education quality. This study aims to evaluate the impact of school-based malaria prevention and enhanced literacy instruction on the health and educational achievement of school children in Kenya.DesignA factorial, cluster randomised trial is being implemented in 101 government primary schools on the coast of Kenya. The interventions are (i) intermittent screening and treatment of malaria in schools by public health workers and (ii) training workshops and support for teachers to promote explicit and systematic literacy instruction. Schools are randomised to one of four groups: receiving either (i) the malaria intervention alone; (ii) the literacy intervention alone; (iii) both interventions combined; or (iv) control group where neither intervention is implemented. Children from classes 1 and 5 are randomly selected and followed up for 24 months. The primary outcomes are educational achievement and anaemia, the hypothesised mediating variables through which education is affected. Secondary outcomes include malaria parasitaemia, school attendance and school performance. A nested process evaluation, using semi-structured interviews, focus group discussion and a stakeholder analysis will investigate the community acceptability, feasibility and cost-effectiveness of the interventions.DiscussionAcross Africa, governments are committed to improve health and education of school-aged children, but seek clear policy and technical guidance as to the optimal approach to address malaria and improved literacy. This evaluation will be one of the first to simultaneously evaluate the impact of health and education interventions in the improvement of educational achievement. Reflection is made on the practical issues encountered in conducting research in schools in Africa.Trial RegistrationNational Institutes of Health NCT00878007

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S This integrative review on the teaching of reading in Kenyan primary schools provides a foundation for the growing movement there to improve reading education. In gathering sources for this review, we took an inclusive historical stance. Thus, we did not dismiss research reports that lacked traditional indicators of quality such as being published in peer‐reviewed journals. We used multiple methods to find relevant research and associated documents, including two trips to Kenya. The review is organized by six topics: (a) language of instruction, (b) reading instruction, (c) reading materials, (d) reading culture, (e) assessment, and (f) teacher development. The review concludes with six proposals for policymakers, educational researchers, and teacher educators for the development of reading instruction based on what we learned in reviewing the literature. The first proposals are intended specifically to address the teaching of reading in Kenya, but they may be relevant to other sub‐Saharan nations. The final proposal encourages others to conduct similar reviews to make possible a handbook of reading in Africa. Esta revisión integradora sobre la enseñanza de la lectura en las escuelas primarias de Kenia proporciona fundamentos para el movimiento creciente para el mejoramiento de la educación en lectura. En la recolección de las fuentes de esta revisión tomamos una posición histórica abarcadora. Por ello no descartamos informes de investigación que carecieran de los indicadores de calidad tradicionales como haber aparecido en publicaciones evaluadas por pares. Usamos múltiples métodos para hallar investigaciones relevantes y documentos relacionados, incluyendox dos viajes a Kenia. La revisión se organiza en seis tópicos: (a) lengua de enseñanza, (b) enseñanza de la lectura, (c) materiales de lectura, (d) cultura escrita, (e) evaluación y (f) formación docente. La revisión concluye con cinco propuestas para elaborar políticas, formar investigadores en educación y capacitadores de docentes para el desarrollo de la enseñanza de la lectura basadas en aquello que aprendimos al revisar la literatura. Las primeras cuatro propuestas tienen como propósito específico abordar la enseñanza de la lectura en Kenia, si bien podrían ser relevantes también para otras naciones subsaharianas. La propuesta final estimula a otros a realizar revisiones similares para hacer posible un manual de la lectura en África. Diese integrative Betrachtung über den Leseunterricht in Kenias Grundschulen liefert einen Grundstock für die wachsende Bewegung dort zur Verbesserung des Leseunterrichts. Beim Zusammenstellen von Unterlagen für diese Betrachtung nahmen wir einen inklusiven historischen Standpunkt ein. Daher verwarfen wir nicht jene Forschungsberichte, denen traditionelle Indikatoren an Qualität fehlten, wie beispielsweise solche, die in fachbeurteilten Journalen publiziert sind. Wir nutzten mannigfache Methoden, um relevante Forschung und assoziierte Dokumente zu finden, einschließlich zweier Reisen nach Kenia. Die Betrachtung ist ...

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Many Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in Africa face challenges that require the intervention of national governments, development partners and other stakeholders. HEIs also require new investment paradigms to maximize students’ acquisition of work-ready skills, knowledge and attitudes to enable students to contribute effectively to the workforce. The objective of this study was to identify reforms and investments needed to strengthen Higher Education (HE) in Africa and to inform the design and implementation of future investments and policy for sustainable development. A systematic review approach, involving a synthesis of literature on this theme in Africa in recent years, by African governments, education networks, academia and international bodies, was employed. The study used data from UNESCO and World Bank databases which were blended with the synthesis of the literature. The obtained literature was analysed and synthesized on the basis of its relevance and value to the HEIs study discourse. Textual and thematic analysis tookcentre stage with a view to establishing current reforms in HEIs and the concomitant investments that national governments and other key stakeholders need to make to have robust HEIs. The study used the Human Capital Theory that postulates that the most efficient path to the national development of any society lies in the improvement of its population, which is considered as the human capital. Despite criticisms of the human capital theory at the individual level on the extent to which education is directly related to improvements in occupation or income, human capital theorists generally assume that after all the known inputs into economic growth have been explained, much of the unexplained residual variance represents the contribution of the improvement of human capital, of which education is seen as most important (Merwe, 2010). The results of the study show that HEIs have done very little to promote Intra-Africa Academic Mobility and nurture HEI-industry partnerships to address demand and supply aspects of the labour force. The massification of higher education, resulting in a democratization of education, and the advent of the knowledge economy and globalization, among other factors, are being experienced without commensurate planning and with no corresponding accompanying increase in resources to enable the HEIs cope with the increased student population.  HEIs in Africa are sub-optimally capacitated to combat Africa’s pressing challenges such as unemployment, climate change and COVID-19 pandemic. The study points out that HEIs need to evolve in tandem with continental and global market needs to achieve Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number 4 on quality education. Further, it recommends that HEIs should encourage Intra-Africa Academic Mobility and foster HEI-industry partnerships to address demand-and-supply aspects of the labour force. In this respect, HEIs in Africa should be developing curricula aimed at building capacity of leaders and professionals to respond to the need to decarbonize and dematerialize development in Africa and leverage on the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Consequently, HEIs must prepare students to be entrepreneurial and resilient; able to continue to learn and reinvent themselves and their careers throughout their lives. Indeed, HEIs should view themselves as creative hubs where partners come together and harness each other’s synergy to innovate and solve societal problems.