Research Fellowship Programme
The PAL Network Research Fellowship Programme is designed to foster innovative, policy-relevant, and equity-focused research that advances foundational learning across the Global South. The programme supports researchers in generating actionable insights using citizen-led assessment data to better understand the factors shaping children’s learning outcomes, educational participation, and inequities.
The 2026 Fellowship Cohort focuses specifically on analysis of PAL Network’s 2025 International Common Assessment of Numeracy (ICAN) and International Common Assessment of Reading (ICAR) datasets, collected through nationally representative household-based assessments across 11 countries. Unlike many school-based assessments, ICAN and ICAR capture both in-school and out-of-school children and include rich contextual, household-level, and demographic information that enable deeper exploration of learning inequalities and their drivers.
The fellowship aims to strengthen research capacity, encourage innovative use of citizen-led assessment data, and contribute to evidence-informed policy and practice. Fellows will have the opportunity to engage with one of the largest cross-country foundational learning datasets from the Global South and contribute to ongoing discussions on educational equity, inclusion, learning recovery, and systems transformation.
PAL Network welcomes diverse analytical approaches and encourages applicants to explore creative and interdisciplinary research directions. In addition to analysing learning outcomes, fellows are encouraged to connect ICAN and ICAR data with external datasets, policy indicators, and ongoing education initiatives to better understand how social, economic, geographic, and policy-related factors are associated with children’s learning.
Selected fellows will receive mentorship and technical guidance from PAL Network researchers and will become part of a collaborative research and peer-learning environment. High-quality fellowship outputs may be disseminated through PAL Network publications, policy engagement platforms, conference presentations, and other knowledge-sharing opportunities.
Objective of the Fellowship
The PAL Network Research Fellowship Programme aims to generate innovative and policy-relevant evidence to improve children’s foundational learning through inclusive citizen-led assessment data and research. The fellowship seeks to strengthen research capacity, promote creative and interdisciplinary analysis of large-scale learning data, foster collaboration across researchers and institutions, and support the use of evidence to inform educational policy and practice. Through mentorship, partnerships, and knowledge-sharing, the programme encourages research that advances equitable, scalable, and sustainable approaches to improving foundational learning outcomes for all children, particularly those from marginalized and underrepresented groups.
This page covers the main categories of the application and selection processes, as well as the eligibility criteria for the research fellowship program.
Contact
Should you have questions, reach out to us at [email protected] or [email protected].
