About the Event

This seminar, led by Shantanu Khanna, Assistant Professor of Public Policy & Economics at Northeastern University, explored the design and early insights from recent research on the power of experiential education to impact socio-emotional skill development for students in Uttarakhand, India. This research was carried out in partnership with Nishith Prakash, Professor of Public Policy & Economics at Northeastern University, and Sara Constantino, Assistant Professor at the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability,

This event was part of the Nardone Family Seminar Series at the Center for Emerging Markets.

Abstract

Despite progress in addressing barriers to human capital in the last two decades, significant learning gaps persist. A new line of research suggests that holistic skills are associated with positive impacts on later life outcomes. However, there is little evidence supporting the effectiveness of existing traditional classroom-based instructional strategies in improving non-cognitive and socio-emotional skills. In this study, we conduct a randomized control trial in 96 schools in Uttarakhand, India to estimate the causal impacts of an experiential learning pedagogy in secondary schools. The curriculum consists of a total of 15 hours of arts and theater-based instruction delivered over 10 sessions across a six-month period. We will measure impacts on socio-emotional skills, cognitive abilities, and learning outcomes.

About the Speakers

Sara Constantino is an Assistant Professor at the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability in the Department of Environmental Social Sciences and a visiting research scholar at Princeton's School of Public and International Affairs. She is also a faculty affiliate at SPARQ and the Social Science Environmental Health Research Institute. She has an interdisciplinary background at the intersection of economics, psychology, and environmental policy and politics. Her research focuses on understanding the interplay between individual, collective, institutional and ecological factors, including how they shape preferences, decisions, experiences and resilience to extreme events or shocks. In recent and ongoing studies, she is looking at the role of polarization, social norms and governance in stimulating or stifling climate action, including both adaptation and mitigation, and what conditions lead groups mobilize to shape policy and other outcomes. She also works on the impacts and politics of guaranteed income and other cash transfer programs.

Prior to starting at Stanford, she was an assistant professor in the School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs and the Department of Psychology at Northeastern University and an associate research scholar at Princeton's School of Public and International Affairs. Before this, she was a senior research fellow in guaranteed income with the Jain Family Institute, a founding editor at Nature Human Behavior, and a research coordinator with the Institute for Fiscal Studies. She received her bachelor's degree in economics from McGill University, a master's degree in economics from University College London, a Ph.D. in cognitive and decision sciences from New York University, and did a postdoc focused on environmental policy, politics and decision-making at Princeton University.

Shantanu Khanna is an Assistant Professor at the School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs and the Department of Economics at Northeastern University. Shantanu is an applied microeconomist with research interests in labor, development, and public economics. His research explores issues like inequality, hiring and wage discrimination, women's empowerment, and the impacts of public policies (especially place-based policies) on firms and workers.

Shantanu holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California, Irvine.

About the Nardone Family Seminar Series

Made possible by a gift from David R. Nardone, this seminar series brings scholars and practitioners to Northeastern University to share insights on emerging markets.   

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