Research shows that children living with two biological parents outperform those raised in other family structures. A growing number of children do not live with two biological parents in sub-Saharan Africa, but few studies have examined the consequences. In this article, data from the African Population and Health Research Center collected in the…

Using a case example of an innovative sanitation solution in a slum setting, this study explores the usefulness of the Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique in a program planning and evaluation context. Using a qualitative image-based method to map people's mental models of ill-structured problems such as sanitation can aid program planners and…

School safety is important in enhancing children's learning. It is defined as measures put in place by staff, parents, learners and other stakeholders. The measures are meant to minimise risk conditions that may cause accidents, bodily injury as well as emotional and psychological distress. Accidents, if not prevented, can cause disability or…

This paper uses difference-in-difference and multivariate analyses procedures to examine the effects of two community-based intervention packages on mathematics achievement of primary school girls from low-income urban households in Kenya. The data involved in this study were collected between 2013 and 2015 from 748 12-19 years old primary school…

Globally, decline in employment has affected the youth more compared to other cohorts with youth in developing countries being particularly hard hit. There have been various interventions by the Kenyan government to address the challenge of youth employment through human capital development like the Youth Enterprise Development Fund (YEFD).…

The objective of this paper is to examine the perceptions of community elders and parents on their roles regarding support to their children's education. Data come from the qualitative component of a baseline survey conducted in Korogocho and Viwandani, two urban informal settlements in Nairobi, Kenya. Data were collected in April-May 2016 through…

Home-leaving is considered an important marker of the transition to adulthood and is usually framed as an individual decision. We move beyond this limited assumption to examine a broader conceptualization that might better illuminate home-leaving among youth in impoverished circumstances. We adopt the Problem Behavior Theory-framework to…

This paper examines effects of life-skills, mentoring, and counseling education intervention implemented among primary school attending girls aged between 10 and 19 years, living in Nairobi slums. We hypothesized that interaction between the intervention and aspiration, self-confidence and interest in schooling, mediates the impact of risky…

This article describes the findings from the assessment of a touch-screen, multi-media learning program on livestock health and production: "The Daktari." The program was tested on a sample of 62 livestock keepers in the Nairobi slums of Kariobangi and Kibera. The study examined prior knowledge regarding three livestock diseases (liver…

This paper describes the design and methodology used to assess the impact of free primary education (FPE) policy in Nairobi, Kenya. The key outcome of the study was to assess the impact of FPE on schooling outcomes among the urban poor. The study assesses the impact of FPE by examining how two non-comparable groups responded to the introduction of…

For long now, the urban child has been considered to be more likely than his/her rural counterpart in being able to realize the dream of fully participating in school. This observation has mainly been attributed to what is commonly known as the "urban advantage." This "urban advantage" is associated with increased access to…