About us

Established in 2018, we are a network of African scholars seeking to advance decision-focused impact evaluation of development programs through capacity building, evidence generation and policy outreach. NIERA is hosted under The United States International University-Africa’s (USIU-Africa) in Nairobi, Kenya.
NIERA is an association currently comprising of alumni of the East Africa Social Science Translation (EASST) Collaborative and has membership across five member countries – Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia and Rwanda equipped with multi-sectoral expertise (high level academic degrees and experience in conducting rigorous evaluations) in various thematic areas.

OUR CORE VALUES

These guiding principles govern our operations


Diversity and inclusivity

Ethical and independent research

Context and results driven

Facts & Statistics
31
Partner Institutions represented

5
Countries represented

12
Trainings conducted

Our History

  • NIERA's History

    Each founding member of NIERA is an East Africa Social Science Translation (EASST) alumnus. EASST is a multi-institution research network administered by the Center for Effective Global Action (CEGA) hosted at University of California, Berkeley. Launched in 2009, EASST seeks to build regional leadership in the generation of rigorous, policy-relevant social science research, and to increase the use of high quality evidence in the design of social policies, programs, and institutions throughout the Eastern Africa region (i.e. Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Burundi, and South Sudan.)
  • NIERA's History

    The cornerstone of the EASST program is a four-month long visiting fellowship. Upon completing the fellowship, scholars are expected to return to their local institutions (mainly local universities or research institutes) in East Africa and assume a leading role in the global effort to use rigorous evaluation and evidence for social and economic development.
  • NIERA's History

    NIERA was therefore conceived as a vehicle to enable EASST fellows to meet the program’s post-fellowship expectations. Additionally, fellows and organizers of EASST have long-expressed the wish for there to be a greater coordination of activity in East Africa upon fellows’ return. This desire led EASST fellows unanimously to decide to form the NIERA during a special session held at the 2017 EASST Summit facilitated by CEGA staff in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
  • NIERA's History

    At this meeting, the founding members of NIERA expressed their appreciation of the EASST program for exposing them to the tremendous value that impact evaluation adds to development research. They were unequivocal that not only did the program strengthen their capacity as impact evaluation researchers, it also connected them to a strong network of like-minded global institutions and experts. The founding members therefore saw the establishment of NIERA as the next logical step in translating the EASST experience into a sustainable movement for promoting impact evaluation across Africa, while continuing to support EASST as a pipeline for new researchers to join the network.