Research area
The governance of education and children's data decides what the technology is allowed to become.
How should public institutions govern data about people who cannot meaningfully consent, and what does that require of the systems built on it?
Education systems now generate detailed records about children, held across ministries, schools and private platforms. The governance questions are not downstream of the technical ones; they determine which systems are buildable at all.
I worked on this inside UNESCO, on teacher development and education data governance, and contributed to the UNESCO writing team for the Broadband Commission's work on data for learning. I continue it on UNICEF Innocenti's expert advisory group on the governance of children's data.
Outputs
2025
UNICEF Innocenti, Office of Strategy and Evidence
Argues that governments can use sensitive education data without centralising it, and what governance that requires.
PolicyAuthor
2023
Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development
Broadband Commission working-group report on the governance of education data, written by the UNESCO team supporting the group.
ReportsWriting team
2022
Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development
Preliminary findings of the working group. Roy was on the UNESCO writing team for this edition too.
ReportsWriting team