Rukmini Banerji and Sẹ̀yẹ Abímbọ́lá join IDinsight’s Board of Directors

April 21, 2021: This month IDinsight welcomes Dr. Rukmini Banerji and Dr. Sẹ̀yẹ Abímbọ́lá to its Board of Directors.

Ms. Banerji brings to IDinsight decades of experience strengthening India’s education system through evidence-informed policies and programs. Dr. Abímbọ́lá brings global expertise in equity, health systems transformation, and participatory governance. Former board directors Arun Gupta and Oliver Sabot who supported IDinsight throughout a key stage of its growth have completed their terms.

“Arun Gupta and Oliver Sabot have contributed wisdom and support to IDinsight throughout its first decade,” said Ruth Levine, IDinsight CEO. “We now welcome Rukmini Banerji and Ṣẹ̀yẹ Abímbọ́lá, who will help us continue to find pathways to impact through deep connections in the places in which we work.”

“It is an exciting next chapter for the Board to welcome Rukmini and Ṣẹ̀yẹ in support of IDinsight’s mission and impact globally,” said Katie Laidlaw, IDinsight Board Chair.

Dr. Rukmini Banerji has been the Chief Executive Officer of Pratham Education Foundation since 2015. She joined Pratham in 1996 and over the years has learned a lot from working with children of all ages in villages and urban slums. She also has extensive experience in leading Pratham’s partnership work with different governments in India. For over two decades, Dr. Rukmini led Pratham’s research and assessment efforts including the well-known nationwide ASER initiative (Annual Status of Education Report) from 2005 to 2014. Originally from Bihar, Dr. Rukmini now is based in Delhi and Pune. She loves being a grandmother and telling and writing stories for children.

“I am privileged to join the Board of IDinsight,” said Dr. Rukmini Banerji. “I have watched the growth and maturing of the organization from a distance over the last few years with admiration. I look forward to working more closely with the IDinsight team and learning from what they do.”

Dr. Ṣẹ̀yẹ Abímbọ́lá is a health systems researcher and a global health scholar. He has worked as a health system practitioner and/or researcher in Nigeria where he completed his medical training at Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife; in Australia where he completed an MPhil in Public Health and Ph.D. in Health Systems at the University of Sydney; and in the United Kingdom where he was a Sidney Sax Overseas Early Career Fellow at the University of Oxford. Dr. Abímbọ́lá studies community engagement in governance, decentralized governance, and the role of governance in the adoption and scale-up of health system innovations. He is currently (2020-22) the Prince Claus Chair in Development and Equity at Utrecht University in the Netherlands, a senior lecturer in global health at the University of Sydney in Australia, and the editor in chief of BMJ Global Health.

“I’ve admired, from afar, the decentralized ways in which IDinsight is organized and does its work; its openness to, and embrace of, different forms of knowledge; and its deep commitment to using knowledge to improve systems,” said Dr. Abímbọ́lá. “I’m excited to now be part of the IDinsight story, and to contribute to and learn from its evolution in the coming years.”