Rie Kijima’s research addresses topics such as the politics of international assessments, the impact of education reforms, and STEAM education. Her recent articles have appeared in journals such as The Review of International Organization, Review of International Political Economy, Sociology of Education, and International Journal of STEM Education.

Previously, she was a Lecturer and Interim Director of the International Comparative Education and International Education Policy Analysis programs at the Stanford Graduate School of Education. She received her Ph.D. and M.A. from Stanford University, and her B.A. from ICU, a liberal arts college in Tokyo, Japan.

She has worked at aid agencies such as the World Bank and Japan International Cooperation Agency. At the World Bank, she was an education consultant specializing in monitoring and evaluation. She helped advance equity-focused education projects in Morocco, Tunisia, Vietnam, and Laos. She is a recipient of the Joint Japan/World Bank Graduate Scholarship.

In 2016, she co-founded SKY Labo, an education non-profit organization that aims to cultivate the next generation of STEAM learners. The organization offers education programs that are grounded in constructivist theory, using human-centred pedagogical approaches. These educational interventions have positively influenced learners’ perceptions toward STEM, elevated their creative self-efficacy, and increased their global and critical consciousness.