Nipuni joined LIRNEasia as a Junior Researcher in December 2022 and currently serves as a Researcher, contributing to projects on social protection, digital development, artificial intelligence (AI), and education policy. She has worked across a range of regional and national projects, with a strong focus on research, stakeholder coordination, and policy engagement.
Nipuni holds a Master of Philosophy in Social Sciences from the Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka (2023), and a bachelor’s degree with First Class Honours in Economics from the University of Colombo in 2020. In recognition of her outstanding academic achievements, she was bestowed with the Dean’s Award for Best Undergraduate Student of the Year in 2017.
Prior to her role at LIRNEasia, she worked as a Research Assistant and also served as a Visiting Lecturer in the Department of Economics and Statistics at Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka.
At LIRNEasia, she is currently involved in:
She serves as the project manager of the “Improving EdTech Policy Capacity in Sri Lanka” project, which is part of a broader regional initiative supporting education technology policymaking in emerging Asia. In this role, she leads research coordination in Sri Lanka and supports knowledge translation for a cohort of policy researchers across the region.
Her past work at LIRNEasia includes:
- The Sri Lanka Social Safety Net Survey, a large-scale, nationally representative survey covering 10,000 households across the country, funded by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC).
- The Global Index for Responsible Artificial Intelligence, where she supported regional coordination across 14 countries in the Asia-Pacific, working with LIRNEasia as the regional hub and funded by EWMI.
- A project funded by The Asia Foundation-South Asia Grant Programme (TAF-SAGP) to test the usability and scalability of an AI tool designed to counter misinformation, which included two phases: development and field testing.
- The UNDP Digital Readiness Assessment, where she managed fieldwork, conducted primary research, and supported secondary analysis to assess Sri Lanka’s digital ecosystem.
- A monitoring and evaluation project funded by HSBC and implemented by Sarvodaya Fusion, where she led data analysis to assess the outcomes of strengthening economic opportunities for women entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka through human capital enhancement in sustainability innovation and digital inclusion skills training programme.