Jacobus joined the McCourt school in 2015, after completing a Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford. His primary research interests relate to delivery of basic education services in sub-Saharan Africa. He is currently involved in three different field experiments of education programs – in South Africa, Nepal, and Uganda. In past research, he evaluated a community reconciliation program in Sierra Leone and conducted a field experiment on foreigner presence and generosity in Sierra Leone.

Jacobus is also a consultant for the Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund at the World Bank and was Research Coordinator for a multi-million research fund, Research Into Improving Systems of Education (RISE). In past work he ran multiple training programs on the design of Impact Evaluations and consulted the Tanzanian and Nigerian governments on education reform.

Jacobus completed his M.Phil (distinction) and D.Phil in Economics at the University of Oxford, where he was funded by the Rhodes Scholarship. He is originally from South Africa and has worked or traveled in 19 different countries in Africa.