LearnPlatform announced the release of Evidence-as-a-Service, a subscription model to support all EdTech solution providers and their partners with the necessary evidence to meet market demands, demonstrate compliance with the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), and efficiently serve all students and educators.
LearnPlatform, known for its innovative EdTech effectiveness system trusted by districts, state agencies and their partners serving millions of students, worked closely with partners for over a year to test different service offerings to help EdTech providers quickly and cost-effectively develop the necessary evidence base to inform their product plans and comply with Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). ESSA requires federal funding and stimulus dollars to be used for “evidence-based interventions.”
“The adoption of technology is here to stay. Districts manage an average of over 1,400 EdTech products, and the numbers are not dropping this year,” said Mary Styers, PhD, LearnPlatform’s Director of Research.
“Knowing which of these tools is working, in which situations, and for which students and teachers are a critical question every district leader is asking.”
LearnPlatform offers three subscription packages to support any size and type of EdTech solutions provider and their partners. The packages are curated to help all providers meet ESSA compliance and build evidence-based interventions that empower districts and states to buy and use their products to drive student outcomes.
Furthermore, given the influx of stimulus funds over the past 18 months, this type of evaluation will provide districts with valuable evidence about the effectiveness of their education technology investments. Administrators can apply this evidence to inform their decisions about EdTech solutions and establish a solid foundation for sustainable, long-range financial planning.
“As every education organization reacts to modernize learning during and after the pandemic, it’s critical that rigorous, practical evaluation accelerates to provide evidence at the speed of decision-making,” said Karl Rectanus, CEO and Co-founder of LearnPlarform. “Our technology, team and model equips providers to work with their state and district partners quickly, safely, cost-effectively and, most importantly, towards the shared goals of better outcomes for students and teachers, no matter their size, solution, or context.”
In the face of massive change for schools, Evidence-as-a-Service offers providers at any stage – early, growth and established – to build an evidence base for their product(s) to better partner with districts and states to equip them with the ability to modernize their learning environments with ESSA-aligned evidence.
Each subscription aligns with one or more of the four levels of ESSA to demonstrate rationale and identify and show promising, moderate, or strong evidence that their product positively impacts student outcomes.
Age of Learning®, a leading education technology innovator and creator of the widely popular ABCmouse® online learning program, leveraged LearnPlatform’s services to evaluate My Math Academy™, the company’s personalized, adaptive math program that helps young learners master essential math concepts and skills. LearnPlatform determined that My Math Academy meets the highest level of evidence standards under ESSA, Level I “Strong Evidence,” and has a significant positive impact on students’ numeracy skills.
“We developed My Math Academy and My Reading Academy™ to support educators in providing equitable instruction and addressing the varying needs of young learners in order to ensure all students achieve proficiency in math and reading,” said Sunil Gunderia, Chief Innovation Officer and Head of Mastery & Adaptive Products, Age of Learning. “We are partnering with LearnPlatform to develop a modernized approach to gathering evidence as it is an important element in validating the learning gains that our programs are designed to help students achieve. This evidence is essential to assisting schools and districts in identifying solutions that will work in their specific contexts to deliver learning outcomes.”
Whether a solution is for core curriculum, tutoring, learning loss, or another educational purpose, the Evidence-as-a-Service model provides a path to ESSA compliance in weeks, at a fraction of the cost of traditional models.
“We work every day to fundamentally change outcomes for students through reimagining the role of assessments in the learning process. As soon as we spoke to LearnPlatform’s team, we knew they were the right partner to run an independent study to examine just that,” said Craig Jones, CEO and Co-Founder of Formative, a web app for classrooms that allow teachers to give live assignments to students, enabling instant feedback and long-term student growth tracking. “The results found promising evidence and also show that Formative satisfies the requirements for ESSA Level III. This confirms what we already know: the more visibility educators have into student learning, the stronger the learning outcomes can be.”
Original story here.