Carnegie Corporation of New York Awards Grant to Help Educators Make More Informed Decisions About Technology

WASHINGTON, Sept. 19, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- The Jefferson Education Exchange, a nonprofit committed to helping teachers and school leaders make informed decisions about education technology, today announced that it has received a $400,000 grant from Carnegie Corporation of New York. The philanthropic funding will support efforts to help educators around the country identify and implement technology that works best for their particular contexts.

Founded in 2018, the Jefferson Education Exchange is tackling an urgent collective action problem faced by educators around the country. Each year, American schools in more than fourteen thousand districts collectively invest more than $13 billion in education technology products and services. Yet only 5 percent of them appear to be used as frequently as schools intend, while approximately 65 percent of student licenses purchased appear to either be completely unused and/or fail to meet schools' usage goals.

"Education's collective action problem stems from the fragmentation inherent in our education system. Educators want more information about what technologies work, and in what contexts -- but they lack the time and incentive to document and share their experiences," said LaVerne Evans Srinivasan, vice president of the Corporation's National Program and director of the Education Program. "This challenge is one that can be solved. The Jefferson Education Exchange is leading this effort with an ambitious sector-wide approach aimed at answering the most critical questions related to edtech implementation."

The Jefferson Education Exchange is a nonprofit launched through a unique collaboration between the University of Virginia's Curry School of Education and Human Development and Strada Education Network. Central to its work, the organization provides cash stipends directly to teachers who document their experiences and perspectives with edtech implementation. This data helps contextually similar peers and edtech decision-makers understand which tools are most likely to work (or not work) in their local environments. The Jefferson Education Exchange's growing body of research is informing its initiative to "map the edtech genome," bringing together leaders from the education and research communities to create a common language for defining the contexts of edtech implementation.

"Research shows that edtech can have a positive impact under the right conditions. But the reality is that until now, there has been no coordinated effort to collect contextualized information that can help educators make better-informed decisions about which tools are most likely to work for them," said Bart Epstein, president and CEO of the Jefferson Education Exchange. "We are grateful to have the support of Carnegie Corporation of New York as we work to create a framework to help teachers, administrators, and district leaders not only choose technologies that are most likely to actually support their students -- but also help those educators understand how to best implement and support those technologies, based on the experience of millions of their peers."

About Jefferson Education Exchange 

The Jefferson Education Exchange is a nonprofit organization committed to bringing educator perspectives to bear on edtech procurement and research. Supported by the University of Virginia's Curry School of Education and Human Development, its work centers on research and development to guide the design of research protocols and tools that will enable educators to document and share their experiences with education technology products. For more information, visit the Jefferson Education Exchange on Twitter and LinkedIn.

SOURCE Jefferson Education Exchange