Improving Outcomes in the Digital Age

To promote equitable outcomes, educators need to know what strategies, programs, and products improve learning for all students. Addressing this need, WestEd brings expertise in cognitive and learning sciences to create rigorous study designs aimed at evaluating promising strategies and interventions tailored to improve student outcomes.
Beyond determining whether a practice or product leads to learning gains, our researchers explore further to understand why, how, for what students, and in which contexts.
We focus on:
- Helping you understand potential for emerging technologies to provide equitable access
- Supporting your efforts to improve personalization
- Building efficiencies in educational contexts
Our Research in Action
Efficacy Study of Adventures Aboard the S.S.GRIN: Social, Emotional, and Academic Skills
Our researchers conducted a rigorous efficacy study of an online intervention to improve social, emotional, and academic outcomes for students with social difficulties. We flexibly and successfully adapted the study to collect data despite COVID-19 school closures. Read more about our project.
Improving Children’s Understanding of Equivalence (ICUE)
WestEd conducted a rigorous randomized control trial of ICUE, a promising intervention and supplemental math program designed to improve student understanding of math equivalence. Our study found that students who use ICUE achieve meaningful improvements in their conceptual understanding of core math concepts. ICUE student workbook and teacher manual are openly available to download. Download resources.
ASSISTments Education Innovation and Research (EIR)
ASSISTments is a research-based, online platform that teachers use to assign and review homework, regardless of textbook. Our team directed a quasi-experimental design study to determine the efficacy of using ASSISTments consistently over one school year combined with teachers’ participation in ASSISTments virtual professional development activities. ASSISTments is shown to improve student math learning outcomes. Our researchers are conducting an additional scale scale-up study focused on how participation in ASSISTments-related professional learning activities further affects student outcomes. Read more about our project.