Since 2010, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation has focused its grantmaking on efforts that serve students from all backgrounds, especially those in underserved populations. They have focused on helping schools deliver and measure “deeper learning,” which they define as a set of six interrelated competencies (e.g. mastering rigorous academic content, learning how to think critically and solve problems, and learning how to learn).
Previously, the Foundation had focused on funding organizations to create “proof points” to illustrate ways that Deeper Learning could help youth. In 2017, they launched an initiative focused on understanding how deeper learning practices can generate sustained, scaled impact in school systems. They funded 10 teams, including ours, to “develop empirically driven, practical approaches to get from proof points of deeper learning practices to equitable and sustainable scaled impact.”
This is no small challenge, and we believe that others could benefit from hearing about our progress along this challenging journey. Accordingly, we are writing a blog, presented here, that will share our accomplishments and challenges, and seek to generate a dialogue among the other funded teams and others working to make meaningful change through Research Practice Partnerships.
