SeeMore Impact Labs

Our work is directed at building educational technology that can actually “move the dial” on the success of disadvantaged students (a hard problem!), and then to scale this within the secondary, postsecondary, and workforce ecosystem (a harder problem!). Our work is based on recognizing that the goal of education is not for students to learn specific academic or job-specific skills, but rather to develop their capacity and confidence in learning. Our online, self-paced Core Skills for Mathematics (CSM) course is to our knowledge the first adaptive learning technology that simultaneously personalizes instruction in academic and how-you-learn, -act and -feel domains. The course is designed to build High Performance competencies that include » college-level quantitative reasoning » using these skills to solve real-world problems » learning new skills on your own » executing your skills with care and persistence, with an intention to excel » and most importantly, self-efficacy, the belief in your ability to succeed, and which leads to all the previous skills. These High Performance skills are key to both education and work success, and the CSM course and certificate provide a means to both develop and certify those skills. Moreover, by both providing deep remediation and building better learning, almost all students – even those who struggle in math and school -- can earn college math credit. As an inexpensive, single semester course, CSM has broad use in schools, colleges, adult education, workforce development, and workplaces. To drive use, our Excel Together initiative embeds college math credit and hiring preferences into the CSM Certificate on a community-wide basis to drive education and training programs to offer the course, and individuals to take it. Excel Together is now pursuing its first statewide programs in West Virginia, DC, and New Mexico, with our eyes on other communities.