IES Blog

The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) has announced two new awards to technology firms to fully develop web-based tools that inform student decision making in postsecondary education. The projects will focus on generating a measure of the return of investment (ROI) for different educational training programs and careers, so that high school and college students have access to data-driven information to guide their decisions.

The awards were made through a special topic offered by the U.S. Department of Education/IES Small Business Innovation Research (known as ED/IES SBIR) program, which funds the research and development of commercially viable education technology. (For information on the 22 awards made through the IES 2020 standard solicitation, read here.)

Background and Awards

While websites like College Scorecard and CareerOneStop provide information to explore training programs in colleges and occupations of interest, there is no tool that helps students understand the costs and benefits of individual postsecondary programs in an integrated, customizable, and user-friendly manner.  

A 2019 Phase I SBIR special topic solicitation requested proposals from small businesses to develop new ROI tools that would improve program completion rates, employment and earnings, and satisfaction with college or career, all while minimizing education-related debt. In 2019, two Phase I awards (see here and here) were made to firms to develop prototype ROI tools. The 2020 Phase II SBIR special topic solicitation requested proposals from the two 2019 Phase I awardees with plans for the full-scale development of the ROI tools, as well as an interface to present information to students and users.  Both firms received 2020 Phase II awards through this special topic:

• Illinois-based BrightHive, Inc. is fully developing an open-source toolkit that states and networks can use to calculate metrics that support and inform decision-making by postsecondary students. The Training, Education, and Apprenticeship Program Outcomes Toolkit (TEAPOT) will include several components to support implementation, including data requirements, a field guide with instructional materials and technical tools to help partners to securely and ethically combine wage and education data, a resource hub containing expert guidance and recommendations for deploying the ROI metrics in different contexts and apps, and a reference interface that allows states and networks to present ROI data as part of their career guidance applications.

• Virginia-based Vantage Point Consultants is fully developing the Return on College (ROC) tool to support students, families, and counselors with understanding of the lifetime costs and opportunity tradeoffs associated of different postsecondary degree programs.  In one version of ROC, students will be able to search colleges nationwide based on geographic location and occupational goals, with personalized output on projected debt, loan repayment, disposable income, graduation risk, and the ROI focal points of these decisions. In the other version of ROC, prospective students visiting a college website will receive data driven information on potential careers, salaries, price, and debt expected for degrees offered by a school.

After development is complete in early 2022, researchers will analyze whether the tools function as intended and are feasible for students to use. Research will also test if the tools show promise for producing a meaningful and accurate measure of ROI. Both firms will also focus on preparing for the wide-scale distribution of the tools to end users, as well as plans for sustaining the tools over time.

Stay tuned for updates on Twitter (@IESResearch) as IES projects drive innovative forms of technology.

Written by Edward Metz (Edward.Metz@ed.gov), Program Manager, ED/IES SBIR

The Institute of Education Sciences Small Business Innovation Research program (ED/IES SBIR) funds entrepreneurial developers to create the next generation of education technology for students, teachers, and administrators in general and special education. The program emphasizes an iterative research and development process and pilot studies to evaluate the feasibility, usability, and promise of new products to improve educational outcomes. The program also focuses on commercialization after development is complete, so that the products can reach schools and be sustained over time.

In recent years, millions of students in tens of thousands of schools around the country have used technologies developed through ED/IES SBIR. And in the past four months, about one million students and teachers used the technologies for remote teaching and learning, as many ED/IES SBIR-supported developers made their products available at no cost in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the closure of schools.

ED/IES SBIR Announces its 2020 Awards

This week, ED/IES SBIR announced the results of its 2020 award competition. Of the 22 new awards, 16 are for prototype development and 6 are for full-scale development. IES also announced two additional awards through a special topic solicitation in postsecondary education. Read about these awards here.

Each of the new awards supports a project to develop a product to personalize the student learning experience or generate information that educators can use to guide practice.

Most of the projects are developing a software component (for example, algorithms, artificial intelligence, machine Learning, or natural language processing) that continually adjusts the difficulty of content, provides prompts to support individual students if support is needed, or generates real-time actionable information for educators to track student progress and adjust instruction accordingly. Other projects are developing technologies to promote student learning through self-directed, hands-on, simulated, and immersive experiences. If the future of education includes a blend of in-class and remote learning due to public health crises, or for whatever reasons, technologies such as these will be ready to keep the learning going.

The projects address different ages of students and content areas.

In science, LightHaus is fully developing a virtual reality (VR) intervention for students to explore plant heredity; LightUp is fully developing an augmented reality (AR) app for students to perform hands-on physical science investigations with their own on-device camera; and Myriad Sensors is developing a prototype artificial intelligence formative assessment system that generates feedback in real time as students do hands-on laboratory experiments.

In math, Muzology is creating a prototype for students to create music videos to learn algebra, and Teachley is creating a prototype transmedia kit with videos, comics, and pictures to enhance teaching and learning of hard to learn concepts.

In engineering and computer science, Parametric Studios is fully developing an augmented reality puzzle game for early learners, and Liminal eSports, Makefully, and Beach Day Studios are creating prototype components that each provide feedback to students as they engage in activities to learn to code.

In English Language Arts, Analytic Measures and Hoogalit are each employing natural language processing to develop new prototypes to facilitate speech acquisition, and Learning Ovations is developing a prototype data engine to make recommendations for what individual children should read.

For English learners, KooApps is developing an artificial intelligence prototype to support vocabulary acquisition, and Kings Peak Technologies is employing machine learning to generate passages that blend English and Spanish words together to improve reading comprehension.

For early learners, Cognitive Toybox is fully developing an observation and game-based school readiness assessment.

For postsecondary students, Hats & Ladders is fully developing a social skills game to foster career readiness skills.

In special education, Attainment Company is developing a prototype to support student’s self-management, and Alchemie is developing a prototype of an augmented reality science experience for visually impaired students.

To support school administrators and teachers, LearnPlatform is fully developing a dashboard that generates reports with insights for teachers to implement education technology interventions, and Zuni Learning Tree, Teachley and LiveSchool are developing prototype dashboards to organize and present results on student progress and performance in real time.

Stay tuned for updates on Twitter and Facebook as IES continues to support innovative forms of technology.

Written by Edward Metz (Edward.Metz@ed.gov), Program Manager, ED/IES SBIR

Last month, we released a blog post showing the changes over time in public elementary and secondary school enrollment by race/ethnicity. Now, we’re taking a look at the changing demographics of postsecondary enrollment. The visuals below, which use data from an array of sources, depict the changes in fall enrollment of U.S. residents in degree-granting postsecondary institutions from 1976 to 2028 by race/ethnicity. It should be noted that the predicted enrollment does not take into account future impacts from the current coronavirus pandemic.

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Higher Education General Information Survey (HEGIS), “Fall Enrollment in Colleges and Universities” surveys, 1976 and 1980; Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), “Fall Enrollment Survey” (IPEDS-EF:90-99); IPEDS Spring 2001 through Spring 2018, Fall Enrollment component; and Enrollment in Degree-Granting Institutions by Race/Ethnicity Projection Model, 1980 through 2028.

Here are some highlights from the data:

• 1976: Of the 10.8 million U.S. residents enrolled in degree-granting postsecondary institutions, some 9.1 million, or 84 percent, identified as White. Lower percentages of postsecondary students identified as Black (10 percent), Hispanic (4 percent), Asian/Pacific Islander (2 percent), and American Indian/Alaska Native (1 percent).
• 2002: The percentage of postsecondary enrollment made up of White students dropped below 70 percent.
• 2003: Postsecondary enrollment of Black students surpassed 2.0 million for the first time in history.
• 2006: About 17.2 million U.S. residents were enrolled in degree-granting postsecondary institutions, a 23 percent increase since 1996. Over this 10-year period, Hispanic and Black students had the largest increases (68 and 51 percent, respectively), compared with Asian/Pacific Islander, American Indian/Alaska Native, and White students (41, 32, and 13 percent, respectively). However, White students still accounted for 67 percent of total U.S. resident enrollment in 2006.
• 2007: Postsecondary enrollment of Hispanic students surpassed 2.0 million for the first time in history.
• 2010: U.S. resident enrollment in postsecondary degree-granting institutions peaked at 20.3 million.
• 2012: Enrollment of Hispanic students surpassed enrollment of Black students, making Hispanic students the largest minority population enrolled in postsecondary education.
• 2028: It is projected that enrollment of U.S. residents in postsecondary institutions will increase slightly between 2016 and 2028 (from 18.8 million to 18.9 million) but remain lower than the all-time high in 2010 (20.3 million). In 2028, it is projected that 52 percent of U.S. residents enrolled in postsecondary institutions will be White, 21 percent will be Hispanic, 15 percent will be Black, 7 percent will be Asian/Pacific Islander, 4 percent will be of Two or more races, and 1 percent will be American Indian/Alaska Native. The Census Bureau estimates that in 2030, roughly 56 percent of the population will identify as White, 14 percent as Black, 21 percent as Hispanic, 7 percent as Asian, and 4 percent as of Two or more races (https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2020/demo/p25-1144.pdf).

By Rachel Dinkes, AIR