Sown To Grow: Enabling SEL Growth Using Machine Learning

In previous research and development, the company created Sown To Grow, a product for grade nine students to complete a weekly survey and write short reflections describing their social emotional learning, with results provided to educators. In this Phase I project, the research team will develop a new prototype with natural language processing and machine-learning technologies to automatically categorize open-ended student responses, with the insights to be provided to educators to inform intervention if needed.  At the end of Phase I, a pilot study will include six educators and their grade 9 students. The researchers will examine whether the prototype generates automated insights that align to the written reflections that students provide, if educators understand the results produced by the prototype dashboard, and whether these results would be useful at providing information that educators could use to support the SEL development of students.