Spring is in the air, bringing fresh ideas and renewed energy to education. This season of growth inspires us to continue evolving and using research-backed strategies and innovative solutions to support educators, students, and families. In this newsletter, we share the latest updates from SRI Education and new resources to help grow positive outcomes for young children and K–12 and college students this season.
Featured News
Sketching the Future of Arts Education in California
California’s Proposition 28 is committing $1 billion annually to arts education, but it also brings a significant challenge: hiring thousands of new arts teachers. A new policy brief from SRI Education shows that California will need to hire over 5,400 new arts teachers by 2025. Read more in this article.
Webinar – Supporting Student Success in Online Courses
How can online college courses better support student motivation, engagement, and help-seeking behaviors? A panel of researchers, students, and faculty hosted a webinar on April 3 to discuss new research into student experiences in online courses and share new evidence-based strategies designed to support student success. Watch the webinar and explore key takeaways in this blog.
New Findings and Resources
Reimagining Instructional Coaching in Early Education (RICiEE)
SRI Education researchers are leading an initiative that aims to expand access to high-quality early childhood education by improving the usefulness, usability, and scalability of classroom quality measurements. The RICiEE team partners with early childhood educators, early learning programs, early childhood systems leaders, policy makers, and families to transform how instructional coaching is conducted in prekindergarten classrooms. Read more.
Barely Getting by and Never Getting Ahead
SRI Education, in collaboration with Think Small and the Upjohn Institute, tested the effectiveness of a wage scale aligning early educator pay with K–12 salaries. Findings from the pilot highlight pay disparities, workforce stability, and participant experiences, offering key insights for future pay equity initiatives. Read the full report to learn more. Read more.
LEARN to Scale Workshop: May 1, 2024
The LEARN Network will host an interactive session for education researchers and developers looking to scale evidence-based innovations. Participants will hear from research, development and marketing experts, explore potential scaling pathways for educational innovations, and access a broad range of free tools and resources. Learn more and register.
Let Your State Know: 2025 State Learning Opportunities
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Special Education Programs’ Early Childhood Technical Assistance Centers have announced a variety of new and ongoing opportunities in 2025 to build individual and state capacity around implementation of IDEA for children ages 0–5. Learn more.
Listening to Students: Experiences of Self-Directed Learning in Online Courses
New research from the Postsecondary Teaching with Technology Collaborative highlights what students say about their experiences in online STEM courses and offers insights into their motivation, study strategies, and behaviors. These findings are shaping instructional strategies to better support students’ self-directed learning that the Postsecondary Teaching with Technology Collaborative research team is currently pilot-testing. Learn more.
Is Seeing Believing? Can Video Coaching Help Support Teacher Practice in Early Childhood Classrooms?
SRI Education’s research shows that video coaching helps early childhood teachers strengthen behavior strategies, classroom management, and student engagement without the pressure of in-person observations. Insights from the ECCO and BEST in CLASS projects highlight how video reflection supports more effective teaching. Read more.
The LEARN to Scale Toolkit
Achieving scale is an important milestone of widespread reach and use of an educational product. This toolkit, created by the LEARN Network, is designed to support researchers and developers in creating, testing, and scaling evidence-based educational products that can achieve widespread and sustainable use and impact. Learn more.
More Publications and Resources
The Cancellation of the Regional Educational Laboratory (REL) Appalachia
For the past eight years, SRI Education has worked closely with educators and leaders in Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia through REL Appalachia to address critical challenges in teaching and learning. Our work supported math achievement, college and career readiness, community college success, and family engagement, with nearly 40% of projects focused on rural schools. Learn more about that work and what the cancellation of the REL Program means for the region in this article. Read more.
The SRI Homeroom: Shaping the Future of Education, One Conversation at a Time
The SRI Homeroom podcast offers down-to-earth discussions on the most pressing issues facing America’s students, educators, and families, along with the work being done to address them. Each episode features interviews with some of the nation’s leading researchers, data experts, educators, and developers, sharing their insights and solutions. Listen here.
SRI Education is now on Bluesky, and we’d love to connect with you there. Follow us for research-based insights, practical resources, and updates on our latest work in education, including events where we’ll be presenting. Follow us here!
Recent Publications from SRI Researchers
- Blog post by Dominique Baeta: SRI Partners with LAUSD to Investigate Career Development Opportunities in Its Schools
- Journal article by Elisa Garcia: Back to School: Teachers’ Initial Perceptions of Students’ Executive Function Behaviors Are Important for Teacher–Student Relationships and Executive Function Development
- Journal article by Krystal Thomas: Teacher Discrimination and Student Engagement in the Context of Classroom Quality: The Mediating Effect of Relational Trust
- Journal article by Margaret Gillis: Understanding the Needs of Infants and Toddlers in Child Welfare
- Paper by Carol Tate, Satabdi Basu, Arif Rachmatullah, and Hui Yang: Implementing Standards-Focused Professional Development for Middle School CS Teachers: An Experience Report
- Report by Ela Joshi, Rebecca Griffiths, and Jodie Lawrence: Students’ and Instructors’ Experiences With Open and Culturally Responsive Instruction: Findings From a State OER Program
- Study by Todd A. Grindal, Sarah Nixon Gerard, Nancy K Perez, Gullnar Syed, Anne Partika, and Morgan Solender: Observing Classrooms Through a Digital Lens: Examining the Reliability and Feasibility of Video Observations in Pre-kindergarten Classrooms
- Study by Gullnar Syed, Hannah Kelly, Todd A. Grindal, and Emma Terrell: Success in Action: Four Stories of Early Childhood Instructional Coaching
- Study by Krystal Thomas, Todd A. Grindal, Gullnar Syed, Sarah Nixon Gerard, and Shari Golan: Reimagining Instructional Coaching: Developing Observation Tools to Support Instructional Coaching in Pre-K Classrooms
Join Us at AERA 2025!
Our researchers are excited to share their work at the 2025 American Educational Research Association (AERA) Annual Meeting in Denver, Colorado, on April 23–27. This year’s theme, “Research, Remedy, and Repair: Toward Just Education Renewal,” highlights critical conversations in education, policy, and practice.
View a list of our presentations below. We look forward to seeing you at these sessions.
