QED specializes in transformational learning design and practices which focus on developing and supporting learning- and learner- centered communities. We have a deep commitment to educational equity, and to developing will, skill, knowledge, habits, and community capacity for eliminating the predictive value of race, class, language, gender, and special capacities on student achievement.
Our theory of change is based on a commitment to tapping the knowledge and expertise that already exists in every community, while providing coaching, facilitation, and additional resources and models of practice, particularly in relation to the following areas:
1. Student Agency
- Youth Voice
- Public Achievement
2. Learning Culture
- Co-constructing learning cultures
- Democratic Culture and Practice – schools as laboratories of democratic practice
- Community Partnerships and Collaboration
3. Personalized Learning
- Learning profiles – tools and structures for developing and leveraging dynamic profiles of students’ learning profiles, using research-based indicators of success
- Designing personalized, student-centered learning
- Standards-based instructional design
- Expanded Learning Opportunities
- Engagement and motivation for all learners
4. Mastery Based Learning
- Proficiency based pathways
- Systems, training, and reporting structures for shifting to proficiency based learning practices
- Assessing proficiency-based learning through:
- Formative and summative assessment processes
- Performance-based assessment
- Common Core State Standards
For more information about transformational practices, see our Transformational Change Model.
To find out more about how Q.E.D. can support your school or organization’s work, please contact Kim Carter at kcarter@qedfoundation.org.