LEVANTE presented at 2024 Jacobs Foundation Conference

In keeping with the 2024 Jacobs Foundation Conference theme of Embedding Evidence in Education, Stanford University professor and director of the Data Coordinating Center for the LEVANTE initiative, Michael Frank, presented the framework for the Learning Variability Network Exchange (LEVANTE) at the conference in Germany this past May. During his talk, Dr. Frank described the initiative highlighting the rationale for research on learning variability that intersects with scientifically grounded policy and practice, as well as the inner workings of the framework underlying the ability to perform this critical research. 

LEVANTE is designed to enable coordinated data collection by diverse research teams worldwide, with the goal of measuring children’s variability within and across individuals, groups, and cultures. These data will contribute to education policies and practices that allow systems to serve more children better. To do this work, Dr. Frank and his team at Stanford developed a child-friendly evaluation battery that enables researchers to capture learning outcomes and core cognitive constructs, with each measure selected based on length, psychometric properties, cross-cultural applicability, and age span. 

The LEVANTE framework further includes a coordinated technical infrastructure allowing for a flexible user journey that begins at the site level and flows through to a repository containing validated and de-identified data. Open science principles are key to LEVANTE’s unique success and feature open source code, permissive licensing of research products, and data accessibility. Thus, LEVANTE will create a uniquely large, well-curated, high value dataset for long-term research use that will constitute the backbone of a larger multidisciplinary, multi-sectoral research community working toward improving children’s learning and development globally.