We are excited to announce that SERN is partnering with the Spencer Foundation and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative on a convening that the Spencer Foundation will host in May 2023 focused on student experience and measurement in K-12 education. This partnership will contribute to the next generation of practically relevant research – including a focus on collaborations between researchers and practice / policy partners – on a topic that is high priority in education practice and policy and that continues to expand the group of researchers connected to the field of student experience research.

The convening will bring together a range of scholars, practitioners, and policymakers to think together about what new or different kinds of measures and assessments we need in K-12 education, if we are to support learners as whole people and community members, and if we are to build equitable education systems. The convening will include multiple SERN scholars and other SERN-affiliated researchers (e.g., SERN fellowship alumni), as well as other researchers with relevant expertise.

A key goal for the convening will be synthesizing what we do and do not yet know from the research and engaging in a coordinated effort to articulate a vision for the next generation of research studies on student experience and measurement, as well as other forms of measurement that may mediate student experience.

Together with our partners on this initiative, we hope that this convening will result in future research collaborations involving both researchers and education systems and organizations. There will be new collaborative funding opportunities through the Spencer Foundation following the meeting, which will be available to both participants in the convening as well as others through the foundation’s open grantmaking processes.