Moving from research to action: What works, what doesn’t, and why?

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

This panel, featuring members of the nascent School Action Learning Exchange network, would explore the topic of translating rigorous education research into practical uptake on the part of policymakers and practitioners.

In light of differing policymaker interest in evidence use, shifting political economies, turnover among key decision makers, and challenges adapting evidence to local context, it’s often the case that applied, timely, education research fails to inform policies and practices, irrespective of its rigor. Drawing from national and global examples of research-to-action initiatives, this panel would share successes, concrete lessons learned, and outstanding questions from their experiences conducting and translating education research oriented towards improving education outcomes and building strong education systems.

The panelists, discussants, and chair would include applied researchers involved in a diverse set of a research-to-action initiatives, including UNICEF’s Data Must Speak initiative, Teach For All’s Global Teacher and Teacher Coach Study, the International Baccalaureate (IB)’s Innovation Framework, and Youth Impact’s efforts to integrate and adapt evidence-based education practices in the classroom. Panelists will share insights leveraging research to influence global, national, sub-national and classroom policies and practices, highlighting a range of analytical and communication/stakeholder sensitization approaches. For example, on the national level, the Data Must Speak initiative studies behaviors/practices that typify high-performing schools in contexts where other schools struggle to perform – and then identifies ways to scale such behaviors by working closely with key governmental policymakers to identify windows of opportunity. Both Teach For All and IB are leveraging adaptive, user-centric learning methods to generate actionable insight to promote evidence uptake and Youth Impact has, using nimble methods such as rapid randomized trials, generated some of the earliest experimental evidence on strategies to minimize learning loss when schools closed.

Presenters would grapple with a number of sub-themes linked to the topic of evidence translation, including considerations of how to message research in response to different stakeholder audiences, approaches for incorporating end user perspectives into research design, strategies for identifying and maximizing political windows to translate evidence into action, and methods for generating and sensitizing rapid research in response to crises. Panelists would also explore the theme of measuring the impact of evidence translation efforts; how do we quantify the impact that particular research has had on education provision or policy formulation?

Lasty, this panel would also serve to introduce the aims of the School Action Learning Exchange (SALEX) community. This nascent community brings together networks and organizations that support schools, school leaders, and teachers by aggregating knowledge, capacity, and promising practices across schools, countries, and regions. ​Leveraging a combination of collaboration, research, and advocacy, among other aims, it seeks to build and promote the uptake of evidence by global education stakeholders. A brief overview of SALEX’s objectives and plans around evidence translation will be shared as a framing for this conversation.

Sub Unit

• Monitoring and Evaluation SIG

Chair

• Renaud Comba, UNICEF

Individual Presentations

• Applying programmatic improvement research to teacher leadership development in the Teach For All network - Robert Dean, Teach For All

• Action research to scale innovation - Jennifer Merriman, International Baccalaureate

• Using networks to translate education research into improved practices and policies - Mark Roland, R4D

Discussant

• Tendekai Mukoyi, Youth Impact