Raising Blended Learners

About blended learning

Tomorrow’s leaders will be tasked with tackling problems that a factory model approach to education will not solve. Educators are responsible for helping learners become college- and career-ready for the 21st century, but have inherited a classroom model built to prepare earlier generations. What is needed in education is a shift to personalized, competency-based approaches — or student-centered learning. We believe blended learning – which combines the best of in-person classroom teaching with online technology – represents the engine to power personalized, student-centered learning at scale across Texas.

About blended learning

About Raising Blended Learners

Raising Blended Learners was a four-year demonstration initiative that showcased strategies for using blended learning to improve student achievement across diverse student demographics and geographic regions in the state, particularly among schools and districts with persistent opportunity gaps. Our ultimate goal was for blended learning to be systematically utilized throughout Texas and be seen as a replicable model for all educators.

Raising Blended Learners consisted of two cohorts. The first cohort, a $2.5 million grant opportunity with extensive technical assistance, launched in 2015, supported 5 pilot and 15 demonstration districts (50 schools, 600 teachers, 35,000 students).

The second cohort, Raising Blended Learners II, was a $15 million initiative providing grants and technical assistance to 20 districts. Districts spent the 2020-21 school year planning their blended learning programs and began implementation in the 2021-22 school year. Upon conclusion of the second cohort, the Raising Blended Learners statewide initiative impacted 40 districts, more than 1,200 teachers, and more than 75,000 students across the state of Texas.

Although this grant has concluded, several districts from cohorts I and II have continued to scale and sustain their pilot programs. If you are a practitioner looking to implement blended learning practices, please see our open-source resource library.

Texas Center for Blended Learning

The next phase of scaling and sustaining blended learning practices across Texas is being spearheaded by a coalition of Education Service Centers (ESCs) under the Texas Center for Blended Learning.

This coalition includes Region 4 Education Service Center, Region 7, ESC Region 12, Education Service Center Region 13,  ESC-20.

The long-term goal of this partnership is to develop systems that enable these initial partners to scale and support best practices in blended learning. The aim is to extend these capabilities to additional service centers until every region in Texas can effectively support blended learning, ultimately benefiting all Texas schoolchildren.

When students are authentically engaged in rigorous instruction that challenges them and is personalized to their educational needs, they take greater agency over their academic journey.

Contact the participating service center closest to you to learn more about the initiative, attend trainings, or join a showcase visit.

Pillars of quality blended learning:

All of our work is aligned with blended learning best practices captured by the pillars of our Raising Blended Learners Implementation Continuum.

• Pillar 1: Assessment and Data-Driven Instruction – Teachers and instructional leaders utilize a systematic approach to assessment and data-informed teaching to design and deliver instruction based on students’ specific learning needs, monitor student learning, and provide feedback to students.
• Pillar 2: Personalized Instruction – Students are offered a variety of learning opportunities to master standards according to differentiated learning objectives dependent on students’ level of mastery, and frequently receive individual feedback about their progress.
• Pillar 3: Student Agency – Refers to the level of control, autonomy, and power that a student experiences in an educational situation. It can be manifested through goal setting and feedback cycles, input in assessment and instruction decisions and opportunities for advocacy.
• Pillar 4: Relationships – Students develop positive, collaborative relationships with teachers, other adults/mentors and peers which are focused on high expectations for academic and personal growth.
• Pillar 5: Rigor – Students engage in the work of the lesson, think critically, and do the heavy lifting on content that is grade-level, college-ready, or student-appropriate, and continually practice and receive feedback until mastery is demonstrated.

Fast facts:

Raising Blended Learners I

Raising Blended Learners II

Key takeaways from the evaluation conducted during year three of Raising Blended Learners I. In the 2017–18 school year,

• 98 percent of all RBL schools met state academic standards.
• More than half of all RBL campuses received at least one academic distinction, with some campuses achieving as many as six distinctions.
• Students in RBL schools are more likely to be collaborative, to seek help if they are struggling, and to have better relationships with their teachers.
• 76 percent of RBL teachers report that they enjoy their jobs more since incorporating personalized blended learning into their classrooms.
• 84 percent of teachers reported believing more strongly that ALL students can learn due to personalized blended learning.

Alumni Engagement

If you are an alum of one of our state-wide programs and are looking for ways to stay connected and engaged, visit our Alumni Engagement page.

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