Monday, March 5, 2012

The Power of Learning Analytics, Targeted Intervention, and Mastery Learning at Scale

This is the first time I have ever reblogged, but the posting by Bror Saxberg, CLO of Kaplan, regarding applying learning analytics at scale at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee is worth repeating.  It is a powerful combination of large scale analytics, careful experimental design, targeted intervention,  semi-automated student motivation, and mastery learning. Make sure you jump to the original via the link below to see some very compelling charts representing their success.

By the way, I ran in to Bror at the Educause Learning Initiative conference, and he is more than ready to lead the revolution for the application of learning sciences to higher education, and he has enough energy for a dozen mere mortals to pull it off!  I am interested in connecting with others who share this passion as well. 

Bror writes:

At the recent Educause Learning Initiative meeting in Austin Texas, I came across some very interesting recent randomized control trial results from the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee.  They’re testing a combination of mastery learning plus “amplified assistance” (data-driven suggestions for faculty about who to intervene with and how) in an introductory Psychology course, and, with thousands of students (!!) having run through controlled trials, they’re showing significant improvements in pass rates and long term retention.
via brorsblog.typepad.com