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The state鈥檚 six-month-old, $2 million public-private personalized-learning initiative is capitalizing on the freedom afforded by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), the nation鈥檚 federal education law, which returns significant power to the states, to chart and test how personalized instructional techniques can be delivered to its 140,000 K-12 students. Broadly speaking, personalized learning tailors the instruction, content, pace, and testing to the individual student鈥檚 strengths and interests, using technology, data, and continuous feedback to make that customization possible.

The ability for states to more fully explore innovation through technology and curriculum paths separate from traditional reading, writing, and math 鈥� rather than following the federal government鈥檚 lead 鈥� was a key aspect of ESSA鈥檚 original intent.

In shifting authority and autonomy back to local leaders, the education law, which replaced No Child Left Behind, earned widespread support from a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers; then-President Barack Obama even dubbed its passage in 2015 a 鈥淐hristmas miracle.鈥�

鈥淐ould you do some of this stuff before ESSA?鈥� asks Richard Culatta, Rhode Island鈥檚 chief innovation officer and the former director of educational technology at the U.S. Department of Education. 鈥淐ertainly it would have been possible, but it would have been harder to do. With our additional flexibility, we are up at the front of the line taking advantage of it.鈥�

Rhode Island is accepting applications for its new Lighthouse program, giving schools the opportunity to apply 鈥� through a challenge process 鈥� to serve as schoolwide personalized-learning models. Already in that pipeline are the Rhode Island Mayoral Academies, a public charter school network that uses the learning platform at its Blackstone Valley Prep. The free digital learning platform, created provides curricula, student projects, and teacher resources and support to some 130 schools, 1,100 teachers, and 20,000 students.

鈥淥ur goal is to meet the kids where they are and help them be their best; that has been our charge from the beginning,鈥� says Blackstone executive director Jeremy Chiappetta. 鈥淚n order to meet them where they are, you need to understand where they are across a broad spectrum and you have to be able to track it and push people.鈥�

Chiappetta points to Blackstone as a key incubator that will inform and shape the state鈥檚 larger personalized-learning vision. 鈥淲e need to be a proof point,鈥� Chiappetta says, 鈥渁n open door for others to learn from us and give feedback to the Rhode Island initiative. It is really powerful, and we are helping fulfill the vision as others are exploring.鈥�

The Lighthouse program is funded in part by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, a three-year $3 billion investment by the pediatrician Priscilla Chan and her husband, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, to advance science and education. Other funders include the Jaquelin Hume Foundation, the Nellie Mae Education Foundation, and the Overdeck Family Foundation.

Rhode Island hopes to have the pilot schools vetted and chosen by this summer, with the goal of implementing a personalized-learning program by the start of the 2017鈥�18 school year.

鈥淲e are providing resources to help them build out their plans,鈥� Culatta says. 鈥淲e will select a couple of schools to win the challenge and want to help a broader number of schools to build plans. Even if we can鈥檛 fund them [all], it leaves them with a solid step to build out a plan on their own.鈥�

Culatta is working closely with Daniela Fairchild, the director of education for Governor Gina Raimondo鈥檚 office of innovation. The office, a quasi-governmental agency working with educators across the state to spur, seed, and accelerate innovation through technology, released in late February that tackled the uneasy task of defining personalized learning for every educator in Rhode Island, further solidifying the three essential components that have been laid out by the U.S. Department of Education: pace of learning, definite learning objectives for each student, and defined instructional approaches.

鈥淭he paper is great to create common understanding,鈥� Fairchild said. 鈥淎ction steps that came out of the paper, the big things, were folks wanting to get connected to more research, to answer some specific questions around implementation, and to see locally some real examples and models of personalized learning.鈥�

In February, in an interview with , Fairchild laid out the broader plan: that the state is looking to 鈥渓everage our work with our partners to scale personalized learning and become the first state in the nation with a new model on a systemic level.鈥�

That system-wide model will also be constructed using new personalized-learning research. Fairchild says the state is now building a network that will pair higher-education researchers to the K-12 practitioners who are implementing the plans in the classrooms. A key component of this network is that it will extend beyond education researchers, connecting elementary and high school educators with academics from a variety of disciplines.

鈥淲e are connecting so practitioners are getting answers in real time,鈥� Fairchild says. 鈥淚f it is just education [researchers], you miss out on network approaches, organizational structures, social networks, cognitive sciences, and so many other disciplines. We are hoping to break down some of those silos and connect some of those [other] researchers.鈥�

Existing research on personalized learning is limited in both depth and scope and is often tied to smaller efforts. According to , the most comprehensive study to date was conducted by the Rand Corporation in 2015, studying how personalized learning shaped the learning of 11,000 students across 62 schools.

鈥淭he results look fairly promising,鈥� says John Pane, one of the Rand researchers, 鈥渂ut the research method is vulnerable to bias. There was evidence of promise that suggests it could be positive, but more work has to be done.鈥�

Pane says giving students more individualized attention has proved powerful in past research, but scaling personalized learning with technology presents a new, modern method that simply hasn鈥檛 been tested. Studying entire schools that are looking to implement the approach across the board offers an ideal research opportunity.

A major component of Rhode Island鈥檚 research will focus on the role of technology in facilitating and measuring learning at a student鈥檚 desired pace. State leaders say that rolling out personalized learning plans to every student in a given school will help define that sweet spot.

鈥淥ne thing we say, kind of jokingly, is one of the biggest challenges is: When do you use technology? And the second challenge is: When do you not use technology enough?鈥� Culatta says. 鈥淔inding that balance is really key.鈥�

Critics of personalized learning argue that too much faith has been placed in the use of technology altogether as it relates to student learning and that putting students in charge of their own learning paths and the pace at which they tackle and master new information can be counterproductive.

But anecdotally, education leaders across Rhode Island 鈥� including the head of Providence Public Schools, the state鈥檚 largest district 鈥� say that they鈥檝e already seen the benefits of a personalized-instruction approach that gives schools greater autonomy.

鈥�Providence is committed to school-based autonomy, with each school involved in choosing its own technology and instructional methods to support personalized learning,鈥� says Christopher N. Maher, the district鈥檚 superintendent. 鈥淏y owning these choices, school leaders and teachers truly buy into personalized-learning concepts and practices. Through professional development led by groups such as Summit Schools and the Highlander Institute [a Providence-based education nonprofit], our teachers and administrators have learned how to use real-time student data to shape instruction so that they can meet each child where that child is at academically.鈥�听

Maher sees this personalized-learning approach increasing engagement on both sides of the classroom. Educators are better able to focus their time and attention on helping students with problem areas and lessons that have them struggling, while kids have a greater sense of control over the pacing and direction of their learning.

鈥淧ersonalized-learning technology helps students choose subjects they find personally meaningful and culturally relevant,鈥� he said. 鈥淚n Providence, the push toward personalized learning has led to greater student voice, with students and teachers working side by side to create a new ethnic studies curriculum now piloted in a number of our schools this year.鈥�

Leaders say that as the state has invested more time, energy, and money in these personalized-learning efforts, Rhode Island educators have embraced the challenge of turning the conceptual into the commonplace.

鈥淭here are already a lot of groups thinking about this and doing a lot of good work,鈥� Culatta says. 鈥淗ow do we help push and really expand the implementation?鈥�

Beginning this fall, Rhode Island is poised to find out.