Event Overview

What insights and improvements are possible when school systems and research partners collaborate?

Chicagoans have built a data-informed culture throughout our city's education ecosystem. 

Hear from Chicago Public Schools leaders and research partners about bright spots and opportunities in evidence-informed strategy, practice, and policy in schools and the education ecosystem. 

This recorded discussion took place on March 13, 2025.

 

 

Highlights & Key Takeaways 

How Chicago Public Schools thinks about and uses evidence-informed strategy, practice, and policy (starts at 5:10) 
  • “I am particularly excited to kick off this discussion about the research partnership between our district and many critical partners. Why? Because this is the partnership that plays one of the most critical roles in helping our district continuously improve and make progress in the name of student outcomes, student practices, and student experiences across our district.
  • The research partners that we have play a very critical role to help us achieve our vision. Most specifically, they inform not only our strategy, but also our decision-making. And help us also track whether or not our efforts are producing the outcomes that we intend to do.
  • ...As a practitioner, their work and their insights are very much appreciated. We feel very fortunate to have this support from our research community."  –Bogdana Chkoumbova, Chief Education Officer at Chicago Public Schools 

 

How Chicago Public Schools & research partners collaborate (starts at 10:30) 
  • Chicago is home to the country's first-ever education research-practice partnership, launched in 1990 by Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and the UChicago Consortium on School Research. CPS now partners with many research partners in Chicago.
  • A definition of “research-practice partnerships,” via our colleagues at the National Network of Education Research-Practice Partnerships 
  • How CPS priorities are reflected in practice and research (14:40)
 
Research leaders on the panel shared (starts at 18:25)...
  • The clearest evidence on what works for student & school success (starts at 20:55), including... 
    • How we see that in the data, including not just rates but in number of students affected by practice and policy improvements
  • What their teams are working on now (starts at 37:30), including...
    • Insights, data, and tools for parents, higher education leaders, policymakers, district leaders, and school communities.
  • How research partners & community members can best work together with a district toward data- and evidence-informed practices and policies (starts at 43:40), including...
    • The collective responsibility to continue using data- and evidence-driven work
    • Being clear about why we're doing this work, for families and communities across the city
    • The importance of strong engagement and collaboration with partners and stakeholders
    • Solutions provide a place for a lot of common cause for people to come together around specific issue
 
Q&A (starts at 53:20)
  • How partners make decisions about what to research
  • What's needed to ensure these research-practice partnerships remain strong

 

This discussion included leaders from:

It was moderated by Pranav Kothari of Revolution Impact & Chair, Illinois State Board of Higher Education.

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