Many of students’ beliefs about learning are formed during their K-12 years. During this formative time, teacher behaviors, messages students receive from the learning environment, and their experiences with challenges and setbacks all influence their learning mindsets.

Motivate Lab’s work in K-12 is focused on supporting students, particularly traditionally underrepresented students, succeed and thrive in school. We collaborate with districts, administrators, and teachers to better understand the challenges students are facing and craft well-timed, developmentally appropriate interventions and trainings. Our work in K-12 includes randomized-controlled trials testing learning mindset interventions, prototyping and pilot testing interventions, facilitating professional learning communities, professional development, and consulting services.

THE NAVIGATE PROJECT

The Navigate Project is a collective of educators, advocates, funders, and researchers dedicated to developing and adapting evidence - demonstrated practices in the postsecondary access and success space.

Evidence on students’ college acceptance and graduation rates suggest that college access programs support students with the planning, decision-making, and goal-setting that helps them succeed in college. Evidence also suggests that learning mindsets—students’ beliefs about themselves as learners and the learning environment—are crucial for success in high school, college, careers, and overall well-being. Learning mindsets can be developed through supportive practices, many of which college access programs may already be implementing.

Learn more about the Navigate Project here.

THE SOCIAL BELONGING PROJECT

The transition from middle school into high school is a critical period for future academic success for rising ninth grade students. During this time period, students - especially those from historically disadvantaged and underrepresented groups - may question whether or not they belong in their school environment.

We have partnered with a rural public high school in the state of Virginia to administer a novel video intervention targeting student perceptions of belonging. We are in the process of collecting data from our second cohort of participants to test if this brief intervention can improve students’ sense of belonging and academic performance, among other outcomes. Our analysis will be conducted in light of the violent, race-based rallies held by the alt-right in Charlottesville, VA just days after our intervention was implemented.

We will report our findings regarding the role perceived belonging plays in the context of secondary education, especially in response to race-based violence in the community. Initial results suggest the intervention increases perceptions of student belonging. If these results hold, we will focus on  collaborating with our high school partner to integrate our intervention more fully into school curricula.

Learn more about the Social Belonging Project here.

THE MINDSET TRANSFER PROJECT

For the more than 10 million children who attend camp each summer, camp is an opportunity to develop critical skills and ways of seeing the world. But do campers make the connection between the skills and mindsets they develop at camp and their lives outside of camp?

The aim of our Mindset Transfer project is to (1) understand how campers and counselors talk about skill and mindset development and (2) help campers see the connection between the skills and mindsets they learn at camp and how to apply them in places like school, sports, and the arts. Partnering with a charter school system in the American southwest, Camp Champions, and the American Camp Association-New York/New Jersey, we're conducting a field study at four camps that includes focus groups, observations, parent/counselor surveys, and camper reflection activities.