University of Kentucky Research Foundation

The University of Kentucky hosts a new national Center for Innovation in Education, led by Gene Wilhoit—former executive director of the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO). The Center is focused on providing technical support to states working on deeper learning policy and practice reform. With this grant, the Center would be able to leverage the communications infrastructure Wilhoit created with a 2012 videoconferencing grant to CCSSO.

The University of Kentucky is the state's "flagship" higher education institution--a public, land grant university dedicated to improving people's lives through excellence in education, research and creative work, service, and health care. This proposal requests support for a three year, $1,971,978 project to establish executive leadership and basic operations of a nascent Center for Innovation in Education under the leadership of Gene Wilhoit, outgoing Executive Director of the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO). The Center will be housed within the University of Kentucky and will be funded by a consortium of foundations. The Center's signature work will be to counsel the states in the Innovation Lab Network (ILN) and to support them in executing the Memoranda of Agreement their respective state superintendents have signed to advance deeper learning through establishing definitions of college- and career-readiness, adopting assessment systems that measure deeper learning outcomes, and revising state school accountability systems accordingly.

The University of Kentucky’s National Center for Innovation in Education provides advice and support to states to make K-12 school systems more capable and accountable for preparing students to succeed in college, career, and life. The center will work on promoting a new learning agenda, helping education leaders improve, and using better assessments to demonstrate student achievement. In this moment of policy devolution, the U.S. school system will benefit from targeted work in the arenas of state and local reform for systemic innovation centered on a new learning agenda that is anchored in deeper learning outcomes.