Second-year certification affirms the company’s mission and people focus, ongoing DEI efforts BLOOMINGTON, MN (April 25, 2024) – Renaissance, a leader in pre-K–12 education technology, announces its recognition as a 2024 Great Place to Work® by the Great Place to Work Institute, marking the second year in a row the company has received this honor. The coveted award is solely based on current employees’ experiences working at Renaissance. Overall, 87% of employees said Renaissance is a great place to work—30 points higher than the average company. “Renaissance is committed to providing solution ..read more

Every educator has heard the phrase “Practice makes perfect.” But as Vince Lombardi famously said, “Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect.” So, what is “perfect” practice? As two of my colleagues recently explained, reading practice is perfect when it includes two essential components to support each student’s journey from learning to read to reading to learn: Individualized skills practice. Dynamic reading practice. What does this journey involve? Students who have “cracked the code” and can pair letters with their sounds require lots of reading practice so the ..read more

Key data insights include the impact of 15-plus minutes of daily reading over time, strength of book series and graphic novels to spark and sustain reading interest BLOOMINGTON, MN (April 9, 2024) – As schools continue to work to bring reading scores up to pre-pandemic levels, a new report provides a definitive look at what kids are actually reading in grades K–12 and documents the significant difference that reading at least 15 minutes per day—over time—makes on future academic success. What Kids Are Reading is compiled annually by Renaissance, a global leader in pre-K–12 education technology ..read more

Some struggling readers using myON achieved two years’ worth of additional reading growth in a single school year BLOOMINGTON, MN (April 3, 2024) – Renaissance, a leader in pre-K–12 education technology, recently released a research study demonstrating that students’ use of the myON digital reading platform is associated with higher levels of reading growth. The new study, which involves more than 480,000 US students in grades K–12, also shows that struggling readers in the early grades who use myON with fidelity can make up to two years’ worth of additional growth in a single academic year. U ..read more

You’re probably familiar with the idiom “The emperor has no clothes,” which comes from a folktale popularized by Hans Christian Andersen. This idiom refers to logical fallacies, meaning things that are widely accepted as true and praiseworthy but are, in fact, lacking. This idiom comes to mind as I survey K‒12 Spanish reading assessments, some of which are indeed complex and praiseworthy, while others are severely lacking. I explore this point in my new Assessment Masterclass video. In this blog, I’ll take a deeper look at some important considerations, and I’ll share key questions to help you ..read more

Moreover, the additional growth achieved by struggling readers who use Lalilo is equivalent to six additional weeks of instruction. BLOOMINGTON, MN (March 6, 2024) – Renaissance, a leader in pre-K–12 education technology, announces the release of a new study demonstrating the efficacy of the Lalilo foundational literacy practice program. This new study, which involves more than 15,000 US students in grades K‒2, shows that learners who use Lalilo experience higher levels of growth in general literacy achievement than those who do not. The study further demonstrates that the additional growth ac ..read more

Moreover, the additional growth achieved by struggling readers who use Lalilo is equivalent to six additional weeks of instruction. BLOOMINGTON, MN (March 6, 2024) – Renaissance, a leader in pre-K–12 education technology, announces the release of a new study demonstrating the efficacy of the Lalilo foundational literacy practice program. This new study, which involves more than 15,000 US students in grades K‒2, shows that learners who use Lalilo experience higher levels of growth in general literacy achievement than those who do not. The study further demonstrates that the additional growth ac ..read more

A regular part of my job involves responding to questions from educators about our Renaissance assessment suite. Often, these questions involve other products in the market. How are Renaissance’s assessments alike or different? How do they compare in terms of performance? Do they use similar methods to compute specific scores? Answering deep questions often requires that I consult the technical manuals of the assessments in question. For Star Assessments and FastBridge, getting my hands on the necessary information is easy—and not just because I work at Renaissance. It’s been our long-held bel ..read more

In a recent blog, we explained how preschool assessment can support great reading outcomes in elementary school. We focused especially on how to help teachers identify children who might benefit from additional support in language and early literacy, and how to systematically evaluate whether preschool programs are “stepping up” to their special opportunity to provide great starts for all learners. As part of that discussion, we briefly touched on multi-tiered systems of support (MTSS) as ways to leverage assessment data to better serve young students. In this blog, we’ll take a closer look at ..read more

When you think of an expert—whether it’s a musician, an athlete, or a chef—the common denominator for their success is most certainly the amount of practice they put in. When it comes to reading, the same holds true: Students who read more are better readers. But we don’t just learn to read as part of human development; reading is not a natural process that will happen on its own. Learning to read requires an enormous amount of explicit and systematic instruction, provided over many years, with a lot of practice. So, how can we help students to make the most of reading practice? In this blog ..read more