Measuring what Matters Learning Partnership

The Measuring what Matters Learning Partnership (MWM-LP) is premised on the belief that we can collectively advance education for children and adolescents growing up in adversity when program and policy leaders from different countries learn and work together. There are several key mechanisms embedded in MWM-LP to help leaders and their organizations turn strategy into successful implementation for larger populations and replication.

Key Mechanisms

  1. Learning and Leadership Webinars enable our global learning community to share, learn, and discuss ideas and best practices. The 2019 series focused on advancing whole child development measurement. In 2020, MWM-LP webinars will focus on program design and evaluation.

  2. Working Groups bring together individuals with specialized knowledge and skills who collaborate on tasks and activities in order to achieve agreed upon objectives. Current working groups are focused on co-creating, testing, and validating a common evaluation instrument; training for social-emotional learning; and “positive deviance” studies of resilient schools in post-conflict regions.

  3. Annual Convenings allow global partners to gather and explore the latest research, innovative practices and emerging policy approaches to create scalable pathways out of adversity for children and adolescents. Due to COVID-19, our 2020 MWM-LP Convening took place virtually and focused on program assessment and evaluation.

  4. Disseminations and Actionable Evidence is a priority. In 2019, MWM-LP chaired five panels at major global conferences and co-authored six articles in peer reviewed journals. In the future, the GC-DWC will enable an annual flagship Notre Dame conference on whole child development, and through faculty affiliates increase intellectual engagement and publication.

2020 Annual Convening

Although COVID-19 moved the weeklong convening to a virtual platform, partners used the time to engage in discussions over activating community systems, practical measurement, global trends in whole child development (WCD), and the framing of WCD in order to ensure inclusion of the most vulnerable children and adolescents in their work and assessments. Highlights from the week included discussions on the role of resilient education systems during COVID-19; adapting measurement frameworks to local contexts; the relationship between academic and social and emotional skills; and the development of effective communication strategies around WCD.

Read the 2020 Convening Reports:

Full Report Executive Summary Community Systems COVID-19 Discussion Summary

Explore the 2020 sessions:

  1. Community Systems and COVID-19 Responses
  2. Practical Measurement: Practitioner-focused best practices in measuring children's learning and development outcomes
  3. National Systems: Global Trends and Whole Child Development
  4. Framing WCD: The Power of How from the FrameWorks Institute

2019 Annual Convening

Entrenched in the goals of the inaugural MWM-LP Convening was the desire to support dialogue, learning, and collaboration across global partners working at different levels of the wider education systems. A focus on whole child development (WCD), through the lens of measurement and the assessment of learning, brought members together to address common challenges around integrating WCD skills into systems.