New Profit Supports LEAP Innovations with $1 Million Investment
February 3, 2016 (Boston) – National nonprofit venture philanthropy fund New Profit is investing $1 million over the next four years into LEAP Innovations, a Chicago-based nonprofit dedicated to transforming education by bridging the gap between education and innovation. LEAP Innovations helps educators develop and implement personalized learning environments enabled by technology to tailor instruction to each student’s skills, interests, and goals.
The investment in LEAP will be a part of the New Profit Innovation Fund (NPIF), New Profit’s core investment vehicle, which serves as a learning lab for identifying and catalyzing the best social impact organizations in America. The funding from NPIF will be unrestricted and supplemented by strategic advisory support from New Profit staff in collaboration with Deloitte Consulting.
“Our relationship with New Profit will unlock opportunities to expand our work more broadly,” said Phyllis Lockett, CEO of LEAP Innovations. “It will be critical to our efforts to scale the best edtech innovations, increase educator capacity to implement personalized learning, and support a national education innovation ecosystem to accelerate learning for all students.”
The tools of last century’s education system are unfit to address today’s educational challenges. This leaves an open door to weave technology through the classroom to create an effective and inspiring learning environment. LEAP Innovations takes this opportunity to use technology to personalize learning for each student’s needs and strengths, lifting their potential to succeed in meaningful careers.
LEAP Innovations addresses both the supply and demand sides of the education innovation cycle through its three branches: the Pilot Network, Breakthrough Schools, and Collaboratory. The Pilot Network seeks out and pilots the best personalized learning tools, enabling LEAP to evaluate and scale what works. Breakthrough Schools Chicago offer a year-long intensive program through which educators receive grants and coaching to define an integrated approach to educational technology solutions. The LEAP Innovations Collaboratory is a place where educators learn creative practices and communicate with peers, tech companies, and entrepreneurs to drive educational innovation.
“We are confident that LEAP Innovations will be a strong contributor to the New Profit Innovation Fund,” says David Levy, a Senior Advisor to New Profit who will serve on the board of LEAP Innovations. “With a strong, diverse team and potential to scale, LEAP will greatly impact the ways in which technology and education affect students’ personal growth and success.”
In their short history, LEAP is already beginning to see the positive impact of its efforts. Since launching in 2014, LEAP has partnered with more than 40 schools in Chicago, connecting nearly 3,500 students with personalized learning strategies and tech solutions.
Early results from LEAP’s 2014-2015 pilots with 15 schools across Chicago show significant positive impact when it comes to student progress on NWEA, a leading national assessment. For those who qualified for free or reduced price lunch (an approximate measure for poverty), impact equated to a 45 percent reduction in the achievement gap. After the pilots were completed, 86% of classrooms participating adopted the educational technology solutions LEAP helped them pilot.
The investment in LEAP Innovations is part of New Profit’s new capacity-building partnership with The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
For more about LEAP Innovations, visit their website at www.leapinnovations.org.
About New Profit:
New Profit is a national nonprofit venture philanthropy fund. The organization’s mission is to break down the barriers standing between people and opportunity in America. To do so, New Profit is working to transform the way America educates its children, propels people towards social and financial stability, and creates healthy communities. Since being founded in 1998, New Profit has collaborated with philanthropists, social entrepreneurs, foundations, businesses, policy advocates and other entities to help drive more than $1 billion towards innovative, disruptive approaches to social problem solving. New Profit’s unique, integrated approach brings together the following activities: investing through the New Profit Innovation Fund and Focus Funds; changing public policy through America Forward; and building communities of learning and action around innovative new approaches to change through the Gathering of Leaders and other activities. www.newprofit.org.