Skip to main content


Welcome, you are visiting R+P Collaboratory

A Research+Practice Collaboratory
The Exploratorium comes together with the Education Development Center, Inverness Research, the University of Colorado - Boulder, and the University of Washington to form a Research+Practice (R+P) Collaboratory. The Collaboratory seeks to address and reframe the gap between research and practice in K-12 STEM education. This gap persists despite decades of work by many leading organizations, associations, and individuals. Attempts to close the gap have generally focused on creating resources and mechanisms that first explain or illustrate "what research says" and then invite educators to access and integrate findings into practice.

Show Full Abstract

Project Contributions

Research-Practice Partnerships in Education: Outcomes, Dynamics, and Open Questions
"Policymakers, funders, and researchers today view research-practice partnerships (RPPs) as a promising approach for expanding the role of research in improving educational practice. Although studies in other fields provide evidence…
Reframing “Failure” in Making: The Value of Play, Social Relationships, and Ownership
"Building on grit and growth mindset literature, the "maker mindset" celebrates persistence through failure as key to inspiring creativity in making education. Yet, moving beyond examinations of individual persistence and…
Making and Mentors: What It Takes to Make Them Better Together
"Making and mentoring are both at a crossroads. Both are scaling at a record pace, aspiring to reach considerably more youth and mentors than ever before. Each has potential for…
What If? Building Creative Cultures for STEM Making and Learning
"A 2014 review of the literature found a growing number of studies celebrating the potential power and excitement of the Maker movement in education (Vossoughi & Bevan, 2014). Most of…
A Screencasting Strategy to Support STEM Learning in the Early Grades
"Learn how a research-practice partnership used screencasting to promote early elementary students' mathematics learning and communication."
Ethical and Equitable: New Strategies for Supporting Sustainable Research Results
Watch Video >> There's a need for new models and approaches to research that can support sustained improvements in education. Too often, positive effects of research interventions drop off shortly…
The Promise and the Promises of Making in Science Education
" Making is a rapidly emerging form of educational practice that involves the design, construction, testing, and revision of a wide variety of objects, using high and low technologies, and…
Research-Practice Partnerships Toolkit: How to Create and Sustain Equitable Partnerships
" The Research-Practice Partnership (RPP) toolkit is a collection of tools, examples and readings curated by the Research + Practice Collaboratory to support educators and researchers working together to build…
Conceptualizing Research–Practice Partnerships as Joint Work at Boundaries
"This article presents a conceptual framework for analyzing how researchers and district leaders perceive and navigate differences they encounter in the context of research-practice partnerships. Our framework contrasts with images…
Making as a Strategy for Afterschool STEM Learning: Report from the California Tinkering Afterschool Network Research-Practice Partnership
"This report summarizes findings from the California Tinkering Afterschool Network, a research-practice partnership with STEM researchers and informal educators to co-investigate STEM-rich making in afterschool programs serving young people from…
Making Is Fun but Are They Learning?: Equity in Science Education
Watch Video There is growing interest in Making as a new approach to STEM learning. Students and teachers alike are excited about it. The White House is excited about it.…
Webinar: Measuring Impacts of Partnerships
RPP Forums is a monthly webinar series created by the Research + Practice Collaboratory MSP to discuss challenges, successes, and strategies for doing collaborative work in education.…
Webinar Series on Research-Practice Partnerships
Interested in collaborating with other educators & researchers? Want to learn how to form an equitable partnership? Check out this new webinar series hosted by the Research + Practice Collaboratory .
Equity in Out-of-School STEM Learning: Professional Development Needs and Strategies
"How can professional learning for out-of-school staff be organized to promote equity in STEM learning? This is the question a group of out-ofschool educators and educational researchers gathered to discuss…
Researcher-Practitioner Partnerships as a Strategy for Scaled Educational Improvement
There is a new vision to guide K-12 science education. The NRC Framework for K-12 Science Education and the resulting Next Generation Science Standards asks educators to engage students in…
Webinar: Mobile Technology and Early Math Learning: A Design-Based Implementation Research Approach
"Join us for a presentation about a research approach among practitioners and researchers in which the (1) work is organized to address problems of practice from multiple stakeholders perspectives, and…
Learning Through STEM-Rich Tinkering: Findings From a Jointly Negotiated Research Project Taken Up in Practice
"The Maker Movement has taken the educational field by storm due to its perceived potential as a driver of creativity, excitement, and innovation (Honey & Kanter, 2013; Martinez & Stager,…
Coordinating Research & Practice: New Models for Engaging Teachers with the Research-Base Related to STEM Practices
"How can engagement with research support classroom adoption of Common Core Math and Next Generation Science Standards? In this session we review three professional development approaches to engaging teachers with…
Developing a DBIR Research Plan
"This brief provides guidance for how to design a research plan using DBIR. It can also serve as a resource for preparing a research proposal to a federal agency or…
Designing for Equitable Learning Across Settings
"The purpose of this paper is to present a conceptual framework for initiatives focused on supporting learning across settings in the domains of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). The…
Research+Practice Collaboratory Launches New Website
The R and P Collaboratory is an NSF-funded project formed to address the challenging gap between research and practice in STEM education, across both formal and informal settings. Led by…