Key Partners

Quest’s partners—Institute of Play, Century Consultants Ltd., Pearson Foundation, and The New School—will offer students and teachers unprecedented access to new kinds of learning tools to support student achievement, youth identity development, and preparation for college and/or career. The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation will provide research support, as part of its ongoing work in Digital Media and Learning. The New York City Partner Support Organization is New Visions for Public Schools.

Institute of Play
Founded in 2006, the Institute of Play is a non-profit that supports design and research in the area of games and learning. It is a research-based, youth-oriented organization that designs game-based learning environments, curriculum, and professional development programs centered on helping teachers gain fluency in the effective use of digital media and games for learning. Professional game designers and leading researchers in the fields of game-based pedagogy, new media literacies, the learning sciences, assessment, and youth development staff the Institute of Play.

Over the past several years, The Institute of Play has mobilized interest and support from some of the most cutting edge researchers and practitioners from around the country in the area of games, learning, and assessment. IoP is a recognized leader in game-based curriculum development and a thought leader in the area of new learning models informed by the digital world of kids. IoP has established a number of core research partnerships to support Quest to Learn, most pressingly in the area of data and assessment, including work with Dan Schwartz (Stanford), Bob Mislevy (Univ. Maryland), and Valerie Shute (Florida State), Jim Gee and Alice Robison (Arizona State University) in the area of literacy and writing, Nichole Pinkard (Univ. of Chicago) and Henry Jenkins (MIT) in the area of new media literacies and professional development, Meg Meyer (Univ. of Wisconsin Madison) in the area of mathematics, and Tony Bryk (Carnegie Center for the Advancement of Teaching) in the area of organizational systems.

The Institute of Play has led the design of Quest to Learn, providing research support, curriculum and assessment expertise, and piloting models for the school as part of the school design process. Its work has been driven by a rigorous design process that has resulted in a design plan that describes in detail a research-based learning and instructional model, curricular structures and maps, assessment strategies and models, hiring procedures, scheduling, community outreach, student and teacher profiles, foundational research in school reform and the learning sciences, student and teacher schedules, etc.

New School University
The New School is a legendary, progressive university comprising eight schools bound by a common, unusual intent: to prepare and inspire its 9,400 undergraduate and graduate students to bring actual, positive change to the world. From its Greenwich Village campus, The New School launches economists and actors, fashion designers and urban planners, dancers and anthropologists, orchestra conductors, filmmakers, political scientists, organizational experts, jazz musicians, scholars, psychologists, historians, journalists, and above all, world citizens-individuals whose ideas and innovations forge new paths of progress in the arts, design, humanities, public policy, and the social sciences.

Century Consultants Ltd.
Century Consultants, Ltd. will be working with the Institute of Play and Quest To Learn to host the pilot of the Oracle Student Learning solution in support of transformational learning. This solution incorporates a suite of web-based tools that include Oracle Student Learning, Learner Analytics, SIS express® and Learner Enterprise. Together we hope to innovate around building shared wisdom, empowering the individual learner, engaging the entire extended learning community and enabling immersive collaboration.

• Oracle Student Learning is an enterprise level teaching and learning environment that allows easy high quality individualized learning paths with the ability to assess students against a multitude of assessment frameworks;
• Learner Analytics allows teachers, administrators and learners make sense of the all of the formative and summative data that is collected through Oracle Student Learning and provides comprehensive reporting capabilities to deliver a rich and holistic understanding of the individual learners
• SIS express® is a fully web-based student information system..
• Learner Enterprise provides connected and open spaces where knowledge can be constructed. Communication and productivity tools enable efficiencies in the learning and teaching cycle.

Pearson Foundation
The Pearson Foundation is the philanthropic arm of Pearson plc, one of the world's leading media and education companies. The Pearson Foundation extends Pearson’s commitment to education by partnering with leading nonprofit, civic, and business organizations to provide financial, organizational, and publishing assistance across the globe.

The Pearson Foundation is a 501(c) (3) nonprofit operating foundation and does not make grants.

New Visions for Public Schools, founded in 1989, is the largest education reform organization dedicated to improving the quality of education children receive in New York City's public schools. Working with the public and private sectors, New Visions develops programs and policies to energize teaching and learning and to raise the level of student achievement.