October 2024

The National Board for Education Sciences (NBES) held its most recent meeting on October 9 and 10. The NBES serves as the advisory board for the Institute of Education Sciences (IES). The meeting agenda included as a main theme the development of a theory of action for IES and its centers, as well as a discussion of IES dissemination efforts by the Regional Educational Laboratories (REL).

Matthew Soldner, acting director of IES, and Anne Ricciuti, deputy director for science, provided NBES members details of a theory of action for IES overall. Soldner described IES’s perceived pipeline of examining conditions on the ground leading to designing interventions, testing interventions, scaling, and synthesis of research. He also noted IES’s more recent goals to support needs assessment, knowledge generation, and knowledge mobilization.

Riccutti highlighted the work that the IES Office of Science does to support the peer review of grants and report reviews. She also noted her vision for the Office of Science toward expanding the diversity of reviewers, collecting demographic data of applicants and PIs, and the use of training and machine learning for increasing efficiencies in processes.

Each of the commissioners described how they are incorporating theories of action within their respective centers:

• Peggy Carr, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), discussed her role as the Department of Education’s statistical official to champion data quality across the entire Department of Education. Carr also noted four components of the NCES theory of action: resources, including constraints on resources and the amount of data collections NCES conducts compared with other federal statistical agencies; evidence-building; synthesizing; and capacity-building.
• Nathan Jones, commissioner of the National Center for Special Education Research (NCSER), detailed efforts around determining areas of priorities and need; evidence-building, including a recent emphasis on systems-level research; and knowledge use, including through promoting research-based practices through the National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance (NCEE) and technical assistance centers within the Department of Education’s Office of Special Education Programs.
• Soldner, in his additional role as commissioner of NCEE, noted three areas within the NCEE theory of action to inform local and state policy, providing information to education leaders, and strengthening instruction.
• Laura Namy, associate commissioner for teaching and learning for the National Center for Education Research (NCER), presented NCER’s theory of action on behalf of commissioner Elizabeth Albro. NCER’s theory of action included an emphasis on leveraging NCER-funded research for evidence-based practice, with examples centered on the role that NCER investment in reading research has had on informing literacy instruction.

In discussing IES’s dissemination efforts, NBES members heard a presentation from Nicole Patton Terry, director of REL Southeast, director of the Florida Center for Reading Research, and Olive & Manuel Bordas Professor of Education at Florida State University. Terry discussed the role that RELs have in building partnerships between researchers and multiple states and districts to support their efforts to take evidence-based practices to scale. Terry also highlighted work that REL Southeast has undertaken to translate NCEE What Works Clearinghouse Practice Guides into toolkits and guidance that can be used in instruction.

NBES will hold its next meeting on November 15 to elect a vice chair for the Board and to authorize submission of the annual report upon completion and review. Additional details are available in the Federal Register notice announcement.