In our series “Spotlight On,” we highlight nonprofit leaders from across the education sector to dive deeper into how their organizations have unlocked innovation, built evidence, and achieved growth. Our latest Spotlight On Growth features Shalinee Sharma, co-founder and CEO of Zearn.
On average across grades, findings from NWEA suggest that students will need an extra 4.3 months of math instruction to catch up to pre-pandemic levels of academic achievement. While this is a slight improvement from NWEA’s estimation one year ago, it still means there’s a lot more work to do.
Zearn is dedicated to helping all students catch up and move forward in math. Founded in 2012, Zearn is the nonprofit educational organization behind Zearn Math, the top-rated math learning platform used by one in four elementary school students and more than one million middle school students nationwide.
At its core, Zearn is driven by the belief that every kid is a math kid. The platform Zearn Math provides guided, interactive lessons that give students more chances to understand the math they are learning with their teacher. Every problem on Zearn includes built-in math help to show students how to approach the problem in a different way if they are stuck. From exploring fractions by slicing oranges to solving ratio problems by mixing trail mix recipes, learning on Zearn helps math make sense.
Accelerating growth and deepening partnerships
Overdeck Family Foundation has funded Zearn’s work since 2018 through our Innovative Schools portfolio, dedicated to expanding access to tech-enabled, student-centered learning environments in kindergarten through ninth grade. In that time, the organization has made significant progress toward its mission of increasing student achievement by unlocking growth on a national scale.
Since the start of our Foundation’s funding, Zearn has increased its reach by over 400 percent. Today, Zearn Math is utilized in all 50 states and major cities including New York, D.C., and Houston, expanding access to high-quality math learning to millions of students. “As a nonprofit, what we’ve found is that in order to drive your organization’s velocity, you have to be crystal clear about your core purpose, and so should every single person in the organization,” said Shalinee Sharma. “Our core purpose is to change mathematical understanding in this country and to be a part of the birth of the first numerate generation, and as such, we know that our product development has to deliver against that promise.”
As a nonprofit, what we’ve found is that in order to drive your organization’s velocity, you have to be crystal clear about your core purpose, and so should every single person in the organization.
Catalytic funding
With our support, Zearn has continuously improved its digital platform. Its pilot grant focused on strengthening the nonprofit’s evidence base, which supported Zearn in publishing multiple studies designed to investigate the association between consistent Zearn Math usage and student math achievement, as measured by state assessments. Researchers at the organization explored the benefits of Zearn both for students who used the platform at the intended level of dosage (three grade-level lessons per week, or 90 or more lessons throughout the school year) and those who used it at lower—but still potentially effective—levels (30-59 digital lessons and 60-89 digital lessons per year).
One recent impact study highlights links between Zearn usage and math learning among students in Texas. Students who used Zearn Math with fidelity saw improvements of 53 scale score points in state math scores compared to academically and demographically similar peers. This finding was consistent across different starting proficiency levels and among diverse demographic groups, including economically disadvantaged students and multilingual learners. Although benefits were smaller for lower levels of dosage, students who used Zearn Math at least once per week still outperformed their matched peers.
In 2021, we provided Zearn with a three-year $4.5 million grant to support growth, improvement, and evaluation of its existing kindergarten through fifth grade curriculum, in addition to the development of a curriculum for sixth through eighth grade. Since the launch of Zearn Math for middle school in 2023, the platform is now used by over one million middle-school students across the country.
Courtesy of Zearn
What’s next
In August, Sharma published her national bestselling book rooted in Zearn’s mission to help all kids love learning. “Math Mind: The Simple Path to Loving Math,” kicked off a national conversation to raise awareness around the importance of numeracy and the need to place math on equal footing with literacy. Following publication, Sharma is leading conversations with educators, leaders, advocates, and parents to explore the myths that hold us back from learning and loving math, why universal numeracy is essential, and strategies to help make math rigorous and accessible for all kids.
“In today’s modern world, math matters more than ever. Doing well in algebra is a top predictor of graduating from high school and college, and those who graduate from college can earn a million more dollars over their lifetime compared to those who don’t. Math can and does change life trajectories, just as it has mine.”
In addition to shifting math mindsets, the Zearn team is dedicated to building its evidence base through ongoing research and evaluation. As this work progresses, Zearn is continuing to test new ways to increase the use of its product, making it possible for even more students to realize their full math potential.
Thank you to Paula Longoria for your contributions to this blog post.
Header image courtesy of Zearn