STRIDE, PRIORITAS, and Tangerine: RTI's Involvement in Global Education

Strengthening primary, secondary, and postsecondary education around the world

Improving early-grade reading, in the U.S. and around the world, has always been a top priority at RTI. In support of this work, and to improve upon paper forms of assessment, in 2010 the Institute developed an open-source mobile assessment and coaching tool dubbed Tangerine, used primarily to record data from early- grade reading and mathematics assessments and to enhance coaching feedback for teachers, students, and school administrators. A few years later, in 2013, the Institute introduced Tangerine:Class, which allows teachers to systematically collect, analyze, and use results from continuous assessments of students' reading and math skills. And the Tangerine variants don't end there: Tangerine:Tutor, developed in partnership with Google and launched in 2017, supports Curriculum Support Officers (the coaches in Kenyan’s Ministry of Education, Science and Technology) who use this tool to record teacher observations and conduct rapid student assessments.

Throughout the decade, RTI has been deeply involved in primary education in developing countries. PRIORITAS, in Indonesia, was a major undertaking that called on numerous facets of RTI's global expertise. Aimed at holistically bettering the quality of education in Indonesia, PRIORITAS sought to improve not only the training of teachers and school personnel, but also the management of school resources and the overall educational experience of students, particularly in terms of reading, math, and science.

Uniquely, PRIORITAS involved a close partnership with Indonesia's Ministry of Education and Culture, Ministry of Religious Affairs, and Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education. The project succeeded in better coordinating and aligning the numerous components of Indonesia's educational system, shoring up the relationships between school management and district governance as well as between teacher-training institutes and the schools for which they provide services.

Finally, RTI has also been active in postsecondary education worldwide. Launched in 2014, the Science, Technology, Research, and Innovation for Development (STRIDE) program aims to improve the quality and capacity of higher education in the Philippines, and to strengthen the linkages between private industry and academia.

STRIDE's sectors of focus include alternative energy, translational medicine, electronics, chemical industries, agribusiness, and information technology, with cross-cutting themes of manufacturing and new product development. The program aims to create a network of researchers, entrepreneurs, and investors who can facilitate innovation-led economic growth, as well as a sturdy base of homegrown intellectual property and a professional workforce well-equipped to flourish in the global economy.