The National Center for Healthy Safe Children offers resources, training, and technical assistance to support states, tribes, territories, and local communities as they promote overall wellbeing for students and their families. Learn more about what we do.
Competency-based programs could reduce the barriers many face to getting a college degree, whether adult learners who struggle to balance an academic calendar with work and family, or workers who want to get the credentials verifying skills they’ve acquired on the job. AIR hosted a briefing on competency-based education, a ...
What are evidence standards for evaluating math and science programs? Join experts from AIR for an engaging webinar about evidence standards. Presenters will discuss the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) Tiers of Evidence and the What Works Clearinghouse evidence rating system and how these evidence standards relate to evaluating math ...
Amy Dalsimer is a principal technical assistance consultant with the Adult Education and Literacy Practice Group at AIR. Her work is focused on improving services and instruction to adult learners by conducting research and providing professional development to states and local providers, strengthening accountability and use of data for program ...
Mary Kay Dugan is a managing technical assistant consultant at AIR. She is passionate about identifying evidence-based promising practices and translating them into policies and effective programs focused on underserved populations including disadvantaged youth and young adults. Dugan has over 30 years of experience helping federal, state, and local governments ...
Elizabeth Zachry Rutschow is a managing researcher at AIR. She is an expert in postsecondary and adult education reform and has led many large-scale, mixed-methods evaluations of community college and adult education reforms. She is dedicated to using qualitative and quantitative research to improve equity and the prosperity and well-being of ...
While best-in-class sectoral programs have successfully raised participants’ long-term earnings, far too few individuals are able to reap the benefits of participating in these programs. The PROMISE Center at AIR is dedicated to learning what may work to help integrate these underserved populations into a vital workforce ecosystem. ...
To improve the outcomes of adult learners, programs and educators need research they can trust and readily use to inform practice. AIR contributes to the research base about what works for adult learners by conducting rigorous and policy-relevant studies focused on teaching and learning.
The National Center for Healthy Safe Children offers resources, training, and technical assistance to support states, tribes, territories, and local communities as they promote overall wellbeing for students and their families. Meet our leaders and researchers.
Jessica Heppen, a nationally recognized expert in education research, policy, and practice, is the president & CEO of AIR. Dr. Heppen been with AIR for 20 years and, in that time, has held several key roles during her tenure.