Yidan Prize laureates help make education accessible to more students

The Yidan Prize recognizes innovative ideas that tackle challenges in education. In 2018, Northwestern University’s Professor Larry V. Hedges, and CEO of online learning platform edX, Professor Anant Agarwal were honored.

January 14, 2019 by Maureen Lea, Alarice International
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3 minutes read
Yidan Prize laureates.
Yidan Prize laureates.

Late last year, the Yidan Prize honored Northwestern University’s Professor Larry V. Hedges for his achievements in education statistical analysis, and the CEO of online learning platform edX, Professor Anant Agarwal.  

Both men had early experiences and circumstances that aren’t what one might assume considering their achievements.

Reaching higher education goals despite the odds

When he was young, Professor Hedges’ parents didn’t believe that university was part of the plan. He grew up in a poor, working class family. They didn’t know anyone who had been to college and his parents discouraged him from thinking along these lines.

While Professor Agarwal had access to educational opportunities growing up in India, he was subject to a school system that relied on traditional teaching, rote learning and memorization. His background also set him apart when he attended Stanford in the 1980s.

Both men have gone on to make contributions to educational access, although each has taken a different route.

Inspiration comes from a graduate student

“The reason I am passionate about education is precisely that it was a life-changing thing for me in terms of mobility, and I would like everybody else to have that chance,” said Professor Hedges.

His mother worked as a dishwasher at Fresno State College. Wandering around the campus one day, 11-year-old Larry stepped inside a lab and began a conversation with an enthusiastic graduate student. This meeting awakened him to a world and future he hadn’t thought of before.

Hedges excelled in school and at university, getting scholarships to pursue his studies. He then, like the student he’d talked to as a young boy, went on to do graduate studies. He was particularly interested in the statistical analysis of educational outcomes.

He conducted a meta-analysis of years of educational studies in a rigorous, meticulous manner, leading to the realization that some studies had previously come to flawed conclusions. This allowed him to set the statistical record straight that increases in education resources, even moderate spending gains, could have a significant impact on achievement.

As Northwestern President Morton Schapiro said, “Larry’s vision and commitment to education as a vehicle to promote opportunity have boosted the prospects for a generation of students.”

Using the internet to broaden access to education

With massive open online course (MOOC) provider edX, which Professor Agarwal co-founded, the mission is to increase access to affordable, quality education on a global scale.

As he makes clear, tradeoffs between access and quality occur all over the world. In the US, access to a quality education is often prevented by lack of money while elsewhere, in many developing nations, access is mostly open but the education on offer is of a low standard using ineffective methods.

Professor Agarwal believes that since more people have access to the internet than to a bricks-and-mortar school, providing access to quality learning materials and environments via the internet at low to no cost goes a long way to democratizing education globally.

The platform already offers “MicroMasters Programs”, which are high-level intensive courses from top universities designed to train people in high-demand skills. With the emergence of new industries, swift changes in others, such as supply chain management and cyber security, and great needs in the market for skilled and trained individuals, a rapid response in terms of high level training offered by reputable institutions was required and edX has helped to fill that gap.

Now, edX will be turning education on its head again with the development of “stackable” bachelor’s degrees. This means that people would be able to study courses online from various institutions and put them together to make a complete bachelor’s degree. It’s a bold idea that would put higher education within reach of a huge portion of the world’s population.

The Yidan Prize is honored and proud to recognize the achievements of 2018’s laureates.

For this year, if you know of people whose outstanding work in education deserves to be supported and broadcast to the world, nominate them for the Yidan Prize today.

(Nominations for the 2019 Yidan Prize end on March 31st, 2019)

 

Yidan Prize 2019
Yidan Prize 2019

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Comments

Quality education should be accessible to all school going - age . Leaders of our world and generation must be enrolled at the right time and age. Professor Larry I am highly touched by education background and your thirst for success. Young enthusiasts look forward to be like you and even do more exploits than what you have done .

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