We’re dedicated to building teacher capacity to grow and make a difference in the lives of disadvantaged students.
The mission of The SchoolWorks Lab, Inc. is to bridge the gaps in student achievement by providing evidence-based research and actionable policy recommendations.
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The SchoolWorks Lab: Empowering Teachers to Bridge Learning Gaps
A New Era in Personalized Learning
The Versatile Learning Plan (VLP), powered by Pathfinder Assessments and the Holistic Learning Profile (HLP), is reshaping education for the better. By using diagnostic assessments, AI-powered personalization, and global benchmarking, we ensure that every student has the opportunity to grow, succeed, and thrive. At The SchoolWorks Lab, we are committed to building a future where no student is left behind, and every teacher is empowered to make a lasting difference.
The SchoolWorks Lab focuses on evidence-based research as a cornerstone of its mission to improve student success across all subjects. The Lab’s approach is data-driven and results-oriented, designed to identify what works in education and why. Here’s how the Lab operates:
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Pathfinder: Revolutionizing Assessment with Data-Driven Insights
MetaTests are adaptive diagnostic tools that play a crucial role in the success of the VLP. By providing real-time, data-driven feedback, MetaTests allow teachers to continually assess student performance and make informed adjustments to their instruction.
The Versatile Learning Plan (VLP): A Holistic Educational Approach
The Versatile Learning Plan (VLP) is a groundbreaking framework designed to support the intellectual, emotional, and social development of every student. Unlike traditional Individualized Education Plans (IEPs), the VLP is built on the principles of Versatile Intelligence and Assessment (VIA), which focus on nurturing the whole child.
The SchoolWorks Lab, Inc. actively partners with students, teachers, schools, organizations, school districts, states, countries and international organizations to improve education and restore hope to teaching and learning:
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1. Researching School Reform and Best Practices
2. Gathering and Analyzing Data
3. Developing and Testing Innovative Solutions
4. Evidence-Based Policy Recommendations
5. Focus on Cross-Subject Success
6. Supporting Disadvantaged Students
7. Providing Answers to Educators and the Public
Founder and President
Rob is the visionary leader, driving strategic partnerships, overseeing product development, and ensuring alignment with educational research and versatile intelligence frameworks. He also works with policymakers at national research forums, state departments of education, and legislators in Washington, DC. Southworth is the founder and president of The SchoolWorks Lab (SWL), an education non-profit created in 2002 to provide high-quality research to effect change and improve access, inclusion and equity for every student in K-12 schools.
For more than four decades, I have dedicated my career to one central question:
How do people actually learn?
My work has taken me from the classroom to school leadership, educational consulting, assessment design, research, and educational innovation. Throughout that journey, I have remained convinced that education must move beyond simply measuring what students know to understanding how learning develops and how teachers can intentionally accelerate that growth.
I am the founder and President of The SchoolWorks Lab, Inc., where I lead the development of Pathfinder, a research-informed instructional intelligence system that combines assessment, artificial intelligence, cognitive science, and the science of learning to help teachers make better instructional decisions while reducing workload. Pathfinder is built upon our framework of Versatile Intelligence and Assessment (VIA), which views intelligence as dynamic, developmental, and educable rather than as a fixed score.
My current research explores how pattern recognition, representational change, insight (the “A-Ha” moment), memory, and feedback contribute to meaningful learning. I believe that learning is not simply the accumulation of information—it is the continual reorganization of knowledge into increasingly coherent and transferable patterns of understanding. This emerging Theory of Learning serves as the foundation for our work in instructional intelligence, continuous assessment, and AI-supported teaching.
SchoolWorks Lab is currently implementing Pathfinder through pilot programs in the United States, Australia, and India, with additional demonstration sites focused on scalable implementation models. These pilots are designed to answer a practical question that matters to every educator:
Can better evidence about learning help teachers make better decisions, improve student achievement, narrow the achievement gap, and make teaching both more effective and more efficient?
Throughout my career, I have worked with educators, schools, districts, universities, nonprofit organizations, and educational leaders to design systems that improve learning rather than simply document it. I believe that technology should never replace teachers—it should strengthen their professional judgment by providing timely, meaningful insight into student learning.
Today, my work sits at the intersection of educational leadership, cognitive science, assessment, artificial intelligence, and learning research. My goal is to build practical tools grounded in sound research that help teachers understand learning more clearly and help every student reach his or her full potential.
Every intelligence has a path. Our mission is to help educators find it.
Founder and President, The SchoolWorks Lab, Inc.
Rob Southworth is an arts education scholar-practitioner, collaborating with schools, school districts, and community-based organizations. He also works with policymakers at national research forums, state departments of education, and legislators in Washington, DC. Southworth is the founder and president of The SchoolWorks Lab (SWL), an education non-profit created in 2002 to provide high-quality research to effect change and improve access, inclusion and equity for every student in K-12 schools. SWL has been awarded multiple U.S. Department of Education and state funded arts education grants for research and evaluation, totaling $1,245,000. He writes and publishes weekly blogs on school reform, assessment, creativity and arts education issues.
Southworth was a political science and theater major in college. He started his career in education as an apprentice teacher at Shady Hill School in Cambridge, MA, and then taught technical theater and acting at Colorado Academy—producing 9 plays a year. He worked in professional theater at the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco and the Denver Center for the Performing Arts. When he attended the Experienced Teachers Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, he brought the idea of performance assessment with him. Theater had confirmed his belief that experiential learning opportunities, such as the arts, support creativity as students demonstrate what they know and can do. Through his work with the National Center for Restructuring Education Schools and Teaching, and teaching in graduate schools of education, he honed his ability to improve teacher learning. In his role as the Chief Academic Officer for a successful K-3 arts integrated literacy school, he turned his vision – of building teacher capacity to grow and make a difference in the lives of disadvantaged students – into reality.
Chief Academic Officer involved with all aspects of academic planning and operations for The Foundations School, a new K-3 independent school offering small classroom sizes, free tuition (85% of students qualify for free and reduced lunch), and a central focus on arts integration and literacy (opened January 2021).
President and Principal Investigator for research and evaluation projects that provide achievement gap insights useful to policy makers, the field of education, and the general public. SWL provides arts integration program evaluation, assessment, student achievement and teacher professional development services. Major research and evaluation projects include:
New Hampshire Department of Education (2019); NYC Department of Education (2008–09); Theater Communications Group (2006-10); Theatre Museum (2004–06); Empire State Partnerships (2003–09); New York State Council for the Arts (2002-08); San Diego Public Schools – Literacy Institute (2001-03); NYC Community School District 2 (1998–99); School of the Future (1995-2001); Rockefeller Brothers Fund (1996); New York State Education Department (1994-96); and more.
Teachers College, Columbia University, Adjunct Assistant Professor, C&T Depart. (1998-2004)
Bank Street College of Education, Adjunct Professor, Principal’s Institute (1998-2002)
Adelphi University Graduate School of Education, Adjunct Professor, Manhattan Center (1996–99)
Ed.D., Teachers College, Columbia University. Curriculum and Teaching Department. Advisor: Linda Darling-Hammond, Ed.D. Dissertation: Teacher Opinion of Student Assessment (1999)
C.A.S., Harvard Graduate School of Education. Experienced Teachers Program. Advisor: Eleanor Duckworth, Ph.D. (1990)
M.Ed., Tufts University. Masters in Secondary Education (1990)
Massachusetts Teacher Certification. Certification in Social Studies, Grades 7-12 (1983)
Shady Hill School. Teacher Training Program. Apprentice Teacher, Grades 5 & 8 (1983)
A.B., Dartmouth College. Political Science. Academic citations for English and Theater (1981)