Pittsburgh high schools adopt math intervention program

Twelve Pittsburgh city high schools are implementing Carnegie Learning® Bridge to Algebra to improve math learning for students with individualized education plans. The blended software and textbook solution was adopted as an intervention program for 300 Pittsburgh Public Schools students in the 2010-2011 school year and the software was also used in after school programs. The program will be implemented again in 2011-12.

To ensure the ongoing quality of the implementation, Carnegie Learning is also delivering implementation training for teachers and in-classroom support in each of the 12 buildings throughout the academic year.

"I have had the pleasure of working with our teachers during the implementation of the Carnegie Learning® Bridge to Algebra blended curriculum,” said Amber Dean, program for students with exceptionalities (PSE), curriculum specialist. “The students respond well to the engaging collaborative nature of the textbook. Additionally, teachers are finding the adaptive ability of the Cognitive Tutor software useful in meeting individual student’s goals. We are quite pleased with the materials and the support provided by Carnegie Learning as we watch our students grow.”

Carnegie Learning® Math curricula show strong results with special education populations in Kent, Washington and Miami-Dade school districts. Independent studies compared the gains of two groups of Algebra I students – one using Carnegie Learning curricula and one using the districts’ conventional math programs. Results of both studies indicated significantly greater knowledge gains by special populations learning with the Carnegie Learning software.

Carnegie Learning, Inc. was founded in 1999 by cognitive and computer scientists from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) in conjunction with veteran mathematics teachers from the Pittsburgh Public Schools. Among the company’s founders is Dr. John R. Anderson, R. K. Mellon University Professor of Psychology and Computer Science at CMU and recipient of the Franklin Institute’s 2011 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Computer and Cognitive Science. Currently, over 1000 school districts and more than 500,000 middle school and high school students in all 50 states use Carnegie Learning math programs each year.

Carnegie Learning is a privately held corporation headquartered in Pittsburgh. The company maintains ongoing local research and development relationships with CMU, the Pittsburgh Science of Learning Center, and RAND Corporation.