Renaissance Acquires Student-Centered, Teacher-Driven Math Solution

The edtech leader has acquired Freckle Education to enhance its offerings with differentiated math, science and social studies solutions

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Renaissance

May 20, 2019, 07:03 ET

WISCONSIN RAPIDS, Wis., May 20, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Renaissance^®, a global leader in pre-K–12 education technology, today announced that it has acquired Freckle Education, a company that provides a differentiation platform for all four core subjects: math, social studies, science and English language arts. This acquisition will expand and enhance educators' opportunities to accelerate student learning, especially in the critical math skills students need to be college and career ready.

"We chose Freckle for its innovative approach to student-centered practice, instructional design and teacher tools," said Todd Brekhus, chief product officer at Renaissance. "So many personalized learning programs suggest students should just put the headphones on, let the computer take over and wait for the learning to happen without the teacher's involvement. With Freckle, we're bringing educators a tool that puts them in control of targeting instruction and differentiating practice for students. The acquisition of Freckle is another step forward in our mission to continually extend and expand the impact of our solutions."

Freckle helps teachers differentiate instruction quickly and effectively deliver guided practice to students at their own academic level. The platform includes interactive student practice activities aligned to state standards, teacher resources such as progress reports and inquiry-based lesson plans and an administrator dashboard. With Freckle's wide variety of high-quality teacher lessons and student activities, educators can differentiate not just what students learn, but how they learn it, engaging students in topics that already interest them and guiding them to learn in ways most effective for them individually.

The move is the third major acquisition for Renaissance in the last year and a half, coming just weeks after the company's April acquisition of myIGDIs™, and mirrors the company's previous purchase of myON^®. A student-centered digital literacy platform, myON by Renaissance^® has proven to be a strategic complement to Star Reading^® assessment and Accelerated Reader^®literacy programs, which provide educators with data-fueled insights into student progress and growth for effective differentiated learning.

Similarly, combining Freckle's differentiated lessons with the robust insights educators gain with Renaissance's Star Math^® K–12 assessment solution will help deepen the learning connection between teacher and student.

"We know that, when we combine best-in-class solutions, it can have an incredible effect on student learning," said Renaissance's CEO Chris Bauleke. "When we introduced teachers and administrators to myON, we saw increased usage of both Accelerated Reader and myON and, more to the point, an increase in student reading. We believe the same thing will happen as educators work with Star Math, Accelerated Math and Freckle, combining powerful tools for uncovering student data and the resources to put those insights to work to strengthen student math learning."

Founded five years ago as Front Row Education, Freckle has rapidly grown into a teacher favorite, with many adoptions championed by teachers. Today, more than 700,000 teachers use Freckle to differentiate learning for over 10 million students across 75,000 schools. Multiple research studies have found that students who use Freckle see greater learning gains than those who do not.

"We launched Freckle because we believe every student deserves a world-class education, and the best way to deliver that is by empowering teachers to differentiate instruction for their students," said Sidharth Kakkar, Freckle co-founder and CEO. "We've been honored to help hundreds of thousands of educators all across the country, and we couldn't be more excited to see Freckle improve learning for so many more students with the expanded reach Renaissance will provide."

Freckle customers will continue to receive the support and service they have come to expect and love from the company. Existing Renaissance customers can look forward to being introduced to Freckle.

Vista Point Advisors, a San Francisco-based boutique investment bank, acted as the exclusive financial advisor to Freckle.

About Renaissance
Renaissance^® is a global leader in pre-K–12 educational technology, enabling teachers, curriculum creators and educators to drive phenomenal student growth. Renaissance's solutions help educators analyze, customize and plan personalized learning paths for students, allowing time for what matters: creating energizing learning experiences in the classroom. Founded by parents, upheld by educators and enriched by data scientists, Renaissance knows learning is a continual journey—from year to year and for a lifetime. Our data-driven, personalized solutions are currently used in over one-third of U.S. schools and more than 90 countries around the world. For more information, visit Renaissance.com.

About Freckle Education
Freckle Education provides an innovative differentiation platform that allows teachers to provide every student with instruction and practice at the level that's best for them, especially in the three-quarters of classrooms with students whose reading levels span across more than four grade levels. With instructional resources and practice activities for all four core subject areas—math, social studies, science and English language arts—Freckle helps educators provide students with rich, engaging learning experiences that accelerate growth. Originally founded as Front Row Education in 2013, Freckle currently serves more than 700,000 teachers and 10 million students across 75,000 schools. For more information, visit Freckle.com.

SOURCE Renaissance