Our Activities

Leveraging Evidence for Action to Promote change (LEAP) lets researchers and practitioners focus on content and collaboration.

New links and coalitions between partners and stakeholders amplify and inspire further action towards bringing evidence-based education solutions into the education ecosystem.

Schools worldwide have started to transform the way they teach and manage their institutions in light of new technological developments and the deep changes in our society, especially in the context of COVID-19.

Rigorous education research has increased considerably in recent decades. There is, however, only limited evidence on topics such as adaptive teaching, personalized learning and effective use of EdTech.

Education technology (EdTech) is a growing field with a huge potential to transform teaching and learning by providing tools to effectively address variability in learning.

To foster a global school system that facilitates the generation and transfer of research and good practices, we collaborate with organizations or institutions that group a large number of schools within and across national education systems.

Seeking to improve the living conditions of Ivory Coast’s cocoa farmers and their children, the Jacobs Foundation is working with public and private organizations to develop a sustainable ecosystem that will ensure access to high-quality education.

A strong coalition of the Ivorian government, companies of the cocoa and chocolate industry and philanthropic partners aims to jointly tackle root causes of child labor in Côte d’Ivoire.

Highly talented and innovative early career researchers working on child and youth development advance their research with a Jacobs Foundation Research Fellowship, which will improve the development and living conditions of children and youth.

Every year since 1991, the Jacobs Foundation has held a conference at Marbach Castle on Lake Constance, attracting leading scientists and young scholars from all over the world.

The purpose of the College for Interdisciplinary Educational Research (CIDER) is to foster interdisciplinary cooperation in the field of education research.

How can we gain a better understanding of the prerequisite of children’s learning, and how can we provide targeted support? These questions guide the new partnership between the German Institute for International Educational Research (DIPF) and the Jacobs Foundation.

Society is changing, and so is education. Classrooms have entered the digital age. As a result, we not only need new teaching methods; we also need to introduce new educational technologies to the classroom.

The Jacobs Foundation Student Traineeship Advancing Research & Systems Change in Education (J STARS) is a unique opportunity for young talents who want to advance learning and education, and pursue a career in NGOs, government or international philanthropy.

Every year, senior scholars nominate approximately a dozen young scholars to participate in the Jacobs Foundation’s annual conference. Invitations are extended to postdoctoral researchers whose work is directly related to the focus of the conference.

Lifespan research examines the gradual and systematic changes in behavior that take place over the course of a person’s life. By observing such changes, scientists are able to draw valuable conclusions about child and youth development.

Ready! is a campaign throughout Switzerland that focuses on the formative early childhood years. It brings partners active in the early childhood sector together to work toward a comprehensive early childhood policy.

To give every child the opportunity for a comprehensive, high-quality education in school and beyond, the Jacobs Foundation is encouraging innovative, systematic cooperation between school-based and extracurricular actors through its Educational Landscapes program.

The “Primokiz”-program was designed for up to 25 small and medium-sized Swiss cities, to support their efforts in designing and implementing a comprehensive plan for integrated early childhood education and care.

Primokiz² connects all actors in the education, social, and health sector and supports them to develop a comprehensive policy on early childhood education thereby creating sound structural conditions.

There are many different kinds of daycare centers. But what do we really know about them? In the interest of greater transparency, the Jacobs Foundation and kibesuisse, a Swiss organization in the early childhood education and care sector, launched the QualiKita initiative.

The longitudinal study being conducted in Bremen with the title “BRISE: Bremen Initiative to Foster Early Childhood Development” includes a number of targeted interventions for children during the first seven years of life.

The German Children and Youth Foundation (DKJS), the Jacobs Foundation and other partners are launching “Quality at the Local Level” in an effort to improve the quality of Germany’s early childhood education and care sector.

Ticino Progetto Infanzia (TIPI) aims to stimulate children’s development in the home, support their growth in the daycare setting, and ensure that they are well prepared for the transition to preschool and elementary school.

Juvenir is a series of studies that address topics affecting young people in Switzerland. Rather than talking about young people, Juvenir talks with them – and they identify the topics that are important for them. The studies are based on the use of social media.

The five-year Fortalezas program, launched in 2012 by the Jacobs Foundation in cooperation with Fundación SES, sought to bring 2,000 young people into the labor market in Argentina, Brazil and Colombia.

The word “djigui” means hope. All over the world, education holds the promise of hope for a better life. Since 2013, the Djigui project has given children and young people between the ages of 9 and 20 a second chance at an education.

To improve the living conditions of a new generation of small farmers in Uganda, the Jacobs Foundation and the Hanns R. Neumann Stiftung launched the Youth Development Project, which operated in Uganda from 2013 to 2016.

Promoting young people’s healthy and productive development is one of the most urgent and complex challenges of our time. In order to raise public awareness of the research in this field the Jacobs Foundation has launched the Jacobs Media Fellowships.

Practitioners in the field of early childhood education and care drive change and will employ their studies to improve early childhood education at their respective institution and beyond: in the education system or in policy, business or society.

Can memory training boost children’s achievement and intelligence? To what extent is the development of a child’s motor skills correlated with learning in general? These are just some of the questions that the Center for Cognition, Learning and Memory (CCLM) is investigating.

Young professionals with an entrepreneurial vision for interlinking business and social impact become participants in a network of future opinion leaders with opportunities to grow and further engage with the thematic priorities of the Jacobs Foundation.

Fellows from research, journalism, entertainement, entrepreneurship, and education come together to learn from each other and collaborate on key issues in the learning sciences thereby elaborating on how to communicate with the public.