Social Innovation in Digital Education - Towards a Holistic Impact Measurement

Social innovation in education is well-established, yet its precise definition remains elusive. In recent decades, digitalisation has enhanced educational practices and fostered the emergence of new ones, thereby creating a dedicated subfield for social innovation. These rapid developments underscore the importance of continual monitoring and evaluation. Despite the extensive research and publicly available statistics (e.g., in Germany) concerning education, social innovations within this sector are seldom included. Moreover, a standardised, longitudinal measurement framework that systematically tracks and compares diverse social innovations is absent.

To address this gap, the two-year research project “Impact Social Innovation” (ISI), funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, developed a field-specific, middle-range impact measurement model for social innovation in digital education. Social innovation in this context is defined as the application of technology-driven solutions that broaden access to education for the general public or specific sub-groups in ways that would otherwise be unattainable. In so doing, three forms of social innovation in digital education take centre stage: Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), Open Educational Resources (OERs), and educational applications.

We use an IOOI (Input, Output, Outcome, Impact) framework to assess their impact on education and society. This framework captures various stages of innovation, from the resources deployed (Inputs) and the immediate results (Outputs) to the changes achieved (Outcomes) and the attributable outcomes (Impacts). Following the IOOI logic, we demonstrate the possibility of constructing similar causal chains across different social innovations. For example, social inclusion is frequently touted as a benefit of digital education. However, it remains crucial to measure whether it genuinely reaches previously excluded groups (e.g., geographically isolated or marginalised) or reinforces the access of already included individuals. The ISI impact model advances the dialogue on measuring social innovation in education by mapping and comparing such causal chains.