Reasoning Mind :: Who We Are :: Our history

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Reasoning Mind (RM) was founded by Alexander Khachatryan, who became dissatisfied with math and science teaching as a result of his and his wife’s efforts to provide their son with a good education. In the process of trying to find a good middle – and later high – school for their son, the family saw firsthand the problems with the current system. Dr. Khachatryan formulated the concepts behind Reasoning Mind, and soon found that there were many individuals interested in the new approach. A team of educators, philanthropists and technology experts came together and began work on raising funds for Reasoning Mind’s first project. (For details about the origins of the company, please refer to How Reasoning Mind Came About.)

By 2002, the necessary funds had been collected and offices were opened in Houston and Moscow. The goal of the first project, A Web-based Environment for Learning Math in Middle School, was to develop a prototype version of the system, and then to pilot-test it on a group of Texas children. Ultimately, the team aimed to use the project to demonstrate the effectiveness of Reasoning Mind’s innovative approach.

Teams of methodology experts worked to design a curriculum based both on the strong math teaching tradition in Russia and on recent breakthrough results in American educational research. Programmers created an integrated learning environment, and web-designers produced artwork and animations for the website. By fall of 2002, the prototype system was up and running; two Texas schools – Hogg Middle School in Houston and Cypress Grove Intermediate in College Station – agreed to provide students for study with the program.

For one semester, fifty students learned through RM’s program, solving problems, playing games, reading theory material, and taking lessons from a small but dedicated group of online tutors. A randomized control-group experiment structure allowed for statistical evaluation of the project’s impact, which was carried out by an independent evaluator; the results were shown be phenomenal – the students’ scores both on internally administered tests and on state-mandated examinations increased dramatically, and there was a marked positive attitude towards the program, as well as an improvement in attitude towards math in general. Moreover, the project was successful both for students from a disadvantaged, inner-city community and for high-achieving students from one of the strongest intermediate schools in Texas. Most remarkably, Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) scores showed that only one semester of instructional intervention had virtually closed the achievement gap between white and Hispanic students.

Now that the effectiveness of the company’s concept has been demonstrated, Reasoning Mind is raising funds for the next step – the creation of a full-scale production version of the system. This system – to be piloted initially with 1,000-2,000 students – will be capable of simultaneously providing instruction to tens of thousands of students. Concurrently with the development of this system, the company will work on creating a full curriculum for middle school math.

In the future, Reasoning Mind hopes to expand to full middle and high school curricula for math and science, providing a wide range of games and other learning modes. Collectively, the environment will form a powerful integrated toolkit that teachers can use to supplement or replace traditional classroom practices, and motivated students can use outside of school to gain a deeper understanding of the subject areas that interest them.

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