Victor R. Lee

Victor R. Lee is an Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Education at Stanford University and is faculty lead for the Stanford Accelerator for Learning's initiative on AI and Education. Through his research, he asks what future-facing STEM knowledge, tools, and practices are important to know to enable active participation and critical engagement with our increasingly digitally-infused lives. He then uses the tools of educational design research to create examples for how we could get there. Currently, this involves researching and designing learning experiences and resources for data literacy, K-12 data science education, and artificial intelligence literacy for both students and teachers. He also has maintained a portfolio of research related to elementary computer science education, maker education, and science cognition. His research is most often done through research-practice partnerships and involves design, implementation, analysis, and continual revision of new learning experiences in actual learning settings (such as schools, districts, or libraries). Lee has co-authored multiple national reports for the National Research Council related to computing and data in education. His work has been featured in the New York Times, CNN, Forbes, Politico, and other national media outlets.

Lee completed his undergraduate studies at UC San Diego with emphasis in cognitive science, human computer interaction, and mathematics. He earned his doctorate in Learning Sciences at Northwestern University where he was supported for several years through a fellowship with the NSF-funded Center for Curriculum Materials in Science. Since leaving the midwest and beginning his professional academic career, he has received the National Science Foundation CAREER award, the Jan Hawkins Award, a post-doctoral fellowship from the National Academy of Education and the Spencer Foundation, and various best paper awards. His book, Learning Technologies and the Body (published by Routledge), is the first compendium of current research of embodied technologies for learning. With Abigail Phillips, he published, Reconceptualizing Libraries: Perspectives from the Information and Learning Sciences (2018). Currently, he is contracted for a new book on K-12 data science education. Victor sits on the editorial board of several leading education and technology research journals and advises various national organizations. He is a past-president and elected fellow of the International Society of the Learning Sciences.