Xiaodong Lin-Siegler, Professor of Cognitive Studies, has received the 2019 Asia Education Impact Award, given by Asia Educational Forum.

The award is given annually to a highly accomplished scholar who has made exceptional discoveries and deepened understanding of the educational challenges that the world faces.

Lin-Siegler was honored for her “innovative research and discoveries regarding uses of failure to increase motivational and learning resources for children and adults in their journey to achieve great goals in life.” She was presented with the award by Yao Wang, Secretary-General of the Asia Educational Forum, at a banquet held in Chengdu, China in late November. 

Lin-Siegler is the Founding Director of Teachers College’s Education for Persistence and Innovation Center (EPIC), an interdisciplinary research and development center that studies failure across a wide variety of disciplines and test theories about how to use it as a catalyst for innovation and success. 

groundbreaking 2016 study by Lin-Siegler, published by the American Psychological Association, found that high-school students may improve their science grades by learning about the personal struggles and failed experiments of great scientists such as Albert Einstein and Marie Curie.

The Asia Educational Forum provides an international platform for governments, businesses and non-governmental organizations to explore and craft solutions for major current issues in education.