History
Guided by their vision to make test scores more actionable by connecting assessments with instruction, A. Jackson Stenner, Ph.D., and Malbert Smith, Ph.D. founded MetaMetrics® in 1984. They recognised the growing need for a standardised, international metric – one that could provide consistency and accuracy in measuring learners and English reading materials wherever they exist.
With support from scientists and government agencies, Dr. Stenner and Dr. Smith were able to carry out in-depth research on reading and psychometric theory, which culminated in the creation of their flagship product, The Lexile® Framework for Reading. Lexile® measures now provide a common language for publishers, assessment companies and learners to interpret readability and growth.
With the creation of the Lexile Framework, they demonstrated that common scales, like the Fahrenheit and Celsius scales, could be built for academic skills. Today, MetaMetrics carries on this legacy of bringing meaning to measurement with continued research in reading. This research has fueled the creation of services and products that make Lexile metrics available to their partners at any stage in development.