Future ReadyKids

Our evidence standard

The research behind Future Ready Kids

We believe parents deserve to know what the evidence supports — and what it doesn’t.

Future Builders Club draws from research across social-emotional learning, self-regulation, interpersonal skills, decision making, critical thinking, creativity, resilience, and youth development.

Research supports the broader idea that many important personal, social, and thinking skills can improve through intentional instruction and active practice.

Method

How we use research

We look for three things:

  1. 1.Evidence that the skill is meaningfully related to child or adolescent development.
  2. 2.Evidence that the skill — or closely related behaviors — can be strengthened through instruction or practice.
  3. 3.A reasonable connection between that evidence and the kind of real-world practice used in Future Builders Club.

We do not treat correlation as causation.

We do not claim that one study proves a skill causes lifelong success. And we do not claim that our exact Future Builders curriculum has been clinically validated.

Future Ready Kids is research-informed. It is not a diagnostic, therapeutic, or clinical program.

What that does not mean

  • It does not mean our exact 12-skill framework has been clinically validated.
  • It does not mean every kid will respond the same way.
  • It does not mean a one-month Skill Path guarantees a behavioral outcome.
  • It does not mean the Future Ready Checkup is a diagnostic assessment.

The bigger picture

The broader evidence for skill-building

A large body of research on social-emotional learning and self-regulation suggests that important personal, social, and behavioral skills can improve through intentional instruction and practice.

One contemporary meta-analysis reviewed 424 studies across 53 countries involving more than 575,000 students and found improvements across social-emotional skills, attitudes, behaviors, peer relationships, school functioning, and academic achievement.

A separate systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized self-regulation interventions included 49 studies and more than 23,000 children and adolescents and found that many interventions improved self-regulation.

  • Christina Cipriano et al.

    The state of evidence for social and emotional learning: A contemporary meta-analysis of universal school-based SEL interventions

    Child Development · 2023

    View source ↗

  • Anuja Pandey et al.

    Effectiveness of Universal Self-regulation–Based Interventions in Children and Adolescents: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

    JAMA Pediatrics · 2018

    View source ↗

The 12 skills

What informs each Skill Path

Each skill below shows what we mean by it, what the evidence suggests, how Future Builders Club practices it, and the published sources we rely on — including where that evidence is limited.

Phase 1

Lead Yourself

Self-Control

Pausing before reacting and choosing a response that supports a goal.

Emotion Regulation

Recognizing emotions and using constructive strategies to recover from them.

Self-Awareness

Understanding your own patterns, strengths, values, and what drives your behavior.

Phase 2

Connect With Others

Empathy

Making a genuine effort to understand another person’s perspective.

Communication

Expressing yourself clearly while listening well enough to understand someone else.

Cooperation

Working productively with others toward a shared goal.

Phase 3

Think Well

Problem Solving

Defining a problem, trying an approach, and learning from the result.

Decision Making

Choosing deliberately by weighing consequences, values, and context.

Critical Thinking

Evaluating claims and evidence, and revising a view when better information appears.

Phase 4

Take Action

Creativity

Generating ideas, experimenting, and making something that did not exist before.

Resilience

Recovering after difficulty, adapting, and continuing forward.

Initiative

Acting in a self-starting, proactive way rather than waiting to be prompted.

Our commitment

Clear claims. Useful practice. Room for every kid to be different.

Future Ready Kids is research-informed, not a clinical or diagnostic program. The Future Ready Checkup reflects what a parent is noticing now; it does not define a child or predict an outcome.

Research can inform what we teach, but no study can tell a parent exactly who their kid will become.

Future Ready Kids uses evidence as a guide — not as a promise.