The Hong Kong-based Yidan Prize Foundation has announced the 2018 winners of the Yidan Prize for Education Research and Yidan Prize for Education Development.

Larry V. Hedges, who chairs the Department of Statistics at Northwestern University, was awarded the Yidan Prize for Education Research in recognition of his groundbreaking statistical methods, while Anant Agarwal was awarded the Yidan Prize for Education Development for making education more accessible to people around the world via an online open-source platform. Selected from nearly a thousand nominations from ninety-two countries, each laureate will receive HK$30 million (approximately $3.87 million) in recognition and support of their work — HK$15 million in the form of a cash prize and HK$15 million for a project fund. 

Hedges developed statistical methods for meta-analysis in social, medical, and biological sciences as well as innovative methods of synthesizing research findings across studies, enabling policy makers, educators, and the public to see evidence of "what works" in the field of education. Agarwal is founder and CEO of edX, an online learning platform he developed at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) with the aim of providing access to high-quality education at scale to learners around the world, regardless of gender, race, geographic location, financial resources, or prior academic qualifications. 

Established in 2106 by Charles Chen Yidan, a co-founder of Tencent, the Yidan Prize is the largest education prize in the world. 

"I congratulate the laureates and nominees alike for their outstanding contribution and achievements," said Chen. "Education should be an area of interest that goes beyond race, religion, economic status, or country of origin. I hope every country and region can share the results of education research and development, facilitating more international cooperation in order to create a better world through education."