ACT acquires online resources curator

Iowa City-based ACT has acquired a Cincinnati curator of K-12 educational resources.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The purchase of Knovation, founded in 1999 as Thinkronize, includes:

l Knovation Content Collection - resources for K-12 schools, districts, states and businesses serving those markets

l netTrekker - Knovation's flagship product, it's an app to organize and share online educational resources

l icurio, a digital curriculum app for teachers to design lessons using online resources from the Knovation Content Collection.

'These solutions will strengthen our personalized learning offerings, helping teachers impact student learning directly in the classroom and beyond,” ACT CEO Marten Roorda said in prepared statement.

'Knovation's solutions and seasoned team will support and empower ACT's transition to a learning, measurement and navigation organization.”

Knovation has about 40 employees, ACT's public relations director, Ed Colby, said in an email. There are no plans to move them to Iowa City, he added.

ACT, a not-for-profit with approximately 1,100 employees and best known for its ACT tests, in recent years has acquired the National Research Center for College and University Admissions, OpenEd and ProExam.

It also has made strategic investments in Smart Sparrow, Open Assessment Technologies S.A. and New Markets Venture Partners, according to the statement.