Working At The Edge

Make School Different: Digital leadership & Transformation

Which are the #learnercentered #edtech companies?

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An article in the New York times re-surfaced some thoughts and questions I’ve written about in connection with a 2016 trip to Silicon Valley – #PennSV16.

While the focus of the article is on the ethics of Silicon Valley courting “brand-name” teachers to promote their wares, I wonder if it’s more about “what’s missing” from the piece that can provoke some interesting questions:

  1. How many of the the edtech products teachers use reinforce an instructionist, dominant paradigm of education? Who gets the agency with a particular product – school system, teachers or learners?
  2. Where’s the leadership in the conversation/engagement? What might happen if leadership is engaged in the conversation between edtech and teachers?
  3. Are edtech companies really focused on transformation of education or are they aiming for the low hanging fruit by making it merely more efficient? Are they driven more by profit (feeding the dominant paradigm) or transformation (focusing on the less lucrative – for the moment – non-dominant paradigm)?
  4. What about equity? How many teachers in distressed schools and districts are the beneficiaries of these edtech//teacher connections? Is the current focus just exacerbating the have/have-not divide?

You can probably guess what I’m thinking based on the questions, but read the article and consider leaving some comments below. I’m not in the edtech business, but think the article surfaces a major part of our capitalist system – edtech – and what they might be missing the mark on – learner-centered education, leadership, transformation and equity.

Are there other elements missing from the relationship of edtech companies and educators? Who are the learner-centered edtech companies?

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Randy Ziegenfuss
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