Edtech’s brightest are struggling to pass — from techcrunch.com by Natasha Mascarenhas
Excerpts:
In the last quarter of 2022, edtech layoffs have hit venture-backed businesses including but not limited to BloomTech, Vedantu, Teachmint, Reforge, Coursera, Unacademy, Byju’s, Udacity and Brainly. Executive shifts include Quizlet CEO stepping down, Degreed’s CEO stepping aside for the founder’s return, and Invact Metaversity’s co-founder leaving after irreconcilable differences with his co-founder.
Class, an edtech company that neared unicorn status only 10 months after launching its Zoom School alternative, also conducted layoffs this year. The company raised a total of $146 million in known venture funding to date, including a SoftBank Vision Fund II check. CEO and founder Michael Chasen did not respond to a request for comment
The e-mail sent to staff was even more direct. “The truth is the layoffs in our sector are widespread for a reason,” Amir Nathoo, the co-founder of edtech unicorn Outschool, wrote in an email sent to staff. “The funding atmosphere has been dramatically impacted by the anticipation of a recession, higher interest rates and an increased need to show [return on investment] to investors.”
Addendum on 12/15/22 — and focuses on India:
Thriving education systems, thriving youth — from events.economist.com by Economist Impact
Some of the key topics to be discussed include:
From DSC:
“How to retain talented staff members should be high on every administrator’s 2023 agenda.” This highlight from a recent email from The Chronicle of Higher Education linked to:
Unfortunately, this important item wasn’t high on the agenda in the majority of the years that I was working in higher education. I often thought that folks in higher education could have learned from the corporate world in this regard. Although even the corporate world hasn’t been doing a good job these days about treating their people well. But that wasn’t the case in my experience at Baxter Healthcare, Kraft Foods, and Wells Fargo from years ago.
Perhaps we should have more people “crossing over” between the silos that we seem to have established. That is, a person could work within higher education for 2-3 years, move over to a corporate environment/government/vocational space/other, and then works a few years there before coming back to higher education in a different capacity. Perhaps more pathways and tighter collaboration could exist in this manner.
Hmmm…design thinking…there’s got to be something here…
Police are rolling out new tech without knowing their effects on people — from The Algorithm by Melissa Heikkilä
Excerpt:
I got lucky—my encounter was with a drone in virtual reality as part of an experiment by a team from University College London and the London School of Economics. They’re studying how people react when meeting police drones, and whether they come away feeling more or less trusting of the police.
It seems obvious that encounters with police drones might not be pleasant. But police departments are adopting these sorts of technologies without even trying to find out.
“Nobody is even asking the question: Is this technology going to do more harm than good?” says Aziz Huq, a law professor at the University of Chicago, who is not involved in the research.
Michigan flags 112 low-performing schools for intensive intervention — from mlive.com by Matthew Miller
Excerpt:
“These are the urban high minority districts, right? So they were the ones that had the highest death rates, the highest case rates, the highest income and economic hits because of the pandemic,” she said. “We know that all of this goes into what we label as school quality even though it’s about so much more than the school or the district.”
From DSC:
I surely hope that what’s going on in the image below isn’t what’s going on within the state of Michigan (as well as other states) — but I have my fears/concerns in that regard. Though admittedly, my focus here isn’t so much about the financial pictures, but rather it has to do with the straight-jacketing of the teachers and students by legislators in Lansing (and other state capitals). If I were to redraw this image, I would have legislators in (far-away) Lansing seated in comfortable chairs and offices while frazzled/overworked educators are straight-jacketed in the classrooms.
We have too many standardized tests and too many one-size-fits-all methods of “doing school” that aren’t coming from the people on the front lines. Those same people, given the right environment, could unleash a far greater amount of joy, wonder, relevance, creativity, and counsel — for themselves as well as for their students.
.
.
The ‘Digital Equity’ Students Need to Learn May Not Come Without Community Outreach — from edsurge.com by Daniel Mollenkamp
Excerpt:
And that means, more than ever, getting an education requires access to fast, reliable internet. But while the infrastructure to make sure that everyone can use the internet has improved in the last couple of years, the process isn’t complete.
If we want to keep the digital divide from growing, experts say, it’ll mean districts thinking about themselves as just one part of the larger community composed of families, nonprofits, businesses—all of them potential partners in expanding internet access for students.
.
Missing an Opportunity: Ed Dept. Criticized by GAO for Teacher Shortage Strategy — from the74million.org by Marianna McMurdock
In recent report, GAO finds key recruitment, retention challenges impacting the profession, and why current federal strategy lacks teeth to succeed
Excerpt:
The challenge of cost of entry into the profession and concerns of return on investment, the GAO report found, is also significantly straining the country’s supply of teachers. Compounding the financial reality, many candidates fear being overworked and mistreated.
“The COVID-19 pandemic laid bare teachers’ discontent with aspects of their jobs, including a lack of support for their safety and value as professionals and an increasingly disrespectful and demanding workplace culture—and exacerbated teacher shortages nationwide,” the GAO stated, pulling data from focus groups held throughout the pandemic.
Addendum on 12/10/22:
The state of AI in 2022—and a half decade in review — from mckinsey.com
The results of this year’s McKinsey Global Survey on AI show the expansion of the technology’s use since we began tracking it five years ago, but with a nuanced picture underneath.
Example graphic:
AI is finally good at stuff, and that’s a problem — from vox.com by Rebecca Heilweil
Here’s why you’ve been hearing so much about ChatGPT.
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
A few weeks ago, Wharton professor Ethan Mollick told his MBA students to play around with GPT, an artificial intelligence model, and see if the technology could write an essay based on one of the topics discussed in his course. The assignment was, admittedly, mostly a gimmick meant to illustrate the power of the technology. Still, the algorithmically generated essays — although not perfect and a tad over-reliant on the passive voice — were at least reasonable, Mollick recalled. They also passed another critical test: a screening by Turnitin, a popular anti-plagiarism software. AI, it seems, had suddenly gotten pretty good.
It certainly feels that way right now. Over the past week or so, screenshots of conversations with ChatGPT, the newest iteration of the AI model developed by the research firm OpenAI, have gone viral on social media.
1 Timothy 1:12-17 — from biblegateway.com
The Lord’s Grace to Paul
12 I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me trustworthy, appointing me to his service. 13 Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief. 14 The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.
15 Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. 16 But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his immense patience as an example for those who would believe in him and receive eternal life. 17 Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.
From DSC:
I was watching a sermon the other day, and I’m always amazed when the pastor doesn’t need to read their notes (or hardly ever refers to them). And they can still do this in a much longer sermon too. Not me man.
It got me wondering about the idea of having a teleprompter on our future Augmented Reality (AR) glasses and/or on our Virtual Reality (VR) headsets. Or perhaps such functionality will be provided on our mobile devices as well (i.e., our smartphones, tablets, laptops, other) via cloud-based applications.
One could see one’s presentation, sermon, main points for the meeting, what charges are being brought against the defendant, etc. and the system would know to scroll down as you said the words (via Natural Language Processing (NLP)). If you went off script, the system would stop scrolling and you might need to scroll down manually or just begin where you left off.
For that matter, I suppose a faculty member could turn on and off a feed for an AI-based stream of content on where a topic is in the textbook. Or a CEO or University President could get prompted to refer to a particular section of the Strategic Plan. Hmmm…I don’t know…it might be too much cognitive load/overload…I’d have to try it out.
And/or perhaps this is a feature in our future videoconferencing applications.
But I just wanted to throw these ideas out there in case someone wanted to run with one or more of them.
Along these lines, see:
Tell me you’re not going to want a pair of #AR glasses ?
? @TechAmazing #AugmentedReality #Wearables #5G #CES2023 #FutureOfWork #AI #cloud
pic.twitter.com/He5d1bSnQK— Glen Gilmore | ?? #CES2023 (@GlenGilmore) December 3, 2022
.
