Edtech Insiders

Send us a textMari Nazary is the Chief Experience Officer at Bloom Institute of Technology, formerly known as Lambda School, Mari has dedicated over 15 years to transforming the landscape of online education. She believes in making education a universal key, accessible and effective for all, without the financial burden often associated with higher learning.Mari's journey in EdTech began with her role at Rosetta Stone, where she developed the company’s first online classroom experience. Her passion for instructional design and product development led her to impactful positions at Education First, Voxy, and DataCamp. In these roles, she spearheaded the expansion of learning products, significantly impacting millions of learners worldwide.At BloomTech, Mari has been instrumental in redefining the education experience. Her initiatives include building a proprietary platform, reducing the cost per learner, and incorporating an AI tutor, significantly enhancing the learning process and improving outcomes. She oversees critical aspects like product development, data management, instructional design, operations, and customer support, with a focus on results-driven learning experiences that cater to a diverse range of students.Mari's background as the daughter of Afghan immigrants in Queens, NY, has profoundly influenced her perspective on education. She holds degrees in classics, Spanish, and linguistics and is a fervent advocate for making tech careers accessible to those traditionally underserved by higher education. Living in Washington, D.C., Mari continues to challenge the status quo, ensuring that education paves a direct path to greater opportunities and success.Recommended Resources:AI for Education blogLenny’s Podcast

Send us a textEdtech Insiders joined the first Common Sense Summit on America's Kids and Families hosted by Common Sense Media at Pier 27 in San Francisco on January 28–30.The conference brought together advocates, researchers, youth leaders, policymakers, and other experts to take stock of America's kids and families and explore solutions to the most pressing issues across four core topic areas: kids and technology, youth mental health, early childhood education, and K–12 education. In this special episode, Alex and Ben interviews Sal Khan.Sal Khan is the founder and CEO of Khan Academy, a nonprofit educational organization that offers free lessons in math, science and humanities, as well as tools for parents, teachers and districts to track student progress. Khan Academy is piloting an AI guide called Khanmigo that is a tutor and teaching assistant.Sal Khan founded Khan Academy in 2008. Khan Academy is a nonprofit educational organization with 220 employees. In addition to math, they offer free lessons in the sciences and humanities. Outside of the Khanmigo pilot, more than 500 public school districts and schools across the United States partner with Khan Academy (up from nine before the pandemic). Khan Academy is used in more than 190 countries and is available in more than 50 languages. They have more than 160 million registered users worldwide.

Send us a textIn this episode of Week in Edtech, Ben and Alex discuss:1. AIOpenAI partners with Common Sense Media to collaborate on AI guidelinesEdsafe AI Fellowships2. Big TechSenate blasts tech CEOs over child safety3. WorkforceupGrad To Open 100 Experience And Learning Centers, Commits INR 1,000M4. PreK-12Byju’s Says Investors Don’t Have Voting Right To Remove Founder From Edtech Group 5. K-12Zum Raises $140MInstructure Completes Acquisition of Parchment6. HigherEdShaq is joining Sam Altman in backing a $29 million community college startupSpecial Guests:Sohan Chouhury, FlintErin Mote, InnovateEDU and Zac Chase, US DOERecommended Resources:2024’s National Educational Technology PlanStory MapAppendices - Office of Educational TechnologyDisc

Send us a textNick Hernandez is the CEO and Founder of 360Learning, a leading advisor and investor in the SaaS technology industry, and the author of Collaborative Learning: How to Upskill from Within and Turn L&D into Your Competitive Advantage.Nick founded 360Learning in 2013 and has since grown the company into a leader in the EdTech sector. In late 2021, Nick and his team secured $200m in funding from Sumeru, SoftBank, and Silverlake for 360Learning to continue their mission of championing upskilling from within through collaborative learning. He is based in Paris, France.Recommended Resources:Lex Fridman podcastThe Logan Bartlett Show podcast

Send us a textLydia Logan is the Vice President of Global Education and Workforce Development, Corporate Social Responsibility at IBM, where she leads IBM's community and university skilling initiatives that create more inclusive and effective schools and workforces. Her programs help fulfill IBM’s pledges to skill 30 million people worldwide by 2030, and to train two million learners in AI through 2026, particularly those from historically underresourced, underserved, and underrepresented communities. She also develops and manages strategic global partnerships with IBM's clients, non-profit organizations, government, and content and curriculum developers that relate to education and career readiness. For this role, she applies her decades of leadership and programmatic expertise in the realms of philanthropy, education, public policy, and economic development. These experiences inform the strategic development and execution of acclaimed global career readiness programs, particularly IBM SkillsBuild.   Prior to IBM, Lydia successfully spearheaded education initiatives while serving in senior leadership roles at Verizon, the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, and Kimsey Foundation.In addition, she was VP and executive director of the Institute for a Competitive Workforce at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, where she led national policy and program initiatives to improve education and workforce development.Earlier in her career, she led Chiefs for Change, a national membership organization of Chief State School Officers.Recommended Resources:IBM SkillsBuildPrincipled Instructions Are All You Need for Questioning LLaMA-1/2, GPT-3.5/4 by John BaileyTools Competition by Schmidt Futures

Send us a textIn this episode of Week in Edtech, Ben and Alex discuss:1. AIChegg, Duolingo, Coursera Stocks Swoon as Goldman Warns of Threat From AICoursera’s CEO announced that Coursera users signed up for an AI course every minute of 20232. EdtechIt’s a good time to invest in early-stage edtech, investors say Byju’s seeks new funding at less than $2 billion valuation, a 90% drop3. K-12National Ed-Tech Plan Outlines How Schools Can Tackle 3 Big Digital InequitiesMichael Bloomberg donates $250M to open 10 healthcare-focused high schools in Boston, Charlotte, Durham, Houston, Nashville, New York, Philadelphia, Demopolis, and Northeast Texas4. Higher EdOpenAI announces first partnership with a universityNortheastern partners with Multiverse, granting transfer credit to apprentices who complete Multiverse’s analytics program5. Big TechMicrosoft makes its AI-powered reading tutor available for free. Will integrate it with CanvasGoogle announces new AI-powered features for educationSpecial Guest:Jacob Kantor and Brett Roer, EDLIT: Empowering Districts through Learning, Innovation, & Technology

Send us a textRyan Craig is a Managing Director at Achieve Partners and was formerly an MD at University Ventures. Ryan’s commentary on where the puck is going in education and workforce regularly appears in the biweekly Gap Letter, Forbes, and Inside Higher Education. He is the author of the book Apprentice Nation: How the "Earn and Learn" Alternative to Higher Education Will Create a Stronger and Fairer America (2023). He is also author of A New U: Faster + Cheaper Alternatives to College (2018), which describes the critical importance of last-mile training and the emergence of bootcamps, income share programs, staffing and apprenticeship models as preferred pathways to good first digital jobs and was named in the Wall Street Journal as one the Books of the Year for 2018. Ryan’s first book was College Disrupted: The Great Unbundling of Higher Education (2015), which profiles the coming shift toward competency-based education and hiring. Ryan is a co-founder of Apprenticeships for America, a national nonprofit dedicated to scaling apprenticeships across the U.S. economy and is a senior fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute.Previously, Ryan led the Education & Training sector at Warburg Pincus. His prior experience in higher education was at Columbia University. Ryan also founded and built Wellspring, a national network of boarding schools and summer camps for overweight and obese children, adolescents, and young adults. He began his career at McKinsey & Co.Ryan received bachelor's degrees summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Yale University, and his law degree from the Yale Law School.Recommended Resources:Gap LetterApprenticeships for America

This Week in Edtech discusses Duolingo shedding human workers due to AI translation, the moral panic surrounding chatbot teachers, and the removal of 13 unicorns from the Edtech Unicorns list. Special guest John Rogers from TPG Rise Fund shares insights into investing in edtech and the challenges faced by the K-12 education system.

Send us a textLauren McCann is the head of Figma for Education. She started her career in the classroom, as a middle school English teacher in Hyderabad, India. Before joining Figma, Lauren led product marketing for Google’s core education products including Google Classroom, Google Meet, Google Workspace for Education (Docs, Slides, Sheets, Forms, Drive, Jamboard) Google Assignments, Read Along, and more. At Figma, Lauren and her education team are working to bring Figma into more classrooms globally. Recommended Resources:Tactically, Figjam by Alice KeelerHidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things by Adam Grant

Send us a textIn this episode of Week in Edtech, Ben and Alex discuss:1. AIGPT Store Opened.  What does this mean?South Korea's MathGPT Sets a New World Record in Mathematical PerformanceUS Congress Introduces “AI Literacy” Bill2. PreK12As Enrollment Declines, Districts Consider Closing Schools3. K12Skipping School: America’s Hidden Education Crisis4. Higher EducationClaudine Gay & Higher Ed’s Crisis.  Is it just PR & Politics or is it a deeper issue?The new FAFSA is meant to make applying for college aid easier, but not everyone can access it yet 5.  OtherImmerse Raises $5M, Goes on “The View”Special Guest:Anna Iarotska, Co-founder & CEO at Robo Wunderkind