The education marketplace: How to make edtech more effective

Isabelle Hau (00:00):

Only 11% of education decision makers were looking at any types of evidence to make a purchasing decision on an ed tech tool.

Dan Schwartz (00:15):

Today, we are diving into a conversation about tools and technology and education. They're all around us, but are they effective? How do you find out? And how do you get into this business if you're interested in making education tools? That's all coming up.

Denise Pope (00:29):

Yeah, those are really, really good questions, Dan. Super important. And you've got to consider those as you are thinking about creating something, right? But it gets a little bit sticky when profits and public good collide. So let's get started.

(00:50):

Welcome to School's In, your go-to podcast for cutting-edge insights in learning. Each episode, we dive into the latest trends, innovations and challenges facing learners. I'm Denise Pope, senior lecturer at Stanford Graduate School of Education, and co-founder of Challenge Success. And I'm with Dan Schwartz, Dean of Stanford GSE, and Faculty Director of the Stanford Accelerator for Learning.

Dan Schwartz (01:16):

I believe it's about 90% of our kids go to public schools, and they get the service that the public provides. People don't think of school as a product. If there's a product, I get to choose which washing machine I want. So there are people who would like that, the version of schools as a product, but for a lot of people, schools a public good.

(01:37):

At the same time, everything inside of the school, they had to buy. They had to buy products.

Denise Pope (01:42):

Who's they?

Dan Schwartz (01:43):

Schools. A school has to go buy desks.

Denise Pope (01:46):

Yeah, okay.

Dan Schwartz (01:46):

They have to go buy the chips that they're going to put in the kids' heads. And so these are all products. And so I'm kind of interested in whether the monopoly over the creation of those products is changing. It really used to be textbook publishers.

(02:04):

Let me ask you a question, Denise. About 10 years ago, roughly, there were zero unicorns in education. A unicorn is a startup that's worth a billion dollars. How many do you think there were, say, last year? 10 years ago, there were zero billion dollar startups in education.

Denise Pope (02:25):

I have no idea, but I would think there would be a lot more than zero, given all that's going on in the ed tech world. Is that a fair answer?

Dan Schwartz (02:37):

Is a lot more two. Two times zero is infinity.

Denise Pope (02:38):

I'm going to say I have no... Over a billion? A hundred. I don't know.

Dan Schwartz (02:44):

That was good. Yeah, so it's about about 50.

Denise Pope (02:47):

Okay.

Dan Schwartz (02:47):

50 plus.

Denise Pope (02:49):

All right.

Dan Schwartz (02:49):

So this is a big change. And so it's kind of, how did all these companies start to get into the market creating products that schools are buying? This is a change.

(03:02):

We've brought in Isabelle Hau, who is a world's expert. She's worked at the intersection of philanthropy, impact investing in education, for over two decades. She was the founding director, or a partner, of a firm called Imaginable Futures. She serves on several nonprofit organizations to improve student outcomes.

(03:24):

She's going to have a book on early childhood.

Denise Pope (03:26):

We're very lucky. She's the director of the Stanford Accelerator for Learning, which is a university level initiative to try and get all of Stanford working on the problem of how to improve educational outcomes for children and adults. So Isabelle, thank you for coming.

Isabelle Hau (03:42):

Yeah, thank you for having me, Dan and Denise. Such a joy to be with the two of you.

Denise Pope (03:47):

We're excited.

Dan Schwartz (03:48):

What is the answer? How come suddenly there's all these startups making lots of money in education? What's changed?

Isabelle Hau (03:54):

Yeah, I mean a lot of what has changed, and by the way, it's not only the number of unicorns, it's just the amount of investments has risen in this education technology space, broadly speaking, by forty-folds. Four zero times increase over the past 10 years.

(04:13):

So huge increase in education technology investments, for sure. What has driven this? I mean Dan, on your question, I think a lot of it has to do with this theme that you have highlighted for a long time around the scientific revolution. And two of the sub themes being best rise in technology, in education, best driving both education technology startups, and companies and organizations.

(04:42):

Some are for profit, some are nonprofit. And then the amount of data that schools are managing is increasing too. That also leads to new forms of pedagogy, new forms of assessments. Anyway, so I think these two themes are leading a number of private sector providers to come in in this public, traditionally public, sector education.

Dan Schwartz (05:08):

So to free up the money to purchase these new products, what's getting squeezed out? I'm not paying teachers because I can get a cheaper teaching machine?

Isabelle Hau (05:19):

A lot of it has been increasing budgets, rather than squeezing existing budgets from schools. As well as new pools of capital being created to fund some of those organizations that didn't exist before. So a lot of private sector funding has supported some of those organizations that's not coming from public pools of funding.

Dan Schwartz (05:46):

So Denise, you think this is a good thing?

Denise Pope (05:48):

Well, I'm struggling with it, right? Because on the one hand, it's a good thing that people are paying more attention. And if this is going to help students and teachers, if it's going to do some real good, I'm excited about that. And the other thing, I worry that there's this tension because people who want to make money from products don't necessarily always put what's best for students and teachers at the center of that. Is that a fair way to say that Isabelle? Can you say more about that tension?

Isabelle Hau (06:22):

Totally, totally agree. For me, there are three levels of issues. One is simply that schools are buying, and a lot of those tools, two folds of those tools are not actually being used. So there's a waste somewhere. Whoever is spending the money, there's a big waste in terms of those tools not actually reaching out to the students as it was intended.

(06:48):

A second issue regarding equity. A lot of these tools are not getting equitably distributed because of who funds, and how it's being funded. And then there is a third issue that we are addressing, or we're trying to address, the accelerator for learning, which is that a lot of tools we don't really know if they actually are delivering on the outcomes for kids or for teachers. So we don't know if they work.

Denise Pope (07:11):

So can we take that one by one? So the first one is, they might not even getting to the audience that they're supposed to reach. And I can tell you when I first started teaching, this is actually true. We got all these new computers, and they were sitting in their boxes in a locked room that I could not access because people, there was some rule that did not allow me to access these computers until I went through some training. Which nobody had taken at our particular school. So brand new stuff sitting in boxes.

Dan Schwartz (07:42):

So Denise, I have a theory about this, actually.

Denise Pope (07:45):

Yeah?

Dan Schwartz (07:45):

I think it's no longer applicable. So this is a long story. Everybody be patient.

Denise Pope (07:51):

Oh boy.

Dan Schwartz (07:52):

So before I went to college, I taught in Kenya, in rural Kenya. And the equivalent of the mayor of the town invited me to his house. And he had whitewashed the floor. It was a big deal because I was from the US. And he put me in a room with a portable radio. And the radio was on me in the radio for 15 minutes, and the radio played nothing but static. And then he came back in and he said to me, how do you like my radio? And I said, it's lovely. So I think over the years I finally figured out why he did that.

(08:28):

He was showing that he was thinking of the future. There's no radio stations yet, but he's going to be ready for it. And technology was the signal. So I think that's what a lot of the computer purchases were. They were a statement to the families, to the community, that we are looking to the future. Which I think was frivolous a little bit, too expensive, but I understand why they did it.

(08:50):

Now I don't think you can do that, right? I think the technology's so integrated, it has to be used and useful. Anyway.

Denise Pope (08:57):

Well, but that goes to the second point, Isabelle, right? Of equity. Why the inequity? What's going on there?

Isabelle Hau (09:04):

Yeah. So internationally there is still a huge divide from a digital access perspective. So I was recently in Senegal visiting some rural schools. And while the schools had access to a few computers, those computers were not in use because the school didn't have money to pay for electricity to wire those computers. Nor did it have any broadband access.

(09:33):

In the U.S it looks a little different. I think we have made meaningful strides on the digital access piece. But we are still struggling on the digital use, and the training and the access to tools that's still very uneven based on funding pools. And the Department of Education, at the federal level, just published a really interesting report on the digital divide.

Denise Pope (09:58):

So what are some answers there? What can we do to prevent this in the future? Particularly I would say for for-profit companies, they're about trying to make money. So they're not going to lower their price for these schools who can't afford their product.

Isabelle Hau (10:11):

Yeah. So there are some efforts going on. I think there are probably two levels to your question. One is funding streams, and policy questions. And then there's a second one, which is more on the professional learning side on, how can we support schools and teachers and educators in accessing those tools that they are the most excited about, and that they feel can make the greatest difference in their context?

Dan Schwartz (10:38):

So Denise, when it comes to my great-great-great-great-great-grandchild who is now a teacher.

Denise Pope (10:43):

Yeah.

Dan Schwartz (10:43):

And some new technology comes out, the company will also have a chip that they can put into their head so they know how to use the technology. It's all going to be solved.

Denise Pope (10:53):

Oh my gosh.

(10:58):

Here's a thought experiment. I got asked to do this a couple of weeks ago at a retreat that was led by a futurist, which for those of you who don't know what that is, I'm actually not even a hundred percent sure what a futurist does. They think about the future, and then I guess backwards plan to think about how that helps you think about what you should do today. I probably botched that. In any case. Here was the question I was asked.

(11:25):

You need to design a school for your great-great-great-grandchild.

Dan Schwartz (11:33):

Okay.

Denise Pope (11:34):

All right. Dan, putting you on the spot. What does that school look like? Tell us.

Dan Schwartz (11:39):

It looks like a doctor's office. My child comes in, and they put in the new math chip into his head. And then later he gets the English writing chip and that's it.

Denise Pope (11:52):

Okay. That's the scariest thing I ever heard. So they're literally just putting in chips into people's head, and that is what the role of learning is going to look like for our great-great-great-grandchildren?

Dan Schwartz (12:04):

You just can't stuff their head with enough knowledge. So let's just cut to the quick, and just put in the chip.

Denise Pope (12:10):

Well, so your answer and my answer were completely different.

Dan Schwartz (12:16):

You think?

Denise Pope (12:16):

Yeah. Do you want to know what my answer was?

Dan Schwartz (12:17):

I do.

Denise Pope (12:18):

And I'm usually, you know me, I am a glass is half full person. I am an optimist. And yet here was my answer. I said, I honestly don't think schools are going to be all that different from what they are today. Years and years and years and years from now. With a few exceptions.

(12:36):

You might get there in a flying car. It might take place in a really futuristic looking building, or whatever. But they're still going to be probably some adult/robot at the front of the room, filling people's heads in some way, shape or form. And that is because I just know how sticky the grammar of schooling is. Which is a Larry Cuban and David Tyak word. It's just sticky.

Dan Schwartz (13:05):

Sorry, did you just say, no change? It could be a robot in front of the classroom and that's not a change.

Denise Pope (13:10):

No, it's a change. But if you think about actually how learning occurs, I don't know that it's going to be that different. It's still going to be some kind of interaction between an educator type thing, or person, and a learner type thing or person.

Dan Schwartz (13:28):

So do you think schools will still have bells? It's like time to switch from period one to period two.

Denise Pope (13:35):

I'll tell you some of the challenge success schools have gotten rid of bells, and it seems like such a little thing, but it's huge. It makes you feel not like a widget in a machine.

Dan Schwartz (13:43):

And you don't think by the seven generations from now it'll just be the chip in their head that vibrates to tell them to move?

Denise Pope (13:52):

Oh God. That's just sounds so scary.

Dan Schwartz (13:54):

I know.

Denise Pope (13:54):

So scary to me.

Dan Schwartz (14:00):

Let's get to the third one, which is, how do we know that the software's any good? Or the technology's any good? So education's a very inefficient market. The consumer may not know what's good.

(14:13):

So it's hard to tell if something's good learning, particularly if you're considering a 10, 15 year timeline. So market forces may not work to find the best product. So what I've heard, and I don't know if this is true, but what I've heard is that most superintendents, when they're deciding whether to purchase some educational product, don't look to evidence.

(14:35):

They go ask other superintendents, what have you used? And, has it worked for you? It's really tough. So the question is, how do we evaluate whether these products are any good, and should this some body take responsibility for this? Like the FDA takes a lot of responsibility for drug testing, but we don't really have one in education. So Isabelle, help. How do we solve this problem?

Denise Pope (15:00):

That's a good question.

Isabelle Hau (15:02):

Yeah, let me actually just give a few stats to emphasize your point Dan, because those are really interesting. One is a little bit of an old stats, but it's a few years old. Where I know a great organization surveyed this education decision makers, including a lot of superintendents. And what they found is exactly in line with what you were sharing. They found that only 11% of education decision makers, we are looking at any types of evidence to make a purchasing decision on an EdTech tool.

(15:35):

The other stats that I really like, which is also in line with all these themes, is that only 7% of global ed tech tools have any form of rigorous evidence.

Denise Pope (15:51):

Seven? Only seven.

Isabelle Hau (15:53):

Seven, seven percent, yes. So that doesn't necessarily mean that the 93% remaining are not working. Let's be clear.

(16:02):

What it means is that we don't know. Okay? So there is a lot of work both on the product development side, and the connection to research, and for academia to be closer to those product developers. As well as on educating decision makers on some of those techniques of evaluation. And what makes a validation of a product. So there have been a lot of efforts on this over the years. A lot of people are working on it, including us, of course. Because we have a big role to play, I think, in improving some of those stats, and improving learning outcomes for children and educators. But there is a lot of work here.

(16:47):

And some examples have been, for example, at the federal level, there was still this clearing house that looks at different products. There is EdReports that does a great job at listing what is working. So there are some great initiatives that exist. But we need a lot more of those to continue improving that connection between what we know from research, and then the application in the real world.

Dan Schwartz (17:16):

So could we possibly make a consumer reports? Where they go and they take this car, and they drive it around and they then have these six areas where they tell you it was a good car or not? Would that work in education? And companies couldn't fund them to do the research, it would have to be independent.

Isabelle Hau (17:34):

Yeah. There have been some attempts at this, and there are some great partners like Common Sense Media that has a listing of EdTech tools, with some readings that are coming from educators, and maybe for some of them on parents from parents. So there are some attempts at this, but it's, again, there needs to be more. And I would argue that with a new phase that we are in with a lot of AI tools, that artificial intelligence coming into play with a lot of new innovations happening, as we all know at the moment. Including a lot of innovations on education, in education, this is actually feels like a right time to think through what could be better ways to connect research and ed tech developers?

Dan Schwartz (18:28):

So my solution to this so far, is to create a master's of science in educational data science, at the school of education, with a hope that these students will be able to play that role. It's interesting, about half of them want to start their own companies.

Denise Pope (18:43):

Well, so wait, so that's a problem, right? Because we actually don't want them to start their own companies. I want them to go and help all these superintendents learn the right questions to ask, and learn how to evaluate the products.

Dan Schwartz (18:56):

I agree. As this was going on, I was thinking we should get those students to go talk to superintendents and principals, and ask them, what would you like to know? What should they collect data and analyze it about?

Denise Pope (19:08):

If you're a parent listening to this, I think you would be a little bit horrified. It's a little bit of the wild, wild West. Products are coming into schools that affect our kids, and nobody's checking for standards, and nobody's checking the FDA on what could possibly go wrong? That's scary.

Dan Schwartz (19:29):

Yes, it is. Although it's a great opportunity for innovation.

Denise Pope (19:34):

Isabelle, what do you think?

Isabelle Hau (19:36):

They are obviously not to see that there's no regulation or policy around all of this. They are. I mean especially on privacy, other dimensions of safety for children in schools. So let's be clear, there are some policy frameworks that exist.

Denise Pope (19:52):

From the federal government, you're saying.

Isabelle Hau (19:54):

From the federal government, and from some states too, that districts and superintendents are obviously very close to. So just to clarify on this, where there is less, or a lot more that could be done is on this question about evidence. And how are those solutions really supporting children and educators, depending on who they are serving or administrators? There are variety obviously of different people who are benefiting from those tools.

Denise Pope (20:25):

So it's less scary as a parent. I know my kid's going to be okay, but now I'm just pissed that maybe my tax money is going to something that isn't working.

Isabelle Hau (20:34):

Yeah.

Denise Pope (20:36):

Still a little less scary, but still equally frustrating.

Isabelle Hau (20:41):

Yeah. Yeah. There was one big piece of regulation that has made some impact called ESSA a few years ago, that has been asking, and requesting actually schools to start making a portion of their decisions based on some levels of evidence.

(21:02):

So there has been some progress on the policy side, but it's a small portion of those tools that need to comply with that requirement on evidence. So most of those purchasing decisions are not required to comply.

Dan Schwartz (21:17):

Denise, an attitude like yours is why your great-great-great-grandchild is going to be in exactly the same classroom now.

Denise Pope (21:22):

I know. And I'm such an optimist. This is so not like me, Isabelle, I promise this is so not like me.

Dan Schwartz (21:27):

No. So you can do a lot of sniff tests. You look at things and you can sort of look at it and sort of say, yeah, I don't think this is a good idea. Or this is a good idea. The concern about evidence, I don't want to harp on this too long, but is it mostly evidence will be very short term? Did the kid get the next math problem right? And so it's going to really push things towards highly measurable outcomes that may not be the kinds of grand things we want for our children.

Denise Pope (21:58):

That's a really good point.

Dan Schwartz (21:59):

So that would be a concern. But I'd like to switch it for a second.

(22:03):

So I worry about getting people started. How can we make sure that they have a good pathway? We had a student who came up with a very good idea. I always thought. It was called Nomster Chef. And you would get a box sent to your home, and would have ingredients, a very simple cookbook with pictures, and plastic knives, and you would cook with your child. And I thought it was really sweet. I gave a hundred dollars to their Kickstarter campaign. And then I bumped into the person who started this a couple years later at an alumni event. And I asked, how's it going? And she said, no one ever told me that I need a budget for marketing.

(22:43):

So how do we help these people go from great idea to invention succeeds out in the world?

Isabelle Hau (22:51):

Yeah, Dan, it's a great question itself. By the way, it's the same question as any startup in any field, any industry. Education is no different from that standpoint. You need to start small, and you need to start with a handful of partners that love your solution. So whether they are parents, whether they are schools, whether they are educators, you need to figure out with your initial set of a few teachers, few parents, few schools, if a solution that people are really enjoying using.

(23:26):

And then from there you can start expanding. Word of mouth is the ideal. So from this initial set of users who love your solution, then you start getting referrals effectively from this group of users and that starts spreading. And then you can use more different types of channels as you continue growing. But the initial set is a lot of try to find your first few users that are going to love what you do.

(23:55):

And so it's a lot of who you know, or networking with key people. And we have classes that help on that front, such as Lean Launchpad, or the Learning Design Challenge at Stanford that helps some of our students who are interested in doing this, in finding this initial set of users that you can try your solution with, and test it.

Dan Schwartz (24:20):

So that's good. So now I've got a fan base and I realize I need a million dollars. Then what happens?

Isabelle Hau (24:28):

Yeah, you have multiple pools of funding that you can access, that one can access. Ranging from one group is called Angel Investors, or Angel Philanthropists. Depending if you are a non-profit or a for-profit. But essentially a group of wealthy individuals or families that want to support your solution. And those are called either, Angel Investors on the for-profit side, or Angel Philanthropists on the grant side.

(25:07):

You also have the second pool that you can go to is there are a set of grants. So non-dilutive capital for non-profit, or for-profit, that exists that support innovation in education. One that I personally really admire is SBIR, which is a pool of funding affiliated with the Institute of Education Sciences. Which is open to innovators in education that actually are aiming for some form of evidence early on. So it's a great way for innovation and evidence to be paired early on.

(25:41):

A third one, a third pool then, is what is called seed funds. So this initial group of investors that are very comfortable with very early stage, very risky type of investment early on. And then the last pool that I was part of for many years is called, Impact Funders, Impact Investing. And that's a newer category of funders that are seeking to have both impact in the world, in positive impact, both socially or environmentally. Combined with positive financial return. So it's a concept of doing good, and doing well financially combined.

Denise Pope (26:21):

There's your pathway, Dan.

Dan Schwartz (26:25):

So Denise, there's all these innovators out there. There's new way, they can create things that didn't exist before. There are easy distribution channels. And you still think your great-great-great-great grandchild's going to be using chalk on a green chalkboard?

Denise Pope (26:46):

No. Okay, I didn't say the chalk on the green chalkboard. It might be like a neon virtual hologram type chalkboard.

(26:52):

But no, I would like to think that Isabelle and her people, and all the institutions and education universities out there, are really going to help to get these to market in a way that people, I liked what Isabelle said, do good, and really change the bottom line. I think that's the hard part, right, is assessing the outcome.

Dan Schwartz (27:15):

The double bottom line.

Denise Pope (27:16):

And really getting kids to learn, or doing what we know that the current situation of schools is not doing around a whole host of issues. So I'm glad there's a bunch of Isabelle's out there. And maybe we'll be doing this. Well, we won't be doing this show, but maybe the great-great-great grandchildren of ours will be doing a show like this over the airwaves that beams to Mars. And there's no need for Isabelle's out there because we've solved the problem of education.

Dan Schwartz (27:52):

So I'm not sure I'd buy the premise that there is ever a final. The point of education is to keep handling a future that comes.

Denise Pope (27:57):

Exactly, exactly.

(27:58):

Exactly. We'll need Isabel's all the way throughout. But it would be cool to think about this in the future. It'd be cool to think about this in the future to say like, okay, Denise, you were wrong. Which you love proving me wrong, Dan. So there you go.

Dan Schwartz (28:13):

Thank you Isabelle. There's been a lot we can take away from this conversation. Denise, you go first.

Denise Pope (28:19):

Oh, okay. Oh my gosh. Okay. Putting me on the spot. I think there's so much, but the main thing is, as we build these new tools, I think we really need to focus on effectiveness. We want them to work. And we also really need to think about equity.

Dan Schwartz (28:36):

So on the effectiveness side, it's important to pay attention to the research that sort of says how you can do things well. Don't just innovate and then see if it works. You can incorporate the research to make the product better from the start. On the business side, I really like the blueprint Isabel walked us through. Find that core group to trial and navigate the development of the product. Find investors that align with your goal. And make sure that after all that you have some money so you don't get stuck in your parents' garage when you discover you've got to market the tool. Because there's so much stuff out there, you need a way for people to pay attention to what you've done.

Denise Pope (29:16):

Yeah, I think that's right. It's really hard to break through. And of course we don't want people stuck in their parents' garages. So lots of great advice. Thank you. Thank you again Isabelle for chatting with us today.

(29:27):

And thank you all for listening to this episode of Schools In. Remember to subscribe to our show on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you tune in. I'm Denise Pope.

Dan Schwartz (29:37):

And I'm Dan Schwartz, from my parents' garage.