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What edtech innovations can you anticipate this year?

We asked 49 edtech executives to look into their crystal balls and share their thoughts about what will happen in 2019. In addition to the usual suspects—more augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) apps—a lot of people believe this will be the year that social emotional learning (SEL) and interoperability become part of the mainstream. There are also a lot of predictions about improving safety and security. Read on to see what’s in store for 2019…

Berj Akian, CEO, ClassLink

• With 2019 here and 2020 in arm’s reach, there’s an ever-growing expectation that next-generation tech tools should do a better job of informing educators on which resources improve learning outcomes. I’m pleased to say that more and more education leaders and technology products providers are regularly talking and doing something about this. I hope this topic always remains the main problem to solve, and that the slow, steady progress the industry is making continues.

•  The industry has made loads of good progress on interoperability; now it’s on the mind of all educational leaders. This is a good thing, because it will take motivation from all sides to achieve simpler data connections between systems. The only wrinkle I see in the land of interoperability is that the conversation is still too complicated, and school leaders still don’t have a go-to resource that helps them translate the techno-babble of open data standards into plain English. What the industry needs is a place where interoperability can be discussed and advocated without complicated jargon and a standards bias—maybe a “Church of Interoperability” that’s open to all. I see Project Unicorn possibly filling this role. They see the bigger picture and nicely bridge the tech and curriculum sides of the discussion.

Chakrapani Appalabattula, CEO, Bloomz

• In recent years, we’ve seen an increase in parental engagement that can be correlated to the implementation of digital platforms and applications. School-to-home communications has evolved through three phases. Student information systems and automated messages are what I consider to be the first stage in the evolution of parental engagement, or version 1.0. With the next stage, 2.0, came a myriad of apps, each designed to solve one problem really well. And now, I believe we are entering a new stage of “one-stop shop” solutions. As schools are adopting and using more digital tools, they are looking for solutions that not only consolidate functions to reduce the risks of privacy or security failure, avoid confusion among teachers and parents, and also better connect and engage school communities. We are already seeing the evidence of this, as administrators are taking a more active role in parent-teacher communication, ensuring that stakeholders are able to engage via their preferred method through one simple-to-use, safe platform. Additionally, educators swear that their parents are showing up more prepared for conferences and more in tune with their child’s education than ever before. As we gain further insight into teacher, parent, and student communication needs, interaction between school and home will become more commonplace and more frequent.

Caroline Fahmy, President & CEO, Educational Data Systems

• Teachers, schools, districts, and states will strive to balance assessment for statewide accountability and assessment for classroom instruction. The assessment mode—paper and pencil or computer-based—will become less important than the content and purpose of each assessment. Educators at all levels will need to strengthen their assessment-data literacy to be effective in using the resulting data.

• School districts will recognize the usefulness of geographic information system tools for analyzing multiple types of data and displaying them on maps. High-visibility adverse events such as school shootings, hurricanes, earthquakes, and wildfires will bring disaster and recovery plans to the top of the planning queue, and high-quality maps that link the locations of students and schools with other data will help in that effort.

Jason Innes, manager of curriculum development and teacher training, KinderLab Robotics, Inc.

• Incorporating robotics and coding into everyday classroom education, versus having a computer lab or robotics hour. Integrating computer science, coding, and robotics into the core classroom curriculum allows teachers and students to use these technologies in creative ways. Coding is a new literacy: Like writing, coding is a means of self-expression and exploration of interests. Incorporating robotics and coding as part of cross-curricular projects will allow students to develop STEM skills in an authentic, personally meaningful way.

• Theorists and educators are exploring the connections between computational thinking and the cognitive skills developed in early childhood. A variety of states are leading the way in adopting standards across K–12. As these efforts grow, more educators and policymakers will see the importance of addressing computer science and computational thinking starting in pre-K.

Vinod Lobo, co-founder and CEO, Learning Upgrade

• Schools will realize that traditional, web-based home learning is out of reach for many low-income families. With more than 80 percent of low-income families owning a smartphone, the focus will turn to smartphone app-based learning for children that parents can facilitate. This will level the playing field much more than previous attempts such as take-home laptops, because parent smartphones have data plans for internet access and don’t cost the school anything.

• As schools have increasingly large sets of student data, there will be a greater focus on using AI to analyze the results and make predictions on outcomes such a dropouts and failing classes. Schools will start to experiment with programs that can inform staff of students who need special attention, but—given that the programs use machine learning—many issues will arise from its use.

• With 36 million adults in the U.S. reading at or below 3rd-grade level, schools need to help low-literate parents to learn in order to create the environment for their children to succeed. Schools will increasingly enroll both parents and children in learning programs that can be completed on multiple devices. This trend will be focused especially on ESL families, including migrant families, refugees, and new arrivals.

Natalie Mactier, CEO, Vivi

• We believe that in 2019 and beyond, schools will shift focus away from hardening campuses against security threats and more toward softer solutions, like emergency notification systems that can be triggered by anyone from any device. Student safety will remain paramount, of course, but schools will increasingly look for more holistic solutions that don’t turn the classroom into a fortress.

• The ability for teachers to monitor and respond to their students’ well-being and immediate academic needs will increase in the coming months and years. In the past, teachers were pinned to the front of the classroom next to the whiteboard or projector, but increasingly, technology is unleashing them to roam around the room and check in on their students, whether it be to make sure they have a firm grasp of the lesson or simply to make sure they feel good about the activity they’re engaged in. This move from teachers as the “sage on the stage” to the “guide on the side” is already well under way in many schools and districts, but as the technology enabling this new model improves and the benefits become ever more undeniable, we’ll see schools moving faster in that direction.

Aparna Rao, founder and CEO, eCare Vault 

• As it stands today, special education across the United States is experiencing a staff shortage crisis. According to research conducted by Education Week, the total number of special education teachers nationally has dropped by 17 percent over the past decade, a worrying statistic for an occupation that has seen a shortage in professionals for years. Coupled with the fact that the number of students who require an Individualized Education Plan is steadily on the rise, this means larger class sizes of students with different learning and physical disabilities, and consequently, increased workload and paperwork per teacher.

• Moving into 2019, school districts will have to look for solutions to reduce all activities for teachers that aren’t focused on the educational success of their students in the classroom. This means exploring options to reduce the amount of paperwork and evaluations teachers are accustomed to, creating a direct line of secure communication with the parents, and streamlining all additional workflows, including the organization of current paper documents that provide the basis of their work. To achieve this level of support for educators, school districts need to move beyond the traditional locked file cabinet and bring these documents to the cloud, where they can be virtually uploaded, signed, and shared in moments, rather than waiting days or potentially weeks for activity. Everyone is pushing for fewer meetings, so there needs to be a space for secure collaboration among teachers, administrators, counselors, therapists, and parents to reduce the number of in-person meetings and, in an easily digestible format, impart transparency and accountability for all involved.

Scott Schickler, CEO and co-creator, 7 Mindsets 

• By the end of 2019, educational leaders will have zero doubt that all learning is social and emotional. This reality will transform how educators engage with students and each other. SEL PD will have to include personal development for teachers, because we can no longer separate the head from the heart in education.

Tyson J. Smith, president and CEO, Reading Horizons

• More universities will evaluate their teacher-prep programs with an eye towards improved instruction in decoding strategies and phonics.

• More schools and districts will adopt reading programs in Tier 1 that supplement their core and that provide instruction that reaches all students, even those who may struggle to learn to read.

• More schools and districts will evaluate their use of technology and adopt systems that allow teacher-led instruction to blend with what students are getting through digital devices.