The future of education is going to be lit 🔥
Jul 24, 2020 8:03 AM
We are just starting on what is going to be a wild ride for the future of education. If you are reading this email it’s because you are receiving the second edition of my newsletter on the future of education. As i’ve said before, I'm watching a lot of edtech trends closely, building a new product in the space, and below is what had my interest this week + my predictions of what I think will happen next.
To open or not to reopen?
Data is starting to come out on which schools are going back to in-person instruction vs. remote learning for the fall. Here is a dashboard from Davidson College on the plans of 3,000 U.S. based universities. If you haven’t listened to Wednesday's episode of The Daily on the Science of School Reopenings, I highly recommend it. How have schools in other countries successfully opened and not contributed to the spread of coronavirus? The main takeaway: look to Denmark who opened up schools last month, but in small pods of 12 students or less.
If you are a VC who heard me pitch Clark over the last 5 years you know I like to stand on my soapbox about the importance of in-person learning and what a massively better impact in-person instruction has on student outcomes - but not at the expense of safety. The safest way for teachers to enter the classroom and for students to go back to school is to keep human contact limited to small, controlled groups. But how will that actually happen?
<Insert the rise of homeschooling>. Pod has been the phrase of the week. The New York Times agrees. I predict that homeschool pods are the new schools, while remote learning fatigue increases. These pods will be powered by private tutors (Wow, I wish someone had made a software system to easily manage a private tutoring business…) and if K-12 schools want to maintain their footprint in a community, they need to learn how to work with these pods, not against them.
I recommend families going down the pod route:
Keep the lines of communication open with their school and continue to use the curriculum of their students’ in-classroom teacher - just opt to do it remotely and proctored by a parent or tutor
Layer in a creative subject where students explore solving problems as a group - this makes up for all the soft skills students aren’t developing via remote learning. This is also a product opportunity for a platform to offer remote courses specifically targeted for developing soft skills w/ a homeschool pod
So what do these pods need to be successful from a technology standpoint? Here’s what i’m thinking:
Scheduling system for a group of families - not too surprisingly, Google Calendar is still the best
Ability for private tutors to log into students’ in-classroom learning management system to get assignments/ etc. We will see hired private tutors using parent log-ins to start and then this bug will eventually become a feature in LMS systems
A marketplace for tutors seeking long-term homeschooling placements, not gig economy style marketplaces like Wyzant or Varsity Tutors
The real question is if teachers who are scared to re-enter their classrooms of 30+ students choose to go the private, homeschooling tutor route instead. If so, we are going to see a flood of talented teachers entering the private market, and both marketplaces and homeschool matchmaking services will start to pop up.
As for college students learning remotely, I see two product opportunities:
A white-labeled virtual community platform for universities Where can students who are not meeting new friends in the dorms, at athletic events, or between classes connect? And how can universities/their brand name still own that connection and network? House Party for colleges
The rise of digital credentialing This isn’t new, but college students learning remote are going to be less inclined to stick with just one university for four years. They might take a few credit-bearing courses from one online university, while taking speciality courses from another, picking up certifications from a variety of sources. To show what they have learned, products like Credly will become much more valuable to the modern college student
I hope you have a great weekend and will be back at you with more thoughts soon.
Megan
Interesting take on the predicted rise of homeschooling pod. My question is, what is the case for stickiness of the pod concept when we eventually find a vaccine and it becomes safe for schools to resume?