Key points:
Teacher retention, student agency, and, yes, generative ai are among the obstacles (challenges), accelerators (megatrends), and technological enablers (tools) that will impact educational innovation for the coming year, as seen describes in cosn's 2024 global tech-enablers/” target=”_blank” rel=”noreferrer noopener”>K-12 Driving Innovation Report.
CoSN's Driving K-12 Innovation Advisory Council, comprised of more than 140 educators and IT professionals from around the world, has selected three major technology obstacles, accelerators, and enablers that will impact educational technology for the coming year. This year's major themes changed more from 2023 to 2024 than in any of the last five project cycles, underscoring a turning point in education and emphasizing the need for collaborative efforts.
“The best aspect of the annual Driving K-12 Innovation report is not telling educational leaders 'the answer' about K-12 innovation today. Rather, it is a thoughtful framework for thinking about innovation focused on technological obstacles, accelerators, and enablers,” said Keith R. Krueger, CEO of CoSN. “Too often, edtech stalwarts start with technology when advocating for innovation. “CoSN reverses that trend and starts with the ‘why’ (obstacles).”
To achieve extraordinary student outcomes, the three most important obstacles and accelerators that schools must address in the coming year are:
Obstacles
Roadblocks forcing schools to stop, prepare and take a leap.
- Attract and retain educators and IT professionals. Recruiting and retaining school staff is a major issue for school systems; Many educators are experiencing social and emotional burnout, as well as low salaries compared to other sectors, causing them to set aside their passion for teaching and leave the field.
- Ensure cybersecurity and online protection. Teaching, learning and conducting business in education with digital tools is now a basic requirement for teachers, students and administrators. Schools must be proactive in creating systems to protect and empower educated users to safely learn and grow with digital technologies.
- Scaling innovation and inertia of educational systems. Schools are challenged to effectively engage and scale innovation, adapting what works well and scaling it across an entire school, district, or state/country.
Accelerators
Megatrends or real-world catalysts that help motivate and increase the speed of innovation.
- Change attitudes towards the demonstration of learning. There is a growing wave of debate about assessing, documenting, communicating and assigning value to student learning, as well as how this learning relates to higher education, vocational training, career paths and real-world life. .
- Building the Human Capacity of Leaders. Strengthening the professional community of schools and providing opportunities for educators and all K-12 professionals to learn and master new skills can open the door to innovative practices that can improve student experiences.
- Learning agency. It is about students being leaders in their learning; reconceptualizing their role from that of “student” to that of “pupil”. When immersed in a strong learning environment, students can move from taking orders to being innovative.
The three most important technology enablers that schools should leverage in 2024 are:
technology enablers
The tools that grease the wheels of schools to overcome obstacles and take advantage of accelerators.
- Generative artificial intelligence (Gen ai). Generative artificial intelligence has emerged as a transformative force in education, changing both how students learn and what they need to learn. As school systems around the world explore the benefits and challenges of this technology, they are developing and seeking expert guidance to meet the urgent need for policies and processes that ensure the safe, effective and responsible use of Gen ai for all concerned parties.
- Analytical and adaptive technologies. Analytics refers to the process of analyzing data collected about student learning and the opportunity to leverage the data to inform educational decision making. Adaptive technologies are tools that adapt to the student based on their interactions with the technology.
- Rich digital ecosystem. Connecting digital systems or environments can form powerful digital ecosystems to enable student learning and/or support educational administration. These interconnected systems of online and virtual spaces can span formal school settings and beyond.
This press release technology-enablers-shaping-k-12-innovation/” target=”_blank” rel=”noreferrer noopener”>originally appeared online. CoSN thanks its sponsors for supporting the Driving K–12 Innovation Series: HP and Palo Alto Networks.
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