No Such Thing: Education in the Digital Age

As President and CEO of ETS, Amit Sevak leads the largest private educational assessment organization in the world, delivering products and services across 200 countries, serving tens of millions of people each year. Sevak has been a driving force in education, learning and workforce development around the globe. He has led the University of Europe in Madrid in Spain, INTI International University in Malaysia and Universidad Tecnológica de México (UNITEC) in Mexico.  His transformational style of leadership consistently led to innovation, better learning and improved job prospects for hundreds of thousands of students and workers. Sevak has long been a coach for edtech CEOs. He has served on numerous nonprofit boards, including Cambiar Education, CitiBridge and Education Design Lab. In 2017, he founded Mindset Global, an education investment firm. His early career included roles as a researcher, professor and advisor. Sevak graduated with a bachelor’s and master’s degree from the University of Chicago and earned his master’s in business administration (MBA) from Harvard Business School. He is a regular speaker on the future of education and work, educational measurement and civic engagement. He is married with three kids and splits his time between Princeton, New Jersey and the Washington, D.C. area. As the world's largest private educational testing and measurement organization, ETS builds assessments based on rigorous research and an uncompromising commitment to quality. Each year, the organization develops, administers and scores more than 50 million tests in more than 180 countries at more than 9,000 locations. With a mission to advance quality and equity in education, ETS delivers groundbreaking research and learning solutions to help students, educators, schools, businesses and governments on their journey to what’s possible.

Dr. Elizabeth Bishop is an educator, researcher and youth advocate with two decades of instructional and administrative experience in public schools, universities and non-profit organizations across the United States. Bishop currently teaches on the faculty of the City University of New York and the University of San Francisco. She is Co-Founder of Global Turning Points, an international consulting collective based on the praxis of critical pedagogy. Bishop’s writing includes her 2015 “Becoming Activist: Critical Literacy and Youth Organizing” and her 2018 “Embodying Theory: Epistemology, Aesthetics and Resistance“ which she created in collaboration with artist Tamsen Wojtanowski. She has two new books expected out in 2022 and 2023. Dr. Bishop holds a Ph.D. in Education: Language, Literacy and Culture and has been featured in numerous articles on youth activism, civic engagement and voting including on Good Morning America, PBS NewsHour, Business Insider and PolitiFact. Find her online @DrBishopDigital. An artist by training, Dr. Kylie Peppler is a professor of Informatics & Education at University of California, Irvine where she designs and studies creative educational technologies together with industry partners. She holds a Ph.D. in Urban Schooling from UCLA, where she was part of the NSF-sponsored team that designed and studied the Scratch platform, which has grown to over 93 million users. Her research group, the Creativity Labs, is part of UCI’s Connected Learning Lab, which reaches over 8,000 newsletter subscribers and a website which averages over 11,500 views per month. Recent projects include partnerships with Merlyn Mind on the innovative uses of AI in classrooms, and the development of new XR solutions with Purdue University for the future manufacturing workforce. Her work has been consistently supported by a range of foundations, federal and industry partners, including the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the Wallace Foundation, Google.org, US Department of Education, Boeing, Best Buy, Fossil Foundation, GAP Inc., and National Geographic.Dr. Sangita Shresthova is a writer, researcher, thinker, speaker and doer. She is an expert in mixed research methods, online learning, media literacies, popular culture, performance, new media, politics, and globalization. She is currently the Director of Research and Programs and Co-PI of the Civic Paths Group based at the University of Southern California, where her current work is focused on the civic imagination. Sangita is one of the creators of the Digital Civics Toolkit (digitalcivicstoolkit.org), a collection of resources for educators, teachers and community leaders to support youth learning. Her own artistic work has been presented in creative venues around the world including the Pasadena Dance Festival, Schaubuehne (Berlin), the Other Festival (Chennai), the EBS International Documentary Festival (Seoul), and the American Dance Festival (Durham, NC). She holds a Ph.D. from UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures and MSc. degrees from MIT and LSE. She received her BA from Princeton University.​She is also a faculty member at the Salzburg Academy on Media and Social Change in Austria.​

Aaron is an award winning social entrepreneur. The author of the Purpose Economy, he is one of the foremost experts on the science of purpose and fulfillment. He founded the Taproot Foundation, the venture-backed Imperative and has recently launched Purpose Mindset. He began his career working in education in Chicago. He authored Fast Company’s ‘Purposeful CEO’ series and has written for or been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg TV, Newsweek, MIT Management Review, and Stanford Social Innovation Review. He is a TED Prize finalist and a LinkedIn Influencer. He graduated from the University of Michigan where he studied service learning. He is available for keynotes and on Purpose Mindset and the Purpose Economy.https://purpose-mindset.org/https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronhurst/https://purposeeconomy.com/Self Determination Theory: https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2011-21800-020LinkedIn Live with Laura Putnam and Special Guest Aaron Hurst https://www.youtube.com/live/tLS3tE4JKmk?feature=share

Dr. Katie Davis is Associate Professor at the University of Washington (UW) and Director of the UW Digital Youth Lab. For nearly 20 years, Katie has been researching and speaking about the impact of digital technologies on young people’s learning, development, and well-being.Katie uses the insights from her research to design positive technology experiences for youth and their families and to provide practical guidance to parents, educators, policymakers, and technology designers. At UW, she mentors undergraduate and graduate students and teaches courses on child development and technology design.She has published more than 90 academic papers and is the author of three books, all exploring technology’s role in young people’s lives: Technology’s Child: Digital Media’s Role in the Ages and Stages of Growing Up, Writers in the Secret Garden: Fanfiction, Youth, and New Forms of Mentoring (with Cecilia Aragon), and The App Generation: How Youth Navigate Identity, Intimacy, and Imagination in a Digital World (with Howard Gardner). In each, Katie aims to make sense of the often-confusing landscape of research and media messages about kids and technology.Check Out https://inventtolearn.com/nyc, for sessions April 14th and 15th, NJ/NY. Code: NOSUCHTHINGLinks:https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262046961/technologys-child/Previously, with Katie Davis https://katiedavisresearch.com

Olatunde Sobomehin is CEO/co-founder of StreetCode Academy, an organization that offers free tech classes to communities of color. He has taught classes at the Stanford Haas Center and the d.school.Sam Seidel has taught in a variety of settings, from first grade to community college, and directed youth programs for young people affected by incarceration. He now works with several networks of innovative schools, speaks nationally about education issues, and writes for the Husslington Post and other publications.About Creative HustleHumans have always been creative hustlers—problem solvers who seek to live beyond the limits suggested by society. Yet we live in a world where the place you were born, the amount of money you have, and the level of melanin in your skin indicate the precise path you are expected to follow. Too many of us silence our creativity and let our hustle calcify as we settle for the roles assigned to us. Now Olatunde Sobomehin and sam seidel, co-teachers of the Creative Hustle course at Stanford University, help you identify and navigate your own creative path that leads from your gifts—your unique combination of skills—to your goals, where you make a living doing things that matter.Links:https://dschool.stanford.edu/book-collections/creative-hustlesamseidel.is (Personal)hiphopgenius.org (Portfolio)k12lab.org (Company)https://streetcode.org/Gallup data: State of the Global Workplace, 2022: https://www.gallup.com/workplace/349484/state-of-the-global-workplace.aspx?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=gallup_access_branded&utm_term=&gclid=Cj0KCQjw54iXBhCXARIsADWpsG-dvSXXa2CHuDpQAysF3ES20y1fYBEQb3EycTtImjIUtnsDfi7I5lYaAsPtEALw_wcBLaRussell https://allhiphop.com/breeding-ground/larussell/Chaselove https://www.instagram.com/chaseloveyall/?hl=en

Today, Outschool offers more than 140,000 live online classes to more than 1,000,000 learners in 183 countries worldwide. Outschool is an innovative education platform that offers a variety of engaging, small-group classes online. Unlike traditional classes, Outschool classes give kids the unique opportunity to explore their interests in-depth via interactive, live video by experienced, independent educators.Amir Nathoo is CEO of Outschool, a marketplace for live online classes for K-12 learners. He led the development of Square Payroll and also served as CEO and co-founder of Trigger.io. He holds an MEng in Electrical and Information Sciences from The University of Cambridge. Links:linkedin.com/in/amirnathooCheddar TV: https://cheddar.com/media/outschool-adds-110m-series-d-fundingBloomberg TV: Why Demand for Outschool Classes Rose by 2000% - BloombergEdTechX: 2022 EdTechX Stories | Amir Nathoo (edtechxeurope.com)

The Center for Scholars and Storytellers works with leading social scientists to develop research insights and tools that are useful for content creators crafting authentic and inclusive stories for youth (ages 2-25). We work with a wide range of organizations from traditional media, tech and gaming, consumer products, and public health and education. When content is created from a research-informed perspective that is authentic and inclusive, it can deliver strong financial returns and support the mental health of the next generation so they can thrive and grow.Dr. Yalda Uhls is the Founder and Executive Director of CSS. Uhls is an internationally recognized, award-winning research scientist, educator, and author, studying how media affects young people. In her former career, she was a senior movie executive at MGM and SonyStephanie Rivas-Lara (she/her) is a 1st year graduate student working to obtain her Master of Social Welfare at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where she also received her BA in Psychology with a minor in Spanish. She currently works as the Research Coordinator for the Center for Scholars & Storytellers where she focuses on providing support on varying projects focused on diversity and representation. She is broadly interested in working with marginalized communities, particularly children and adolescents, to support their needs and ensure their well-being. As a first generation, Latina, and queer individual, she feels that media has played a huge role in understanding her own identity and that of others.https://www.scholarsandstorytellers.com/https://www.scholarsandstorytellers.com/css-teens-and-screens-2022

Dr. Margaret Honey joined The New York Hall of Science as president and CEO in November of 2008. Among her current interests at NYSCI is the role of design-based learning in promoting student interest and achievement in STEM subjects. She is widely recognized for her work using digital technologies to support children’s learning across the disciplines of science, mathematics, engineering and technology. Prior to joining NYSCI, she spent 15 years as vice president of the Education Development Center (EDC) and director of EDC’s Center for Children and Technology. While at EDC, Dr. Honey was the architect and overseer of numerous large-scale projects funded by organizations including the National Science Foundation, the Institute for Education Sciences, The Carnegie Corporation, The Library of Congress, the U.S. Department of Education, and the U.S. Department of Energy. She also co-directed the Northeast and Islands Regional Education Laboratory, which enabled educators, policy-makers, and communities to improve schools by helping them leverage the most current research about learning and K-12 education.A graduate of Hampshire College with a doctorate in developmental psychology from Columbia University, Dr. Honey’s work has helped to shape the best thinking about learning and technology with special attention to traditionally underserved audiences. She has directed numerous research projects including efforts to identify teaching practices and assessments for 21st-century skills, and new approaches to teaching computational science in high schools. She has collaborated with PBS, CPB and some of the nation’s largest public television stations, has investigated data-driven decision-making tools and practices, and with colleagues at Bank Street College of Education, created one of the first internet-based professional development programs in the country. From her early involvement in the award-winning and groundbreaking public television series The Voyage of the Mimi to her decade-long collaboration on the education reform team for the Union City (NJ) school district, she has led some of the country’s most innovative and successful education efforts.Dr. Honey has shared what she’s learned before Congress, state legislatures, and federal panels, and through numerous articles, chapters and books. She currently serves as a board member of National Academies’ Board on Science Education and on behalf of the National Research Council has chaired the workshop report on IT Fluency and High School Graduation Outcomes, and co-authored a report on Learning Science: Computer Games, Simulations, and Education. Her recent book, Design, Make, Play – Growing the Next Generation of STEM Innovators, explores the potential of these strategies for supporting student engagement and deeper learning. Dr. Honey also serves as a member of the National Science Foundation’s Education and Human Resources Advisory Committee.