EdTech on a Learning Curve
An overview of the Opening Keynote at EdTechX 2022 with co-founders, Charles McIntyre and Benjamin Vedrenne-Cloquet.
On 23rd June, EdTechX hosted the first ‘back-to-live’ summit since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Inspired by the theme ‘The Experience of Learning’, this ninth live edition began with the customary opening keynote where EdTechX founders Charles McIntyre and Benjamin Vedrenne-Cloquet share key insights from across the global EdTech sector. Entitled ‘EdTech on a Learning Curve’, this year’s thought-provoking keynote focused on how to make the learning process effective in the digital age, pushing the boundaries to ways of learning that will provide us with an unforgettable experience of learning.
Benjamin Vedrenne-Cloquet begins by painting a somewhat dark picture of the post-pandemic EdTech industry by highlighting some of the key issues the sector needs to confront.
“The most regressive triumph of the lowest tech”
Despite the rapid growth seen in the sector since the outbreak of COVID, he raises the question of whether EdTech has delivered in solving the challenges presented by school closures and workforce disruptions, in terms of both delivery and ethics. In reality, the pandemic saw “the most regressive triumph of the lowest tech”, he says, with uninspiring Zoom classrooms, poor engagement and poor efficacy, leading to a learning deficit of over 8 months with increases in rates of school dropouts, obesity, teen pregnancies, and mental health issues.
On the workforce side, although Benjamin recognises ‘The Great Resignation’ as more of a long-term trend than pandemic driven, he notes that it is fuelling a rising skills gap amplified by 5 structural factors described as the 5Rs — Retirement, Relocation, Reconsideration, Reshuffling, Reluctance — factors which EdTech has not yet been able to address fully.
“Edtech don’t be evil”
With the plea, “Edtech don’t be evil”, the EdTechX co-founder then addresses ethics in the sector, highlighting abusive marketing practices and data theft at a time when we faced a need for EdTech solutions. He warns that “governments are watching” with concerns around the use of big capital and big tech in education, with a reminder of the Chinese government’s sudden clampdown on a thriving EdTech industry, turning it into a non-profit sector overnight.
On a more optimistic note, Charles McIntyre looks to a brighter future with two key areas of interest — Impact and Experiential. “Places of learning reflect the communities they serve”, he states, and, with the emergence of new environments of learning, he urges us to be mindful of societal impact in the face of the ‘uberization’ of education in a digital world. To help “assess the hygiene of the world we want to create”, he and his co-founder have developed an open-source and self-assessment methodology to help the EdTech ecosystem assess the efficacy of their ESG and impact initiatives.
“When digital goes mainstream, experiential becomes premium”
In their opening address at the 2020 online summit, Charles and Benjamin coined the phrase, “When digital goes mainstream, experiential becomes premium”. Now, two years on, Charles resurfaces this idea and projects it as the next normal, underlining the sector’s challenge to build on people’s desire for engagement, experience and wonder, and create a paradigm shift to deliver experiential learning using technology.
Impact and Experiential lie at the heart of the pair’s business dealings, Charles explains, first with their ‘SPACS for Good’ initiative which supports equity within the EdTech environment, then with their commitment to donating a portion of their shares in their own listed SPAC, EdTechX Holdings, to help fund digital inclusion. In regard to the shift towards experiential learning, Charles and Benjamin have already put their money where their mouth is with their SPAC’s recent combination with ZSpace, an AR/VR platform providing innovative hands-on experiential learning.
Charles predicts that these immersive technologies will become the game changers in Education and Workforce Development which, in combination, are expected to be the two largest forces after Healthcare impacting through VR and AR. The overall AR/VR/MR global market is projected to be worth US$250B by 2028, and education’s share is expected to reach US$16B by 2025.
“Who will be the gatekeepers?”
How this “Eduverse” will work in practice is a key consideration looking forward, according to Charles. We will need massive processing power based on self-learning AI Foundation Models, he says, and, like the splitting of the atom, this can be hugely helpful, but equally, hugely dangerous. The question is, “who will be the gatekeepers?”, Charles asks, “so we don’t get burned”. The role of Impact and ESG will be paramount in the creation of the Eduverse, he concludes, a process that will need to be “designed by many, accessible by all and using Open AI”.
Benjamin closes the session on an optimistic note as he looks towards a future with an “augmented relationship with knowledge”, in the belief that EdTech is much more than basic digital dissemination and replication. “We are at the very beginning of a new experience of learning”, he concludes.
Download the opening keynote slides here.
