EDTECH SCRUM: The four-year old Education Innovation Summit, now run by GSV Advisors, moves to the Phoenician this year, once the home of the fabled meetings of PC industry pioneers. We're gearing up for a raft of announcements (and yes, we'll tweet 'em as we see 'em).
Of course, most of the meeting is about who you see. More than 100 companies are presenting--so you can dip into a quick presentation by any of them. Or if you want to check out the panels and catch people there, you can see the full agenda here.
Here's the EdSurge cheatsheet about some sessions you might want to check out:
MONDAY
The conference "officially" begins on Monday--although it's mostly a day to show up and get connected. A session with LearnZillion and teachers at 4:30 pm is a smart move for companies actively working with schools. And the dinnertime chat at 6:00 pm includes Bill Campbell, one of the most elusive and effective board members and the delightful writer, Steven Johnson, author of Future Perfect: The Case for Progress in a Networked Age & Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation
TUESDAY
8:00 am: Michael Crow, President of Arizona State University. Last year, Crow gave one of the most cogent and compelling talks.
10:00 am: Jon Schnur, Executive Chairman and Co-founder, America Achieves and Jaime Casap, Google's global education evangelist. Schnur, an Obama advisor, has seen just about every corner of the industry. Jaime has Google's playbook down cold. Or, if you prefer futuristic hardball politics, you can hear all about inBloom, followed by thoughts on how the next POTUS will feel about education.
Noon: The big guns come out: AOL former chairman Steve Case, followed by former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers.
2:00 pm: EdSurge's Betsy moderates an all-star panel on the education-focused issues driving change (Larry Berger President of Amplify Learning; Tyler Bosmeny CEO of Clever,Margery Mayer, President Scholastic Education; Iwan Streichenberger, CEO InBloom; and Tom Vander Ark, Managing Partner, Learn Capital). We'll try to make some news here!
3:00 pm: Get the schools' perspective: the POV of charters that have been some of the earliest edtech adopters: (April Goble of KIPP Chicago Schools; Jonathan Hage of Charter Schools, Beth Purvis of Chicago Charter School Foundation; Jeanne Allen of Center for Education Reform)
Or listen to a group with a distinctly "districts" approach: (Dr. Linda Clark, Superintendent, Joint School District No. 2 in Idaho; Dr. Manuel Isquierdo, Superintendent, Sunnyside Unified School District, Arizona; Sara Schapiro, Director of the League of Innovative Schools, Digital Promise; Diane Tavenner, CEO, Summit Schools; Joey Wise, Chairman and Chief Education Officer Distinctive Schools.)
3:00-5:00 pm: "Office hours" with Gates Foundation program managers--a great opportunity if your hunting for a grant.
WEDNESDAY
8:30 am: It's worth hauling yourself out of bed to hear two successful edtech entrepreneurs: Dan Rosensweig of Chegg and the delightful Lynda Weinman, of the appropriately named Lynda.com.
10:00 am: Lots of higher ed this morning. Get a dose of pedagogy at the panel called: “Thar’s Gold In Them There Hills!”: How University Research Can Transform Education" with USC's Richard Clark, BrainPop's Din Heiman, ASU's Kurt Van Lehn, Kaplan's Bror Saxberg and Dept. of Commerce's Jim Shelton or check out the individual "EDtalks" also devoted to higher ed. Alternatively the "What Works" panel will tackle one of our fav questions: "Are there too many incubators," and features Pearson's Gregg Alpert, 4.0 School's Matt Candler, Kaplan's Kate Eberle Walker, Socratic Lab's Heather Gilchrist and Phyllis Lockett of New Schools for Chicago.
11:00 am: Your choice: Games or money. Both panels are chock full of people with fascinating perspectives: Gates Foundation's reps are on the games panel; David Pottruck, former chairman of Schwab is on the money panel. The "What Works" workshop will likely dive deeper into the money question, with representatives from DLA Piper, Comcast Ventures and Venture PIpeline. Anant Agarwal, President of edX; Felice Nudelman, Chancellor of Antioch University; Josh Coates, Chief Executive Officer of Canvas by Instructure;
12:15 pm: GSV'S Michael Moe pops up to moderate a panel on MOOCs featuring Coursera cofounder Andrew Ng, edX's Anant Agarwal, Antioch chairman, Felice Nudelman, and Instructure's Josh Coates. In the same time slot: "Kaizen EDU: Continuous Learning in The Knowledge Economy" with Fullbridge program's Candice Carpenter Olson, Chegg's Anne Dwane; Jessie Woolley-Wilson of Dreambox; Jeff Snipes, Challenge Success, and Michael Horn, of the (renamed) Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation.
2:00-4:00 pm: Notable brief workshops during this time slot include "Counselling Entprepreneurs" with NewSchool's Jennifer Carolan, Stonework Capital's Matthew Greenfield, Roger Novak, of Novak Biddle Venture Partners; Jason Stoffer, of Maveron; Matt Witheiler, of Flybridge Capital Partners; Roy Gilbert of Grockit.
Have fun!
