Keep Pitchin’: Out of the 12 startups participating in ISTE’s 2015 PitchFest, four will move on to compete in the final session on Tuesday morning:
Education Framework: The company’s EdProtect product helps administrators manage the privacy requirements of the edtech tools in their districts. The Education Framework team also reviews other products’ privacy policies and provides ratings for each.
Cogent: Cogent’s Interactive Cases distills complex science issues into individual case studies. In a case, students work through simulations to learn about and solve the problem at hand.
Mathspace: Mathspace tracks students’ work on math problems and gives feedback on intermediate steps, not just the final result. Props to Mathspace’s speaker Dan Tu-Hora for being the only one of 12 companies to mention potential competitors in his pitch.
ZyRobotics: The company’s Zumo Accessible Learning System is a suite of apps for students with physical disabilities. Each app can be customized to meet the needs of the students. As co-founder Dr. Ayanna Howard related during her pitch, “You can interact with the app using whatever motor skills you have.”
An audience vote at the end of each of 2 sessions determined the winners. The four companies will compete for two titles, Most Innovative and Most Likely to Succeed, and a variety of (non-cash) prizes.