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Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

ParentSquare Named Excellence in Equity Award Winner

Santa Barbara, CA — ParentSquare, provider of the premier leading unified school-home communications platform for K-12 education, announced their selection as a winner in the inaugural Excellence in Equity Awards program presented by the American Consortium for Equity in Education. The award was presented in the Special Contributions to Equity category.

This competitive awards program honoring schools, educators, and industry received more than 160 total nominations from across the U.S., plus a number of submissions from abroad. Last week, 64 finalists were announced in the 16 industry categories, with 30 winners selected. There were also 21 winners selected in 10 categories dedicated to educators and schools.

ParentSquare is the only fully unified product that engages every family with school communications and communications-based services—all the way from the district office to the classroom teacher, and all in one place. Schools know who’s not being reached and have the reports and tools to improve contactability and communications equity while maintaining privacy and security.…Read More

New research offers major insights into post-pandemic learning

Educators are noticeably more comfortable giving students autonomy over their learning–and this is just one of the long-term impacts the pandemic has had on K-12 education, according to insight from the nonprofit Project Tomorrow.

In its annual Congressional Briefing, the nonprofit presented this year’s Speak Up Research Project findings. This year’s results indicate patterns across digital learning for students and teachers coinciding with the effects that the pandemic had on learning.

The Speak Up Research Project is a national research initiative and free service to schools and districts. Since the Fall of 2003, Speak Up has helped education leaders include the voices of their stakeholders in annual and long-term planning. ed.Web.net hosted the briefing, which featured keynote speaker Kristina Ishmael, Deputy Director of the Office of Ed Tech at the U.S. Department of Education.…Read More

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Carnegie Learning Helps TX Districts Use TEA Funds with Hands-on Program

PITTSBURGH, PA – Carnegie Learning, a leader in artificial intelligence for K-12 education and formative assessment, announced a NEW, transformational program to support districts across Texas to optimize the most recent round of Texas Education Agency (TEA) funds to fast-track student success in their schools.

As an approved Strong Foundations Grant provider, Carnegie Learning will collaborate with the primary point of contact and math and/or literacy committee to meet every grant requirement.  

“We understand that teachers and districts are stretched for time and resources, and that’s where our team comes in to help bridge the gap,” said Carnegie Learning CEO Barry Malkin. “Unlike any other education company or curriculum provider, we partner with each district to create individualized plans that meet their unique needs – large or small. Because we know every student deserves that level of support.”…Read More

Carnegie Learning Middle School Math Solution Receives Perfect Scores from EdReports.org

PITTSBURGH, PA – Carnegie Learning, a leader in artificial intelligence for K-12 education and formative assessment, today announced that its blended core Middle School Math Solution received perfect scores in a new report published by EdReports.org. The High School Math Solution also received all-green scores, with just one point shy of perfect. 

EdReports.org is an independent nonprofit that evaluates instructional materials for quality and standards alignment. It is a gold-standard leader in helping teachers and administrators identify the highest-quality instructional materials. The Carnegie Learning Middle and High School Math Solutions met EdReports’ expectations in all three gateways: 

  • Focus & Coherence—Are the instructional materials focused on the right content at each grade level, and is it presented in a coherent way? 
  • Rigor & Mathematical Practices—Do the materials have the right mix of conceptual understanding, procedural skills, and applications to address the standards to their full depth? Do they help teachers build productive habits of mind in their students? 
  • Usability—Do the materials have the right support in place for teachers to use them effectively? 

The EdReports.org review process is rigorous, and many other curriculum solutions do not pass the first and second gateways and are therefore not evaluated for the third. Schools and districts can therefore choose the Carnegie Learning Math Solution with confidence, knowing it has met the highest quality standards in addition to proving effective through third-party efficacy research. (Learn more at http://www.carnegielearning.com/research.) …Read More

The Education Service Centers of Indiana Select ParentSquare as a Purchasing Program Partner for School-Home Communications Technology

Santa Barbara, CA — Aug. 17, 2022— ParentSquare, the award-winning unified school-home communications platform for K-12 education, has been named a vendor partner by the Educational Service Centers of Indiana (ESC of I).

ESC of I is a collaborative of nine Indiana Education Service Centers (ESCs). Each ESC serves the schools in its designated geographical region through a variety of programs and services. Together as ESC of I, they implement statewide initiatives, such as a cooperative purchasing program, to benefit Indiana’s nearly 50,000 educators and 720,000 students.

“ESC of I develops partnerships with a wide variety of organizations to support the needs of our member districts,” Central Indiana Education Service Center Director of Partnerships Dr. Christy Hilton stated. “Those organizations are vetted by our partnerships team members for quality, service, and return on investment. Our team found ParentSquare’s reputation for powerful functionality and exceptional service to be well deserved.”…Read More

9 priorities for a future-focused education system

The Aurora Institute, a national education nonprofit focused on education systems change, has released its annual report outlining key federal policy issues aimed at transforming our K-12 education system so it is fit for purpose, strengthening our democracy and shaping our next generation of engaged citizens.

Informed by the expertise and wisdom of thousands in its community, the Aurora Institute’s federal policy priorities are a set of nine recommendations designed to ensure education systems move from the current state to future-focused education systems capable of preparing all learners with building the knowledge and skills necessary to achieve lifelong success.

The priorities include:…Read More

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PowerSchool to Launch Connected Intelligence, First Fully Managed Data-as-a-Service Platform for K-12 Schools

FOLSOM, Calif — PowerSchool (NYSE: PWSC), the leading provider of cloud-based software for K-12 education in North America, today announced it has launched Connected Intelligence by PowerSchool®. Partnering with  Snowflake via the  Powered by Snowflake program, Connected Intelligence by PowerSchool is the first fully managed K-12 Education focused Data-as-a-Service (DaaS) platform. It provides school districts and education agencies with a unified, global, fully managed, and secure platform. With Connected Intelligence by PowerSchool, school districts retain sole ownership of the data and have the ability to collaborate with internal stakeholders and external partners efficiently and securely.

By unifying all data under one comprehensive platform, segregated by school district, with built-in, stringent data security and governance controls, educators and school district or state-wide leaders will be able to take advantage of many benefits, including the following:

  • Increase equitable opportunities for all students. Connecting data from early childhood to adulthood can help improve a wide variety of initiatives aimed at supporting student outcomes and can even be leveraged within post-secondary support and workforce development.
  • Spend fewer resources managing data access and storage. Instead, educators can spend their time actually using data thanks to machine learning and analytics that create alerts if a student is exhibiting warning signs (e.g., an increased chance of not graduating on time).
  • Store education data securely and in one place. Access to all data in one place empowers educators and stakeholders with key insights to improve student outcomes.
  • Expand access to all data, including historic, current, future and any third-party data sources. This includes labor and workforce development data and secure inter-agency data sharing and collaboration, such as with juvenile justice, foster care, and other social services agencies, which aims to position all students for life-long success and their communities for positive social and economic futures.

“Connected Intelligence by PowerSchool gives state departments of education and school systems the ability to transform the economic and social outlook of their communities by bringing all their data together and giving them unprecedented ease of access, unparalleled performance, and the peace of mind that comes with knowing their data is safely secured,” said Shivani Stumpf, Group Vice President, New Solutions of PowerSchool. “This innovative, all-inclusive data ecosystem that we’ve developed, and built on Snowflake’s Data Cloud, aims to help education leaders make the most effective and efficient use of data with greater agility, and to inform their investments so that they can focus on what matters most — improving student outcomes and preparing all learners for success.”…Read More

Jamf Introduces Jamf Safe Internet to Power Online Safety Anywhere Students Learn

MINNEAPOLIS, July 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Today, Jamf (NASDAQ: JAMF), the standard in Apple Enterprise Management, rolled out  Jamf Safe Internet to K-12 education customers across the globe. Designed to help schools protect minors from harmful content on the internet, Jamf Safe Internet allows customer admins to enforce acceptable-use policies without sacrificing the unmatched learning experience Apple devices provide.

Apple has already established a  strong presence in the education market as students spend more time learning online. This creates a growing need for digital safety to prevent students from accessing unsafe content and eliminate cyberattacks. Incorporating filtering technology and network threat prevention features currently available to commercial customers through Jamf’s security solutions, Jamf Safe Internet is the only Apple-first, education-focused cybersecurity solution that ensures students can navigate the internet safely. Jamf Safe Internet values student privacy by applying prevention over inspection principles.

“With technology now firmly embedded in the student experience, there is a growing need for digital safety to eliminate cyberattacks and prevent students from accessing unsafe content. Jamf combines best-in-class network threat prevention and a vast content-filtering database to block unsafe and malicious content so that students can safely learn online from anywhere,” said Suraj Mohandas, Senior Director of Education Strategy, Jamf.…Read More

4 tools to help students build post-COVID research skills

As an educator with 21 years of experience in teaching and learning, I have had the opportunity to work with students of differing abilities and learning backgrounds. During a typical school year, meeting the varied needs of my students makes for an extremely rewarding, but challenging job. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has compounded the needs of students tenfold, maximizing both the rewards and challenges of my role as an educator. 

As the world begins to shift in the evolving post-pandemic environment, it’s clear that much has changed. In my opinion, K-12 education has seen tremendous changes whose impacts we will be assessing and addressing for years to come. 

However, as educators begin to consider how to evolve education to meet the needs of our students today and in the future, we have before us the enormous task of shoring up students’ academic skills that may have eroded during the “emergency teaching” era. …Read More

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