Great conference: Education Innovation Summit

My mind is still reeling from the presentations at this week's Education Innovation Summit at ASU's SkySong facility. The crowd was a healthy mix of VCs, Edupreneurs, industry players like Pearson, local practitioners, industry luminaries such as Joel Klein, Ron Huberman, and Adrian Fenty.

A common theme I heard was that politicians in US are afraid to make such changes because they fear the environment here isn't ready for such reforms, and if they propose changes, the public will react negatively, and they won't get reelected. So, the political environment needs to be more open to change.

While we keep hearing about budget cutbacks in US, we should note that the US still spends more per student than any other country in the world. So perhaps the Republicans aren't simply against education. The US has been increasing budgets and shrinking class sizes over the last decade, but these aspects alone have not affected student outcomes. That means we need to look beyond these factors.

ASU's president Michael Crow explained that times have changed and education needs to change. Under his mangement, ASU has improved student outcomes, increase enrollment numbers, graduate rates, and research projects despite a 60% drop in public funding. You can't do this by sticking with traditional models. Of course higher education isn't tightly controlled like K-12.

Joel Klein explained that we should not be surprised that a monopoly government institution with a unionized workforce resists change as this is what our current education system really is. However, we have to do something with urgency to prevent the "American dream from becoming the American memory". Here are Mr. Klein's top five ways to reform our system:

1. Move towards data-driven system. With data we can see what's working and what's not. Right now we don't have such details.
2. Move from textbook to digital. If history is any indication, this has greatly improved other industries.
3. Shift away from traditional school classroom model towards new models.
4. Embrace customized/individualized approaches to student education.
5. Rethink human capital. Are we mandating that teachers do bureaucratic tasks? How could they better spend their time?
   

These points resonated with with others said. Ron Huberman, a humble public servant that ran Chicago Public Schools with a $5 Billion annual budget expressed he could have done a much better job with $4 Billion if the system was free of the bureaucracy that holds in back. In the US, 90% of school board members are directly aligned with teachers unions. Can you say conflict-of-interest? But the problem is not union's alone. Ineffective management by superintendents and others are equally to blame.

Carlos Watson, journalist turned investment banker, compared Education's struggle to move beyond "incrementalism" with Martin Luther King's Letter from Birmingham Jail commentary that "superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes."

As an edupreneur, it was great to attend some business sessions and be reminded of key points like maintaining focus, partnering wisely, remaining student-driven and to make sure we're solving real problems.