This interview was originally recorded on XX, as part of Leoni Consulting Group’s All Things Marketing and Education Podcast.
Access this episode's show notes, including links to the audio, a summary, and helpful resources.
[Start of recorded material 00:00:01]
Elana:
Hello, and welcome to All Things Marketing and Education. My name is Elana Leoni, and I've devoted my career to helping education brands build their brand awareness and engagement. Each week I sit down with educators, EdTech entrepreneurs, and experts in educational marketing and community building. All of them will share their successes and failures using social media, inbound marketing or content marketing, and community building. I'm excited to guide you on your journey to transform your marketing efforts into something that provides consistent value and ultimately improves the lives of your audience.
Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of All Things Marketing and Education. This week, I am so excited to be sitting down with my friend, Susan Bearden. Susan is the Director of Digital Programs for InnovateEDU, and there she leads something called Project Unicorn, which, yes, is my favorite mythical animal. I even have a stuffed unicorn that I take with me everywhere in my car. Fun fact. But Project Unicorn is a collaboration of 16 organizations. I'm going to have Susan talk all about it. It sounds awesome. They're all about supporting and promoting the use of data interoperability – there we go, long word – in K-12 education. If you're not even familiar what that means, don't worry, Susan's going to be talking all about it in this episode. I want to talk a little bit more about Susan to give you context. Of course, I want to gush about how we know each other and how awesome she is. Then we'll get started on all things really EdTech, data, data privacy, digital citizenship, all the fun things in between.
Susan is a former teacher and a K-12 tech leader. She has done lots of amazing things. I was just saying right before the episode, I love this chance to dive into your bios because I get to gush at how awesome you are and the impact you've made in K-12 education. Really, Susan. She has served as the Chief Innovation Officer for CoSN. Wow. Has been a Senior Fellow at the U.S. Department of Education, the Office of Educational Technology there, and Susan has literally written a book on digital citizenship. In 2017, she wrote Digital Citizenship: A Community-Based Approach. That's the title of the book. We will put it in the Show Notes, don't worry. Last but not least, she was named one of EdTech K-12 Magazine's top 30 K-12 IT influencers for 2022. Gosh, that's a lot. We are going to be talking about all things data, data interoperability, what it is, why it matters, how it can benefit EdTech companies, why educators should care about it and look for it when they're choosing EdTech products. We'll get into cyber security, data privacy, all of that stuff. There's a lot of interesting things going on in EdTech right now.
But before we do, I would like to embarrass Susan a little bit. Susan, I couldn't remember the exact moment we met, and I assumed it was on Twitter. I did a little digging and sure enough, really, it felt like we were mentioned in Twitter here and there. But I was a guest moderator on EdTech Chat when Tom Murray was running it. You were a co-runner of that. I remember. You threw me in randomly. But it was 2014 when I guest moderated that.
Susan:
Oh my goodness. That was almost ten years ago. What a trip.
Elana:
It gets better. You were actually one of the people who volunteered to be a mentor for my first ever ISTE speaking session. I don't know if you remember that, because I didn't. But I had a bunch of awesome people like you that were mentors. I turned our ISTE session into a hands-on workshop of teaching people how to tweet, because I thought it was ridiculous to just sit on stage and go, "Here are all the ways you can use Twitter." No, let's actually use Twitter. Y'all were going around and floating around and helping people learn how to set up their accounts and tweet. I just thought that was so cool. We never met in person, and you just decided to jump in and be a mentor there.
I'm going to let Susan take over. But before I do, I just want to end with Susan is really one of those people that does take a leap of faith of some crazy lady on Twitter. She helps them out in person without really – I think I just threw out a random ask on Twitter. She is passionate about helping others, you know this. But also you can tell with her career, her life-long career in education, she is passionate about improving K-12 education. Susan, I believe you are a unicorn, and not the weird sparkly kind that was in Tom Cruise's Legend – that was a bit weird for the '80s movie – but really the kind of person that lights up a room. I feel like you're the guiding light of like, "No, you should do this. This is the right way to go. This is the most ethical way in the world of EdTech." There you go. I want to welcome you, Susan, to All Things Marketing and Education.
Susan:
Thank you so much, Elana. That's the nicest intro I've ever gotten. My goodness. Thank you. You're so kind. Yes, I feel like I've known you forever. But I'm so glad that you figured out it was EdTech Chat because I didn't know it was the first time we met. I've just known you forever, obviously 2014. That really actually does feel like forever. That makes sense.
Elana:
Yes. Especially with the pandemic.
Susan:
Yes. Before COVID and after COVID.
Elana:
Yeah. Well, I want to dive into all the things that you are known for, but I don't think people probably ask you this question enough. I'm personally curious on just the beginnings of you. I'm curious on why education for you? Why K-12 education? What inspired you to say, "I'm going to get involved in this crazy industry?"
Susan:
That's really a great question, because I have a totally non-traditional education background. I actually started out my professional career as a professional musician. I have bachelor's degrees in English and viola performance, and a master's in viola performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music. I actually started my career as a working orchestra musician. I got a job in Jacksonville, Florida after I finished my master's. That's actually how I ended up in Florida. My husband and I now split our time between Florida and Connecticut. I was there for a few years, and then I knew I didn't want another orchestra job. I started a doctorate at Florida State. I was on the faculty of music camp and discovered completely by accident that I really enjoyed working with kids and I was good at it.
Now, for context, you should know both my parents were teachers. My father was the 1984 Connecticut Teacher of the Year. He was a Milken Foundation award winner. He was a living legend in our hometown. Never, when I was growing up, did I even want to think about going into education. Because when you're the daughter of a living legend, that's a hard thing to live up to. I was on this camp. I just discovered I enjoyed working with kids. I accidentally fell into a teaching job teaching strings in Brevard County, Florida. That's actually how I got into education, was as a music teacher. I did that for six and a half years. All the time I was doing this, this was in the late '90s, early 2000s, and I was really interested in technology. I was really interested in how technology could be used to solve problems and to make things better. But I didn't have a lot of access to it as a traveling music teacher.
I decided to go back to school, and I got a degree in IT. Actually, my degree was in database administration. I got a job at Independent School in Melbourne, Florida managing their student information system. I originally thought, "OK, well, I'll take this job for a year or two, then I'll move on to industry." Wasn't planning on staying in education. Then after ten months they promoted me to IT director. That's how my extremely unplanned-for and unanticipated career and technology management was born. I did that for eight years, and it was very rewarding. I view being an IT director, or working in a K-12 IT department, as a service role. We are there to help everyone else do their jobs better. That includes teaching. How could we support teachers and help them do their jobs better and help them educate kids better? That's my mantra with technology to this day, even though I'm no longer in a school-based role, it's, "How can we leverage technology to improve education for kids?" That can look like so many different ways, from whether that's the actual use of technology in the classroom to leveraging data interoperability to help better support students. There's so many different ways technology can be used to support education. That's where my sweet spot is. That's where my passion is.
Elana:
Yeah. Thank you for that. That's really interesting. I don't know if that says anywhere in your background in music and –
Susan:
Probably not. Yeah. Because that goes back for a while. Yeah.
Elana:
Do you still play and get out there every once in a while?
Susan:
I did up until about three or four years ago. I would freelance on a part-time basis. I had private students for many years about – I just stopped playing about four years ago just because, as I get older, I have disc issues in my neck. Playing the viola is not fabulous for your neck, unfortunately. Going like this for hours on end, not super good. I do miss it. But I do still support my colleagues who are music teachers and still a passionate fan of music and how it can really support students and help improve their lives.
Elana:
Agreed. Well, let's get into the things that you're into now. You've got a lot of cool information and resources you can share. But let's first start off on what the heck is data interoperability and what it is not. Because I see other people confusing the term. Then let's talk about why it matters to the educators listening and to the EdTech folk listening.
Susan:
Absolutely. Interoperability is the eight-syllable word that no one can pronounce, let alone define. Congratulations Elana, you got it.
Elana:
I tried really hard. I tried really hard.
Susan:
It doesn't really roll off your tongue. You say data interoperability and people's eyes glaze over. They're like, "Interopera what?" But basically, you benefit from interoperability every day, you just don't realize it. How Project Unicorn defines data interoperability, it's the seamless, secure, and controlled exchange of data between applications. In education, the goal of interoperability is to focus on better informing instruction and driving student-centered learning environments.
You might say, "OK, well, what are some other examples of interoperability?" You say, "I benefit from interoperability, how so?" OK, I'm just going to look at my Bluetooth Air Pods right now that I'm using. These will work with both a PC and a Mac. The reason is because Bluetooth is a wireless standard that has been agreed upon by all of these different companies. Whenever they make a Bluetooth-enabled device, it doesn't matter who the manufacturer was or what type of device it is, it's going to work with Bluetooth. Because Bluetooth is an agreed-upon standard. Actually, Wi-Fi is another example of an agreed-upon standard. That's why, for instance, you don't need to have different wireless cards every time you go to a Starbucks or to another restaurant to use their Wi-Fi, or to your house. Because it's an agreed-upon wireless standard.
Another example would be the ability to get ATM money from a bank that's not your own. I might bank with one bank, but if I go to a Wells Fargo and I want to withdraw cash at an ATM, I can do that. That's because the banks have gotten together and agreed upon data standards for banking transactions that allow you to withdraw money from a bank, even though it's not your own bank. It'll come out of your account at your bank. Same with – Another example would be checking flights on Expedia or Google Flights or Kayak. The reason that you can see all the flights available from all the different airlines is because they have agreed-upon data standards that they use to exchange information. Really, interoperability, it sounds like such a really scary word, but it actually underpins so many of the conveniences that we take for granted in modern life.
Elana:
This is a really bad example, but let's just say it's the Common Core of data. It's like it's creating standards, right?
Susan:
Yes.
Elana:
I know that's a trigger word for a lot of people, but it's creating agreed-upon standards that everyone uses so the data can flow freely between devices. Right?
Susan:
Exactly.
Elana:
OK. In the world of EdTech, tell me how that affects the classroom, the teachers, the administration, all that fun stuff.
Susan:
Well, one of the challenges that we have in the EdTech space right now is that a lot of EdTech tools don't talk to each other. I'm pretty sure that lots of teachers can relate to the fact that they have their students, they may be using four or five different tools. But to get that data into a gradebook, they have to download the information into a CSV file and maybe do some spreadsheet manipulation magic in order to upload it to their gradebook, or to be able to combine information from other sources in order to evaluate that data.
What we at Project Unicorn are doing, is we promote and support the use of open data standards, which makes it easier for educators to access and make use of their data. Because in other industries, I think education is probably 20 years behind other industries. You hear of all these other industries that are doing all this incredible work with data analytics and predictive analytics. But education, because tools tend to be siloed, they're created for a particular use case and not with a thought for the broader ecosystem. They often don't talk to each other very well.
One example that, I like to call it the gateway drug to interoperability, is a single sign-on. What single sign-on is, is the ability to use a single set of login credentials to log into multiple products. There may be examples of, for instance, in some cases you've probably all been to a website where it says you can log in with Facebook or log in with Google or log in with Apple ID. That's an example of single sign-on. In education, that can look like a lot of different things. There's several different services, like Clever or ClassLink or Identity Automation or GG4L that provide single access where students just have to remember one username and password, and they can log on, and they can access all of their EdTech tools. That's a very basic example of interoperability, but it's a very powerful one. Because I'm sure any teacher can attest to the instructional time lost, trying to deal with students and resetting passwords.
It's ridiculous. It doesn't get easier when they get to high school. That hasn't been my experience, either. That's just one example of how interoperability can streamline education. Another example could be, for instance, say that you have curriculum tools and you want to be able to assign them. Or you want to be able to integrate them into your particular learning management system. That's another type of interoperability. The ability to automatically roster different EdTech tools so that teachers don't have to manually upload rosters and make changes to class rosters every time they get a new student into their classroom. Rostering is another kind of interoperability.
Then you have some of the standards that are used by either at the district level or at the state level to create larger scale, either operational data storage or for data warehouses so that you can use predictive analytics. All of that can be made possible through the power of interoperability. Because if you can't get data out of a system, and if it's in one format and then you want to get it into another system and that's in a different format, that just creates a whole lot of extra work, a lot of extra time. We all know that everybody who's working in education already has a full-time job. That's a really heavy lift to either expect teachers to do or IT staff or data teams to do, to be manually manipulating all that data. The more seamless we can make it, the less work it is, and also the more secure it is. Because anytime you're dealing with a manual export of data from a system, and you're downloading it onto a laptop and then you're uploading it to another system, well, that inherently is less secure than if that data was automatically transferred between systems without human intervention.
Elana:
I have so many questions, because this is such an interesting topic. But I want to just recount, and probably do it in an oversimplified way of what you just said; is that you said data interoperability matters because of one, just ease of use, user experience. Gosh, I do see probably the number one use case I've seen is the integration with SISs, which is really nice, the student information systems, because the roster does change so much, and it helps with the adoption of the tool. If you have a communication system, you can immediately have them all create accounts. Ease of use, user experience, you said personalization, where when you do have data commingling, you can start correlating data and providing insights to better deliver instruction. Then you said security, too. Because then you're dealing with all these files and all that stuff. Did I miss any other benefits of what you were talking about?
Susan:
I think you got a lot of the major ones. Absolutely. All of those are important benefits of interoperability. When you can bring together data from different sources. So often, how many times would it be helpful if teachers could look at all of their student assessment data and their attendance data and their behavior data and maybe some other types of data? If they were able to look at it in a single location without having to go hunting down and logging into multiple systems to try and draw conclusions or to get a picture of the whole child, that's really what it's about. At the core of data interoperability, we're really talking about how do we help improve instruction? How do we help personalize learning for kids? How do we identify students who might be at risk for dropping out? How do we identify that student who always happens to be absent on a Thursday, and it turns out they have trouble to getting school on a Thursday? That's something that the school might be able to help with. Once you have that data interoperability in place, the potential use cases for improving education just grow exponentially.
Elana:
You said EdTech is behind generally in this. How behind are we? I'm curious, since this is your job, you probably see districts that are very high on the spectrum of data interoperability. Can you talk to me about what it looks like in that full-fledged here's what it is? But it sounds like that's the exception and not the rule generally in EdTech right now, right?
Susan:
Absolutely. CoSN does their IT leadership survey every year. I believe in their most recent survey, they were talking, and I believe the statistics they quote – and I don't have the survey in front of me – but I think it was, for instance, just taking single sign-on. Single sign-on was the most implemented aspect of interoperability in K-12 schools that they evaluated or that they surveyed. I think 47% of schools said they had partially implemented single sign-on. But only 33% had said they had fully implemented single sign-on. When you think just about single sign-on and you think of what are some of the ramifications besides the loss of instructional time, well, with the rise in cybersecurity attacks in school, ransomware, and other hackers, a lot of schools are finding that their costs for cyber liability insurance are skyrocketing. More than doubling or even tripling in a single year.
A lot of those companies are now requiring multifactor authentication, whereby when a teacher or even sometimes potentially a student logs into a system, they have to also authenticate by either a code that's texted to your phone – a lot of people are probably very familiar with that – or they might have an app on their phone, like an authenticator app that generates a code for them. Or there might be a physical token that they have to use in order to log in. Well, imagine that you had to do multifactor authentication and you didn't have single sign-on in place. Now you're taking the 86 classroom tools, already you have problems with passwords, and then you're adding multifactor authentication onto that? Mind blown. I don't even want to think about that. That's just an example of one of the most adopted interoperable technologies, and a few examples of why it's important.
But you're right, a lot of school systems are not very far along on their data interoperability journey. There are some that are. They tend to be, not always, but generally the districts that tend to be further along in their interoperability journey are often the larger districts, because they have more resources. Quite frankly. It's very hard. There's a shortage of skilled data analysts in the K-12 space, let alone data engineers in the K-12 space. A lot of times, it's only the largest districts with the largest budgets that have the ability to have the human capacity to implement data interoperability at that scale.
We also view it as an equity issue, and there are alternatives. There are companies that will, for instance, host data services. Whether that's an operational data store or a data warehouse or some combination of those, that will do the technical heavy lifting for you. A platform as a service or a software as a service offering. But it's still a challenge for a lot of districts. Because we all know the average district in the United States, I think is 3000 students. They're not going to have a very big IT team. You still have those schools where the IT director is also the PE teacher and also coaches track after school. Schools do not tend to be overwhelmed with lots of technology personnel.
Elana:
But that has huge ramifications in student learning, student safety, data safety, all of these things. I'm glad that you actually brought it back to "here's what it's really like." Because everywhere around in my schools, especially with teacher and educator shortages right now, most schools are losing their tech people. Their tech people are potentially going out of education, going into jobs where they can make more money, and they are left with nothing. That person was already doing ten million things. Just the basic things. Not even thinking about what you're talking about yet, that would be a pipe dream for them.
I think we have a huge opportunity in education. I want to quantify the risk we're putting our schools and our student data in by getting into this conversation around data privacy and cyber security. Because as you said, insurance rates and all that stuff is skyrocketing up because we don't even have the basics in place. But I do know anyone following news on K-12 education noticed that we experienced the largest student data breach to date recently, from the Illuminate Education debacle. Maybe if you want to just talk from your, I'd love to hear your thoughts on what do you think happened. Are we set up to do this again? It feels like we don't have a lot of infrastructure in place. How can EdTech people assure those that are purchasing their products that their product is safe and not going to do this as well? Because this was a pure – there were lies involved, right? Didn't they say they were doing something and then they didn't?
Susan:
Yeah. In case any of your listeners aren't familiar with the recent Illuminate data breach, Illuminate is company that makes different software products that are used by many schools, including some very large districts. They had a recent data breach that was the largest breach of student data in history. It affected literally hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of students. Districts all over the country and some of the largest districts – at the New York City Department of Education, I think, was where it was first announced. But the news of the breach has spread to other districts that were impacted as well. The reason it was so consequential, not just because of the data breach itself, but because apparently from what I have read, Illuminate had attested to the district that they had certain data security protocols in place. That data was encrypted on their servers. It turned out that they did not have all of their data encrypted, which was how this breach was able to happen.
I would first say to EdTech service providers that it's very important that if you say that you are doing something with regard to cybersecurity, you'd better be actually doing it, because I think this has had some pretty significant consequences. Also, at the national level, I know there's a lot of movement at the federal level towards updating federal privacy laws. There's also been a lot of movement at federal level with regard to recognizing K-12 education as critical data infrastructure. When you start getting the attention of politicians in Washington, who seemingly can't agree on anything except the need for improved student data privacy, that says something. That's really significant. I think we're going to be seeing some significant movement in Washington with regard to updating FERPA and with cybersecurity requirements. It's not just schools that are at risk for being hacked or being victims of ransomware attacks. Vendors are also at risk.
This is what happened in this case. It wasn't that the school systems did anything wrong. This was on the vendor. School systems are great. Now, not only do we have to worry about student data being protected on our end, but we also have to start really carefully vetting our vendors and making sure that they are protecting their data on their end. One thing that was also pretty significant was that the Future of Privacy Forum has something called the Student Privacy Pledge. Illuminate was signatory to the student privacy pledge. The Future of Privacy Forum recently announced that they basically rescinded Illuminate's membership with a Student Privacy Pledge and they were turning the matter over to the FTC for additional investigations. It's a really big deal.
I feel like for the EdTech service providers who are listening to this, I think it's very important that you really take cybersecurity very seriously. That it's important that, for instance, sales and marketing people really understand exactly what your product does and doesn't do with regards to protecting student data privacy and cybersecurity. Whatever you do, don't say that your product does something when it doesn't. Because that can get you in all kinds of hot water.
Elana:
You're so nice. I was like, "They lied." [inaudible 00:30:04]. You're right. You're right. They misrepresent. I think everything you said is before, schools just had to worry about what they had and their data that was theirs. Now they have to worry about how secure their vendors are. Let's get into that a little bit. If I am an educator looking at just using a freemium tool in the classroom, or if I'm an IT director looking at purchasing an EdTech tool, what are the things you would look for to say, "Oh, this is a secure tool that I could feel confident using?"
Susan:
Well, I think one really terrific resource for districts is – there's several terrific resources that I can refer folks to. I can actually maybe include some of those in the Show Notes, Elana, so that you can include it. But the Student Data Privacy Consortium, which is, you'll add that to the search notes, they have a National Data Privacy Agreement. There are several states that have adopted versions of the National Data Privacy Agreement. There are some states that require their districts to sign contracts with every vendor they work with, whether that's free or paid, that are attesting to certain, basically, privacy and cybersecurity provisions. If you join the Student Data Privacy Consortium, and the database used to be free to search – I don't think it's a significant fee to join – but you can actually see the existing contracts that districts have signed with vendors.
If you want to get language, if you say, "Well, I don't know what kinds of questions I can ask," well, you can search the database and you can see, "Oh, well, this neighboring district had signed a contract with this vendor. Or this district in another state had signed a contract with this vendor." But here's the language that they used. Districts, even if you are not yet currently required by law to sign contracts with all of the tools that you use, it's considered best practice. Eventually, I think it's going to become standard practice. I think that's a great place to start, is to look at the, again, it's the Student Data Privacy Consortium. They have a National Data Privacy Agreement. Take a look at what the requirements are there, and then build your contract based on that and whatever specific privacy laws you may have in your state.
Elana:
I had no idea that even existed. That is amazing. That was a gold mine.
Susan:
It is a fabulous resource. In fact, Project Unicorn – I'm going to do a little plug – we have a webinar that we're doing in late September with the Student Data Privacy Consortium and Access 4 Learning, which is one of the data standards bodies. That also is the umbrella organization for the Student Data Privacy Consortium and with the Future of Privacy Forum. We're going to be talking exactly about data privacy and interoperability. How do they connect? How are they related? How are they different? What are the considerations you need to make? It's going to be on September 27th. If I could get a login registration form by then for the Show Notes, Elana, I'll be sure to get you one.
Elana:
Sure. Then just to open up the umbrella on this topic, just because we've talked specifically about data breach, really, and it's narrowing the field a little bit. I will say that there's a whole gamut of stuff in cybersecurity that we haven't talked about. When we think about, if I'm just an educator and I don't want to look at contracts, I work with a lot of EdTech companies, my team as well. If I go to an EdTech site and they don't have a webpage devoted to all the things they're doing to make your data secure, that's a red flag, too. Make sure they have all those standards. They're COPA. They're FERPA. They have a privacy statement that shows they truly care and it's easy to digest. They have something a little bit more in depth, the privacy policy, so you can see how long they store your data. Then what happens when they delete a record? All of those things truly matter because data privacy, student data privacy has been in the news since the beginning of EdTech, really. A lot of the big companies. We have Remind and Dojo. Even recently, there was, not an exposé, that feels like very tabloid, but there was an article in The Guardian about all of the EdTech companies on the watch list. There's a lot going on here. Did I miss how you would navigate if you were an educator on just going to a website and trying to figure out if they're safe?
Susan:
Well, one tool that I recommend for educators is Common Sense Media. They have privacy valuations of different EdTech tools. It's basically like a red, yellow, or green rating. If they have concerns about a tool's privacy policy or terms of service, they will outline it in their review. That's an easy way. It's not by any stretch of the imagination, like, the same as a legally binding contract. But for educators who are just wanting to get just a market signal, like, "Is this product safe? Or do I need to investigate it more closely?" That's definitely one place that I would send classroom educators, would be the Common Sense Media privacy evaluations.
Elana:
Yes. I love how she's recommending neutral parties. That their job is devoted to really making sure you have the right information. They're evaluating everything from a standard that they expect for safety. Then I'm just going navigate the website.
Susan:
You can't expect teachers to be privacy experts. That's why you should rely on some other folks who've done some of this work for you. Another great resource is Student Privacy Compass, which is studentprivacycompass.org. You can do that for the Show Notes as well, Elana. But they actually have an educator training course on student data privacy that's geared towards classroom teachers. It just helps. It gives educators that baseline understanding of what is all of this privacy stuff. Because most teachers weren't trained in understanding legal language. Nor do they find it particularly enjoyable. But the Student Data Privacy Compass, which is part of the Future of Privacy Forum, does have some excellent resources. If you go to their website – and I'm actually there right now – you go to audiences, and you click on educators, you can see they have an educators' guide for student privacy. They have several information on how to communicate with parents and students. They have their K-12 training. They have a section on security. Lots of good information there.
Elana:
Yes. OK. If you are an educator listening, all of these resources will be in our Show Notes. I hope you just jotted down a couple and know that there are organizations devoted to help you navigate this a little bit in a quick and easy way. We don't expect you to be experts in this. But we do expect you to ask the question now, because it's a necessity to start with. Then from the EdTech companies out there, I know that you all take this very seriously. Every EdTech company now, it's top of mind. But I hope you walk away with how serious this truly is. Just do a quick check on your website. Do a quick check on how you're rating with all of these tools that Susan was talking about. Make sure that you're being as transparent as much as possible. Me coming from communications, it's not something you can just put on your website and forget. You should be talking about it in everything you do. Whether it be your webinar, your social media presence, it's something that you deeply care about.
Susan:
Absolutely. For those EdTech sales reps, take some time to educate yourself about student data privacy. I know for Project Unicorn, we have resources specifically for EdTech sales reps about interoperability. But make sure that you are familiar with your company's privacy policy and your terms of service. Make sure that you can answer those questions honestly and truthfully. You don't have to be a lawyer, but you should know the basics so that you can answer questions and really better represent your product.
Elana:
Great. Well, let's switch gears a little bit. I'd love you – given your expertise in everything going around on all things data, cybersecurity, digital citizenship. At the time this episode will launch in late September, educators are really wrapping up their back-to-school season. You've been an educator. I would love your thoughts to educators, parents, admins, and maybe even education tech companies that are scrambling. You can leave it open. But anything you want to say to them at this time of their lives in a very challenging, unique school year?
Susan:
Well, first of all, I want to say from the very bottom of my heart, thank you, to every educator who's listening to this podcast. Whether you are a classroom teacher. Whether you are an instructional coach. Whether you're a building administrator, a district administrator. The past two years have been unbelievably difficult. I can't count how many times during the pandemic I said to myself, "I am so glad I am not a school-based technology director right now." You guys have gone through so much during the past couple of years. I just want to say thank you for the work that you're doing, because you do matter. The work that you do matters. I know that the past two years have been extraordinarily challenging. I just want to say thank you for the work that you're doing.
To the EdTech service providers, I would ask you to make sure that you are aware of the challenges that educators have been facing for the past two years and be thoughtful and intentional in the marketing of your products. Do not overwhelm teachers with sales stuff during the first three weeks of school, that's just bad. There's no faster way to turn people off your product than to be emailing them aggressive sales pitches during the first couple weeks of school. That's just a crazy time for anyone who works in education. Remember that the first couple of weeks of school can be anywhere from early August through mid-September depending on where schools are located. You have a lot of schools in the South that start in August. I know my grandchildren go to school in Florida, and they are already in school. Whereas currently up in Connecticut, they're not starting until after Labor Day. Be sensitive to the fact. Make sure that the product that you're selling is really going to be helping solve challenges that educators face.
Elana:
When we think about back to school, I was just reading – I think at this point it was a Facebook post from somebody in the school system – they said, "Here's my day. I come in and I see over 100 emails from EdTech companies." Aggressive emails trying to sell them. They are starting their school day, and they have to open up this bomb of an email box. Some are even doing the old-school calling. I think what Susan said around that is really critical. I always talk to EdTech companies and say, "In October is when you should start thinking about a unique way to reach out that provides value."
Susan:
Yes, I agree 100%.
Elana:
Yeah. Susan, thank you for those words. I will just echo everything you said. Thank you to everyone listening. But just more importantly, thank you to what you're doing for education. To even just listen and professionally develop yourself and listen to awesome people like Susan shows that you truly care and that you're going above and beyond to be better. I am inspired every day by educators being those lifelong learners, being just guided by curiosity and passion and selflessness.
Susan:
Absolutely. I think you made such a great point. Just the fact that people are listening and that they're interested in growing and learning is a great sign, because that's really what we want to teach our students. We want them to become lifelong learners. By modeling that ourselves, as whether that's in our roles as parents, as educators, as education technology professionals, whatever your role is, I think that commitment to lifelong learning is really important.
Elana:
Agreed. Well, I know we could talk all day about this. For me, I'm like a learner soaker-upper, too. I'm like, "Tell me more all about this interesting stuff, because I couldn't imagine devoting my entire day to this stuff." You know the nooks and crannies. Anybody who wants to reach out to Susan, she will share that in the Show Notes. But how can people just quickly get in touch with you, Susan?
Susan:
You can always find me on Twitter. I'm @S_Bearden on Twitter. Or you can also find me on LinkedIn, Susan M Bearden on LinkedIn, and will make sure to include my email address also in the Show Notes. But I would love to hear from you. I love connecting people to information. It is my favorite thing to do. It's one thing I love about my work with Project Unicorn, is that I connect people to resources that help them do their jobs better. That just makes my heart happy. Anything I can do to support listeners, no matter what your role in education, please don't hesitate to reach out.
Elana:
Yes. Project Unicorn is also on all the socials too. They're on Twitter.
Susan:
Yes. We are @ProjectUnicorn on Twitter. I think that's our primary social platform. But yes, definitely check out our website, projectunicorn.org. Regardless of what role you have in education and whether you're at a state level or a local education agency, we've got resources to help you.
Elana:
Great. Then the last thing we ask all of our guests, which is a bit of a fun question, too, is – I get inspired listening to what your answers are around this. But it's funny, because we're asking you how you stay inspired. But education is hard. We have all long days, and our heart is so invested in what we do, so emotionally it can be draining. How do you keep going in those days that you're just like, I am dead? We are recording this on a Friday and we are both in that "I am dead."
Susan:
Yes. We are both in that "I am dead" phase. You're right.
Elana:
What are you going to do this weekend? Or after work, to just put some pep in your step and say, "Alright, I got this for next week?"
Susan:
I think it's important to remember – and I struggle with this, but I'm always trying to get better, and I've gotten better at it as I've gotten older – is that you need to set boundaries between your work and your personal life, because there's always more work to be done. It doesn't matter what your job is. Especially when I was teaching, I would wake up at two in the morning when I was teaching, or even as a tech director, worrying about something. Or something not going to happen. Or my students. How am I going to handle this in class today? Or what have you. I think it's important to be able to set boundaries between your personal and professional lives.
For me, one of my favorite hobbies is dog training. I do competitive obedience training with my Corgi, Ellie, as a hobby. I'm going to a couple of practice dog shows this weekend, and I love it, because it's the one thing I do that has absolutely nothing to do with my professional identity whatsoever. I'm still a learner, and it's a lot of fun for me, and it's a great way for me to relax and recharge. You'll find me out with my dog this weekend, and I'm really looking forward to it.
Elana:
That is amazing. I'm just thinking about Best in Show, that movie, now.
Susan:
That was a terrifyingly accurate depiction of the confirmation world dog shows. I do competitive obedience. It's a little different. But yeah, it was terrifyingly accurate.
Elana:
Yeah, a fun fact about –
Susan:
Good movie to watch.
Elana:
It is super funny, though.
Susan:
It is.
Elana:
On my dad's side, my aunt has been a dog show breeder since she was 18. She's like that stern character. What was that lady that was the stern dog trainer? That was my aunt. She does Rhodesian Ridgebacks.
All right, everyone. Well, thank you all for joining us. I really appreciate it. I appreciate you taking the time out of your busy, hectic lives. Especially if you've already gone through a lot of the back-to-school and this is such a challenging year. Know from the bottom of our hearts, we appreciate you.
You can access all the Show Notes that we were talking about. This one has a lot of really usable resources. It's going to be at Leoniconsultinggroup.com. that's two Gs, Leoniconsultinggroup.com/thirty. Like your birthday 30. I was going to pretend I was 30. But that ship has sailed. We'll have all the resources, all the detailed notes too. What did Susan talk about? What were the themes? We're going to put that all up on the Show Notes. If you liked this episode, please feel free to give us a five-star review on Apple or anywhere that you view or listen to podcasts. We will see you next time on All Things Marketing and Education. Take care.
Thanks so much for listening to this week's episode. If you liked what you heard and want to dive deeper, you can visit Leoniconsultinggroup.com/podcasts for all Show Notes, links, and freebies mentioned in each episode. We always love friends. Please connect with us on Twitter @Leonigroup. If you enjoyed today's show, go ahead and click the subscribe button to be the first one notified when our next episode is released. We'll see you next week on All Things Marketing and Education.
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Elana Leoni, Host
Elana Leoni has dedicated the majority of her career to improving K-12 education. Prior to founding LCG, she spent eight years leading the marketing and community strategy for the George Lucas Educational Foundation, where she grew Edutopia’s social media presence exponentially to reach over 20 million education change-makers every month.
Susan Bearden, Guest
Susan M. Bearden, CETL, is the Director of Digital Programs for InnovateEDU, where she leads Project Unicorn, a collaboration of 16 organizations seeking to support and promote the use of data interoperability in K-12 education. A former teacher and K-12 technology leader, she previously served as the Chief Innovation Officer for CoSN and as a Senior Fellow at the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Technology. The author of Digital Citizenship: A Community-Based Approach, Susan is passionate about facilitating best practices in education technology in support of innovative teaching and learning. She was named one of EdTech K12 Magazine’s Top 30 K12 IT Influencers for 2022.
About All Things Marketing and Education
What if marketing was judged solely by the level of value it brings to its audience? Welcome to All Things Marketing and Education, a podcast that lives at the intersection of marketing and you guessed it, education. Each week, Elana Leoni, CEO of Leoni Consulting Group, highlights innovative social media marketing, community-building, and content marketing strategies that can significantly increase brand awareness, engagement, and revenue.
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