Edtech 28

 

researchED 2022

For the second time, I shelled out some of my own hard-earned cash to attend researchED 2022. Instead of last year’s schlep to Stratford, this year was an 88 bus from Westminster straight to Parliament Hills Schools in Hampstead. Arriving early allowed me the luxury of breakfast and coffee at a local independent deli, something […]

23 days ago Education More
 

Don’t waste your time reading the DfE’s latest edtech report

Making sense of the business of edtech has always been a challenge. It’s why I set up the Assignment Report in 2005 and why I read the DfE’s most recent edtech report, published in June, with interest. Business Intelligence (BI) is weak in most education and edtech companies and is too rarely integrated effectively into […]

2 months ago Education More
 

1520 600gm Mangos (what it means in China)

For governments worldwide, education is a major policy and spending area, so it’s inevitable they try to influence it as much as their remit allows. In most Western countries, scope is often limited by the structural and segmented nature of learning, e.g. Pre-school, K12, HE, FE, corporate learning, etc.  In China, however, the government (the […]

2 months ago Education More
 

An existential threat to Chinese edu companies?

The other 261 Chinese companies listed in the US (those on the NYSE alone have a market cap of about £1.1tn) are facing another existential threat – expulsion from US capital markets in 2024 unless they comply with the US Security and Exchange Commission’s new auditing standards. In May the SEC announced 80 NYSE-listed Chinese […]

3 months ago Education More
 

Ethics and edtech

Edtech and education are as full of hypocrisy, cant and mendacious action as any part of the economy. The sooner we accept this, the better we can, as individuals and as organisations,examine and calibrate our attitudes and ideas. The recent possible boycott BETT, is but one example. I had a minor role in raising the […]

6 months ago Education More
 

Can AI predict autism with 96% accuracy?

Can the AI edtech software from UK company Century Tech, predict autism with 96% accuracy? My thoughts.

7 months ago Education More
 

Crapresophobia (an aversion to poor research)

Like too many things today, debate about educational research is polarised and contentious. I saw this when working as an ‘edtech expert’ on the EU’s H2020 programme; at a meeting, after the head of the programme admitted to wasting €300m, we had a long debate about the need for fast, independent research (not just internal […]

1 year ago Education More
 

Taylor’s 10 2021

The first version of my simple test for anyone serious about edtech was published in 2014. This is the updated version, but for this is just a first filter and anyone who gets past it (no cheating on Google) then face the far trickier Taylor’s Secret edtech test! How many edtech unicorns have $1bn+ revenue? […]

1 year ago Education More
 

NTP FUBAR?

The story that the £160m Phase 2 of the National Tutoring Programme (NTP 2.0) will go to Randstad and not the Education Endowment Foundation’s subsidiary the National Tutoring Foundation Ltd, was broken by Will Hazel in The i on 9 May. Kudos to Mr Hazel and it seems that the NTP will make a formal […]

1 year ago 2 Education More
 

The importance of assessing Technical Debt & high-performance in early stage investments

I have read over a thousand pitch decks from start-up edtech companies. Less than 1% met my personal tests for investability. Not one covered two specific issues that should be important to investors from every sector, namely: What is the estimated Technical Debt in the business? Do you have a high-performing tech team?   Technical […]

2 years ago Education More