Looking forward to one of SXSW’s earlier programs. ‘Innovation and Learning’ is the theme.
I attended a meetup in advance of the main event. Just some interesting tidbits after meeting conference organizers and volunteers:
1. EDU is less prominent than other portions of the main conference such as music, film, and TV. There are interesting events covered by the Interactive portion which would interest EDU attendees. I plan to attend some of these panels: link
2. Less presence of streamers, YouTubers, TikTokers for EDU panels. An incredible amount of EDU type content is consumed by K-12 and college kids. Like many older adults, I learn a lot using YouTube and have posted YouTube videos in this blog.
If our kids spend their lives on YouTube and TikTok, shouldn’t there be more conference presence of the social media influencers within the EDU space? Definitely, there are speakers this year covering this confluence. I’d like to see more.
3. Most school and college systems still function in an analog fashion. The future is now and anyone who’s focused on digital learning and AI will leapfrog those who just consume textbooks. If anyone is wondering about the wealthy geeks who’ve transplanted to Austin. Well, they came from a life of digital learning. They chose the fast track to economic self-sufficiency. A pot of gold awaits those who consume and create marketplaces which the world wants. The torrent of personalized knowledge coming from social media could be curated much better for our school systems by educators. Our children deserve tech-driven accelerators that will allow them to compete globally.
4. SXSW has a partnership with Penske Media which controls popular podcast medium Vox Media and publications such as Rolling Stone. Content consumption on these traditional sources of info is declining. Supposedly, traditional media may become extinct per this New Yorker piece.
5. Offering my skills to the Austin community as someone who’s been in Tech and contributed to EDU oriented nonprofits such as BUILD and Upwardly Global. I’ve also convened social impact programs such as the following: link
Happy to help!
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