Insights

The new year represents an opportunity to both reflect and look ahead. As such, I’ve been considering what 2022 will bring for the field of education and the education technology market as we enter into yet another year in a pandemic.

My own thoughts are that now, as a ripple effect of COVID-19, more parents and guardians know what and how students are being taught in school. Pre-pandemic, for many families, the extent of parental and guardian involvement in their children’s daily education was limited to twice yearly teacher conferences. With this heightened visibility, combined with the ubiquity of social media, the role of the parent and guardian will be magnified and their voices amplified in 2022. Edtech companies can do a better job of hearing and supporting parents and guardians by investing in portals and communication systems that directly supply specific information about the progress of their child, regardless of where that child is learning.

I also connected with various leaders at Cambium to see what they predict for 2022; below are their thoughts.

Jaya Yoo, SVP of Product Development, Learning A-Z

With students in and out of the classroom, teachers were teaching in bits and pieces. This created drastically different needs for each student, highlighting the importance of being able to access high-quality resources that can be individualized. In 2022, teachers and districts will be reaching for tools that can assist them in meeting each student at the level they’re at, be it through personalized learning resources or tools that support 1:1 instruction.

John Jorgenson, CMO, Cambium Learning Group

As more teachers retire and leave the profession, 2022 will be a year of reckoning for the country. The importance of professional teachers will emerge as an important national conversation. There will be added pressure by governments and businesses to prepare teachers, pay them, and elevate their professional standing. While this shift won’t happen in a single year, 2022 will be seen as a pivotal shift in the zeitgeist.

John Edelson, President, Time4Learning

I predict that homeschooling’s rise in popularity will continue into 2022 due, in large part, to two factors. First, the alignment of homeschooling curriculum with brick-and-mortar schools (which Time4Learning pioneered) makes it easier for families to seamlessly transition between homeschooling and in-person instruction without much disruption. Second, homeschooling techniques -- flexibility, student-paced learning and technology-first academics – are now mainstream, which will lead to more homeschooling growth and a paradigm shift in classrooms.

Nick Gaehde, President, Lexia Learning

With COVID-19 we learned lessons that will carry over into 2022. The first is that technology will continue to play an important role in the classroom with expanded infrastructure and broader applications to increase teacher-student engagement. Secondly, we will see the need for greater access to real-time data and analytics to empower teachers to intervene when needed to accelerate individual student achievement. And thirdly, we believe that there will be more urgent attention paid to professional development for K-12 educators. For Lexia, this means instruction in evidence-based, proven methodologies for students and teachers that build on literacy as the foundation to all learning and that create a path to educational equity for all.

Ashley Andersen Zantop, COO, Cambium Learning Group

The pandemic has deepened pre-existing disparities in student opportunities, with a disproportionate impact on students of color and minority communities. To effectively address these widening opportunity gaps, educators need clear visibility to student learning outcomes. Decision-makers at the state and district level and educators in the classroom will continue to have an increasingly urgent need for highly efficient and effective academic measurement combined with clear reporting, including regular formative, interim and summative assessments. This will drive increasing demand for highly adaptive, time-effective, personalized assessments embedded in classroom solutions and independent of instruction.