An Ed-Tech Tragedy?

The COVID-19 pandemic pushed education from schools to educational technologies at a pace and scale with no historical precedent. For hundreds of millions of students, formal learning became fully dependent on technology - whether internet-connected digital devices, televisions or radios. An Ed-Tech Tragedy? examines the numerous adverse and unintended consequences of the shift to ed-tech. It documents how technology-first solutions left a global majority of learners behind and details the many ways education was diminished even when technology was available and worked as intended. Using tragedy as a metaphor and borrowing the organization of a three-act theatrical play, the book shows how technology-first modes of learning introduced novel health and safety risks, handed significant control of public education to for-profit companies, expanded invasive digital surveillance and carried detrimental environmental repercussions, in addition to adversely impacting educational access, equity, quality and outcomes in most contexts. Dedicated sections consider alternative and less technology-reliant educational responses to COVID-19 disruptions that had the potential to be more inclusive and equitable. The analysis further explains how pandemic models of learning are rippling beyond school closures and influencing the future of education. Holistically, the work invites readers to reconsider a turbulent chapter in education history and reexamine the purposes and roles of technology in education.

Mark West is an education specialist at UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, where he researches and writes about education with a special focus on technology. He advises governments, international organizations and civil society groups about opportunities and risks for education in an age of accelerating digital change. Prior to joining UNESCO, Mr. West worked as a journalist, history teacher and teacher trainer. He is a graduate of Stanford University and a former Fulbright Fellow. In addition to an An Ed-Tech Tragedy?, Mr. West is the author of numerous UNESCO publications about technology and education, including I'd Blush if I Could and Reading in the Mobile Era. I'd Blush if I Could prompted Apple and other large technology companies to make changes to the way AI voice assistants project gender. It clarified how education can help close digital gender divides and was praised by experts and media outlets around world. Reading in the Mobile Era brought international attention to the ways governments, schools and families can leverage inexpensive mobile technologies to help advance literacy.

INTRODUCTION: Defining ed-tech / The origins and rise of ed-tech / Ed-tech and technology solutionism / Why tragedy? / Situating the disruption / A Netflix moment for commercial ed-tech | Act 1: THE HOPE OF TECH SALVATION: Reformatting schools with technology / Cut the red tape and catapult education to a better future | Act 2: FROM PROMISES TO REALITY: Most learners were left behind / Inequalities were supercharged / Learners engaged less, achieved less and left state-provisioned education/ Education was narrowed and impoverished / Immersion in technology was unhealthy / Environmental tolls multiplied with the ed-tech boom / The private sector tightened its grip on public education / Surveillance, control and machine processes marked the move to ed-tech | Inter-Act: LOOKING BACK TO SEE AHEAD: School closures, the shift to remote learning and public health / Did technology-mediated remote learning contribute to the prolongation of school closures? / If not ed-tech, then what? / Was COVID-19 an education crisis? / Ed-tech finds a new rationale - resilience Is technology a pillar of educational resilience? / If ed-tech is the answer, what is the question? | Act 3: NEW DIRECTIONS FOR ED-TECH: Prioritize the best interests of students and teachers / Reaffirm the primacy of in-person learning / Strengthen digital connectivity, capacities and content / Protect the right to education from shrinking ground | CONCLUSION: Remembering the ed-tech experiences of the pandemic / The arc of tragedy / Reorienting and steering the digital transformation of education