Why I Left Silicon Valley, EdTech, and “Personalized” Learning

Relevant Snippets

“It was isolating with every child working on something different; it was impersonal with kids learning basic math skills from Khan Academy; it was disembodied and disconnected, with a computer constantly being a mediator between my students and me.”

“Hyper-individualization does precisely what the emerging body of research says it does and more: it isolates children, it breeds competition, it assumes that children can learn entirely on their own, and it dehumanizes the learning environment, reducing the human experience of learning down to a mechanistic process, one where children become the objects of learning as opposed to the subjects of their own educational narrative.”

“But technologists know that good technology is only built to fulfill needs that didn’t previously have solutions. Curiosity, compassion, and a love for learning are needs that are already accounted for. They are accounted for by teachers–not computers.”