Is Ed-Tech Killing this Conference?
Concurrent Session 5

Brief Abstract
Where exactly does innovation take place? Who defines what innovation is? Faculty? Administrators? Entrepreneurs? The answers to these questions are deeply contested in today’s ed-tech marketplace. This session brings into discussion a diverse group of stakeholders--faculty members, instructional designers, vendors, and conference organizers--struggling with these questions.
Presenters



Extended Abstract
Where exactly does innovation take place? Who defines what innovation is? Faculty? Administrators? Entrepreneurs? The answers to these questions are deeply contested in today’s ed-tech marketplace as Silicon Valley start-ups boast that they have all the solutions to the problems of education and academic technologists and faculty members are increasingly skeptical of the role of technology, and especially the business of technology, in the academy.
Can higher education professionals trust commercial enterprises with developing innovative products for education? How do academic administrators and technologists place checks on the power of vendors? Can the Ivory Tower innovate on its own without the Valley? How can institutions of higher ed work together with technology companies to build tools that clearly benefit teaching and learning and aren’t drive just by the bottom line?
This session brings together a diverse group of stakeholders struggling with these questions. They are faculty members, instructional designers, academic technologists, vendors, and conference organizers. Each will present a single slide outlining their perspective on the problem and possibilities of education technology. The panelists will then facilitate discussion with session attendees, soliciting audience perspectives and working as a group to imagine solutions.
The aim of this conversation is to move beyond easy celebrations and critiques of education technology towards a working model for how higher ed and tech professionals can authentically collaborate in the innovation of new teaching and learning technologies. Our plan is to collect both practical and theoretical ideas shared and developed in the session and distribute more widely within the OLC community and beyond.