Academic Standards

Webinar Summary & Transcript - EdGate Joins with 1EdTech to Offer CASE Standards

bford — Thu, 09 Jul 2026 18:59:59 +0000

Webinar Summary & Transcript - EdGate Joins with 1EdTech to Offer CASE Standards bford Thu, 07/09/2026 - 11:59

EdGate Joins With 1EdTech to Offer CASE Standards

Academic Standards

Standards Alignment

EdTech Implementation

Curriculum Alignment

Summary

This webinar introduces EdGate's participation in the 1EdTech CASE (Competencies and Academic Standards Exchange) Network and explores how standardized, machine-readable academic standards can improve interoperability across the K–12 education ecosystem. Featuring representatives from EdGate and 1EdTech, the discussion explains the purpose of the CASE standard, why it was developed, and how it addresses longstanding challenges associated with managing, sharing, and maintaining educational standards across publishers, districts, and technology providers. As digital learning environments continue to expand, the speakers emphasize the growing need for consistent, accessible standards data that can be integrated seamlessly across platforms.

A major focus of the conversation is the importance of moving beyond static documents and proprietary formats toward a common framework for publishing and exchanging academic standards. The panelists explain how CASE enables standards, competencies, rubrics, and framework relationships to be represented in a machine-readable format, allowing curriculum providers, learning management systems, assessment platforms, and other educational technologies to communicate more effectively. They also discuss how universal identifiers (GUIDs) eliminate inconsistencies that have historically required publishers to duplicate alignment work when working with different states or districts.

The webinar also highlights EdGate's role as a CASE Network partner and preferred service provider. The presenters outline how EdGate will mirror CASE Network standards while expanding access to additional subject areas, international standards, and crosswalking capabilities not yet available through the network. They demonstrate how EdGate's standards repository, taxonomy-driven methodology, reporting tools, and CASE-certified API provide publishers with a centralized source for standards management while supporting evolving state adoption requirements and digital curriculum initiatives.

The discussion concludes by emphasizing the broader impact of interoperability on educational publishing and digital learning. By adopting common standards formats, preserving consistent identifiers, and expanding machine-readable access to educational standards, organizations can reduce manual work, improve data accuracy, simplify curriculum alignment, and better prepare for future technology integrations. Collectively, the speakers present CASE as an important step toward creating a more connected, efficient, and scalable educational technology ecosystem.

Key Takeaways

Machine-readable academic standards improve interoperability between curriculum, assessment, and educational technology systems.
Universal CASE identifiers eliminate inconsistencies and reduce duplicate alignment work across publishers, districts, and platforms.
Standardizing how academic standards are published simplifies curriculum alignment, reporting, and state adoption processes.
API-driven access to standards enables organizations to maintain more accurate, timely, and scalable curriculum management workflows.
Crosswalking standards allows publishers to efficiently adapt instructional materials for multiple states and educational frameworks.
Centralized standards repositories help organizations manage evolving state, national, and international academic standards more effectively.
Adopting open interoperability standards supports digital transformation by enabling educational systems to exchange data more seamlessly.
Collaboration between standards organizations and technology providers creates a more connected, efficient, and future-ready education ecosystem.

Topics Covered

1EdTech CASE Network
Machine-readable academic standards
Standards interoperability
CASE identifiers (GUIDs)
Standards repositories and management
Curriculum alignment and crosswalking
CASE APIs and standards delivery
Digital transformation in K–12 education

Featured Speakers

Gina Faulk

General Manager, EdGate

Kathryn Green

Technical Program Manager, 1EdTech

Jeremy Ashcraft

IT Director & Software Architect, EdGate

Kathleen Ideguchi

Director of Client Services, EdGate

Themes

Why CASE Was Created

The panel explains the interoperability challenges caused by inconsistent standards identifiers, manual workflows, and disconnected educational systems. CASE was developed to provide a universal, machine-readable framework that allows standards to move seamlessly across educational technologies.

Notable Insight

"CASE is a universal framework for publishing standards in a machine-readable format."

Key Questions Explored

What is the CASE specification?
Why are machine-readable education standards important?
How does CASE improve interoperability?

EdGate's Role in the CASE Ecosystem

EdGate describes how its extensive standards repository, alignment services, and CASE-certified API enable publishers and educational organizations to access both existing CASE standards and additional subject areas not yet available through the CASE Network.

Notable Insight

"We're really a single source for providing standards in the CASE format."

Key Questions Explored

How does EdGate support CASE implementation?
What standards are available through EdGate?
How can publishers obtain CASE identifiers?

Digital Transformation Through Standards

The speakers discuss how interoperable standards improve curriculum alignment, digital learning systems, assessments, reporting, and future educational technology innovation.

Notable Insight

"The CASE standard addresses the challenge by providing a universal framework for publishing standards in machine-readable formats."

Key Questions Explored

How do CASE standards support digital transformation?
Why are APIs important for education standards?
How do CASE identifiers benefit publishers and school districts?

What This Means for Education Leaders

As digital learning continues to expand, education organizations should prioritize solutions that support interoperability and consistent standards management across their technology ecosystems. Adopting machine-readable standards and common data formats can reduce manual processes, improve data accuracy, and simplify the exchange of curriculum and assessment information between platforms.

The discussion also highlights the value of maintaining a centralized, up-to-date approach to academic standards. Organizations that invest in scalable standards management, crosswalking capabilities, and API-driven integrations are better positioned to respond to changing state requirements, streamline curriculum development, and support more efficient implementation of digital learning initiatives.

Finally, the webinar reinforces that collaboration across standards organizations, technology providers, and content developers is essential for building a more connected education ecosystem. By embracing open standards like CASE, education leaders can improve interoperability, reduce duplication of effort, and create more flexible systems that better support educators and learners over time.

I think this follows the same style as the previous webinar pages you've been creating: it focuses on broader strategic implications rather than summarizing EdGate's products, making it more valuable as evergreen content for both readers and AI search engines.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What is the CASE specification?

A: CASE (Competencies and Academic Standards Exchange) is a 1EdTech Global standard that provides a machine-readable format for publishing academic standards, competencies, rubrics, and relationships between learning frameworks.

Q: Why are CASE identifiers important?

A: CASE identifiers create consistent, globally unique references for standards, reducing duplicate work and improving interoperability between publishers, districts, assessments, and learning platforms.

Q: How does EdGate support CASE?

A: EdGate provides CASE-formatted standards, certified API access, standards alignment services, curriculum crosswalking, and additional standards not yet available through the CASE Network.

Q: What is curriculum crosswalking?

A: Curriculum crosswalking maps one standards framework to another, allowing existing alignments to be reused across multiple states or educational systems without repeating the entire alignment process.

Q: Why are machine-readable academic standards important for K–12 education?

A: Machine-readable academic standards enable curriculum, assessment, and learning technology systems to exchange data consistently, reducing manual work, improving interoperability, and making standards easier to maintain across states, districts, and educational platforms.

Featured Quotes

"The CASE standard addresses the challenge by providing a universal framework for publishing standards in machine-readable format."

Full Webinar Transcript

Opening Remarks

Gina Faulk

–to Jeremy Ashcraft, EdGate’s technical manager, as well as Kathleen Ideguchi, who is another of our lead technical product managers. She's also joining; she's going to help us out with the Q&A.

So we're gonna go ahead and get started. I see a few people are still joining. Today, the goal of this meeting is to explain and announce EdGate’s new participation in the CASE Network. We just joined CASE–or 1EdTech over the summer, and we're going to walk through and explain more about what EdGate will be doing with 1EdTech, and Kathryn is here to explain more about CASE and give some background on the CASE Network. So, again, Gina Faulk and Kathryn Green lead the meeting today.

Before we get started, all of the participants’ videos will be turned off, as well as microphones. If you have questions during this webinar, please go ahead and type them into the Q&A box, and we will address questions at the close of this meeting. If we don't have time, we'll definitely follow up after the meeting and answer as many questions as we can.

Discussion

Gina Faulk

So first, I wanted to give a quick overview of EdGate. EdGate has been around since 1997. The core of what we do is to align publisher content to educational standards. Mostly K-12, although we do venture into professional development, higher ed, and early childhood. We have tools that we license out to our clients. The ExACT Alignment Tool is our do-it-yourself alignment tool. We also license out standards as well, so in order to do all the alignments to the standards for our clients, we have to keep a huge repository of not only the U.S. standards, but also international standards across K-12, and again, into those other subjects as well, so we've built a large repository of over five million standards at this point. A big chunk of that is the CTE standards that we also house. So it's crucial and there's so many ways that we can help 1EdTech because we are maintaining all of those standards.

Some of the EdGate highlights I wanted to mention: EdGate does have several patents around our methodology. We also use a controlled vocabulary or a taxonomy in order to align content to standards, meaning that we tag content with a concept which then maps out to all the standards. So we've already tagged the standards, and when we tag the content, it basically marries the content to the standards. We have a team of mostly former teachers who do our custom alignment work, so it's a team of subject matter experts across all subjects. So anything from ELA (English Language Arts), math, science, social studies, SEL (Social Emotional Learning), they're able to review the content and then tag it with our taxonomy. We also have an AI-based tool that we use for high-volume projects. So it's projects that have really good metadata that we're able to use a more automated approach to quickly and efficiently map all of that content to standards. We also have a repository of open educational resources. We have over 100,000 open educational resources that we've aligned to standards as well, and we license out that data to companies. It could be a learning management system, a software company, or anybody who might need to gap fill what they currently have. As I mentioned previously, we also have CTE standards as well, so we're able to align CTE content to learning requirements and learning outcomes. And, of course, not only do we manage the U.S. standards and maintain the repository of U.S. standards, but we also offer the Australian, Canadian, U.K., and Indian. We often feel like the Australian and Canadian standards are as much work to keep up as the U.S. standards. It's a really big task to keep those up.

In addition to everything I've mentioned, we also do some additional services as well. So we do crosswalking, meaning that if a client has already aligned their content to, say, the Texas TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills) exams, we can take those alignments and map them to additional standard sets. So we can take those alignments and then cross-select them over to New York, or California, or even to Canadian standards. So it really removes the need to align state by state. We're able to take the existing alignment and map it out, and again, it all relies on our taxonomy of concepts.

Most of our clients use our reporting tool, which is the ExACT reporting tool, so what they're able to do is once we've done the alignment or the client has done the alignment using our ExACT tool, they're able to run analytics reporting tools. So if a client is going after an RFP (Request for Proposal) or a state adoption, they are able to run reports state by state in order to provide that information state by state, or to their clients. This also does include gap analysis data, as well, so they can see where their gaps are, where they might need to report back to their product management team and content developers, and produce more content in order to win RFPs or state adoptions.

We also do third-party correlation reviews, so if a client has already correlated their client, but needs a separate set of eyes on their alignment just to check for accuracy, or if the state requires it, as some states do now require a third-party sign off on their alignment, as well as a certified letter and statistics, we're able to provide that as well.

And we do deliver our alignments and standards via a state-of-the-art API. Additional deliverables would include a bulk download, which we can also provide. We also have a Correlation User Interface offering, which is basically a widget or an iframe that we place on our client's site–It really is an API, but–it calls in… We're supporting that tool, so the client can actually log into the publisher site and view the correlations in real-time, and it's calling into EdGate’s system to report back that data.

So, now I'm going to turn it over to Kathryn, who's going to give a quick overview of 1EdTech.

Kathryn Green

Hi, everybody, thanks for joining us today.

This is the quickest of quick overviews of 1EdTech. We are an international, non-profit, educational, technology collaborative, and you can see that we have over 570 members that make up the 1EdTech Community. And those partners represent K-12, higher ed, corporate, and edtech suppliers, of which EdGate is, of course, now one. Breaking down some of the more granular memberships, you can see those numbers there.

The mission of 1EdTech is there in blue: to “Advance teaching and learning through technology that can affordably scale to improve educational access and attainment”. I think in the last six or seven months, we've seen how important that mission can really be. And the way that we execute on that mission is by facilitation and support of digital standards and specifications that are created by our members. We invite you to check out our website. You can see the link there, it's 1EdTech.org, and the image itself is to our annual report from 2019, which I also invite you to check out.

Can I have the next slide, please? Great.

The 1EdTech Certified Product Directory is a key output of 1EdTech. In the product directory, you can see over 5000 products that have been certified to meet the standards of the 1EdTech specifications. I'm sure some of you have seen many of those before, and perhaps you have run into 1EdTech because of a certified product.

You can check out that site for certification itself at 1EdTech.org/certification/get-certified. You'll also find that if you go into the product directory, you'll find EdGate in there as a certified member of 1EdTech, who is certified to the CASE specification for both consumer and provider abilities. We'll talk more about CASE real shortly, but I'll switch back to Gina here for a second so she can talk about how EdGate and CASE first connected.

Gina Faulk

Sure. Thank you, Kathryn.

I wanted to just tell a quick story. This is really our first introduction to why something like CASE is necessary and would be so helpful. In 2015, Houston ISD (Independent School District) was working with a learning management system, and this learning management system included content from a myriad of sources. All kinds of publishers were submitting their content, or their content had been adopted by Houston. The problem that happened was that various GUIDs (Globally Unique Identifiers) or UUIDs (Universally Unique Identifiers) were used to represent the standards. So, many different ways to represent the TEKS. And obviously and understandably so, Houston wanted a consistent format to be used so that they could link the assessment results with the digital content.

So what happened is that some of the publishers had to go through a process where they might have already aligned their content, but they used different IDs, so they had to go back and redo their alignments to the the format that Houston was using. So it was a very lengthy, convoluted, and expensive process for some of these publishers. And we were very much wrapped into that ourselves, and at the time, we thought, “Yeah. You know, something like an open set of UUIDs or identifiers would be so useful in CASEs like these. So Kathryn is going to talk about that more, but yes, that was really what kind of made us more and more interested in talking with 1EdTech and getting involved.

Kathryn Green

Great. Thanks, Gina.

So, you're seeing pictures of silos up here, and I think we're all pretty familiar with the silo effect that we have in our organizations. CASE was first undertaken to actually solve a problem at higher ed, where support for standards, competencies, academic programs, and software was very poor, and when it did exist in systems, the data was siloed and not very useful. At the same time, there was a group of practitioners in the K-12 space that was also to have an open standard to manage competencies. If you could do one click, Gina, that would be great. And from the bringing of the merging–oop! If we go back real quick? Thank you, no worries! From the merger of those two groups, the CASE standard was born, with CASE standing for “Competencies and Academic Standards Exchange”.

Next slide. Thank you.

So, in a learning and education system, you can see all these areas that are really important to teaching and learning, but they're not connected, and they don't talk to each other. Institutions that we’re paying millions of dollars for their software systems, while standards and competencies were being managed in a spreadsheet or a Word document, and distributed via PDF–maybe that spreadsheet over there looks familiar to some of you–this is far from a scalable solution.

Okay, next slide?

Then, bringing CASE into the system and using CASE academic standards and competencies, your data can then flow through data systems and integrate into your teaching and learning environments. From program design and enrollment, through assessment and credentialing.

Next slide?

Here, 1EdTech Standards, what they do is they enable a connected teaching and learning ecosystem. The CASE standard here is a universal framework for publishing standards in a machine-readable format, and you can see in these separate four areas of teaching and learning, CASE is included because it really serves as a foundation for so many of the ways these areas can be executed. The other items you're seeing listed there with CASE are also 1EdTech specifications that we're not touching on today, but again, I do want to emphasize how important CASE is and serves as a foundation for these other specifications and areas of teaching and learning.

Next slide?

CASE has three separate components that are all machine-readable; so, one, the first component is just to describe the standard or the competency, how it should be assessed there in a rubric, and then third, the relationship the standard has with other standards or frameworks, which enable these crosswalks and linkages that Gina mentioned EdGate provides, and then CASE enables. CASE can connect an institution's program objectives, teaching materials, and resources, and optionally, examples of the learner's work products, and ultimately their credentials, all in a traceable and machine-readable format.

Next slide?

CASE connects frameworks. It can bring sets together of frameworks and help them talk to each other. And the need for a way for users to actually see how those frameworks connect, and how all the parts and pieces of CASE can come together in a user-friendly software, that was really the birth of the CASE Network. If you could hit “click”, please. The CASE Network was then born. CASE Network is a software piece that is run by 1EdTech. “A single, verifiable, trusted source of learning standards and workplace credentials in digital format, making it easier to support digital transformation”.

Next slide, please.

Using CASE Network allows users to get away from the manual work of copying and pasting from PDFs–you'll see that with the rainbow on one side of the slide–and then into a digital, machine-readable format, which you'll see in one view on the other side of the slide. As districts transitioned to digital–many of them very quickly in the past year–they face many challenges with the interoperability of content originating from multiple sources in a variety of formats. One significant challenge has, of course, been that these standards are not machine-readable. The CASE standard, though, addresses the challenge by providing a universal framework for publishing standards in machine-readable formats, with the flexibility to represent learning standards, competencies, rubrics, and the relationships between them.

If you could click real quick, just a small click? Thanks, Gina.

So, what you can see here are some of the GUIDs that are the output of CASE, and these GUIDs themselves, these Global Unique Identifiers, these are what make it machine-readable. The CASE Network itself, it currently includes 50 state standards, plus the Common Core. There's accuracy, because we're mirroring official standards, there's transparency because this is a clickable “WYSIWYG”, or “what you see is what you get” software, and then there's timeliness, because of our secure API that provides updates within minutes.

I think there's one more click? There we go, you can see the machine-readable headline there is included and–

Gina Faulk

Oops, back. There we go.

Kathryn Green

Oh, you're good.

Next up, Gina, we'll talk about how 1EdTech CASE and EdGate are all coming together.

Gina Faulk

Thanks.

So, beginning in early 2019, many of EdGate's clients started asking about CASE and if it was something that we could provide them with. And I think this really started too because of both Georgia and Texas becoming CASE states, with Texas's Proclamation 2020, they actually required that the CASE identifiers be used for their adoption. And so, we started again, realizing that this is something we really need to do, so we've offered our clients the CASE identifiers as part of the deliverable. So if you are an EdGate client and we've aligned your content, then we will provide those CASE identifiers as a separate metadata field so that we're not missing anything with these state adoptions. It's definitely going to be something that's… And we've heard through 1EdTech that more and more states are coming on board. Just this past summer, we joined 1EdTech as a contributing member, a CASE Network Alliance member, a Task Force member, and a CASE Network sponsor, so we're all in now.

And now we are a CASE–or a preferred service partner for the CASE Network. So what does that mean? So, as Kathryn mentioned, there are already–all 50 states, standards, the ELA, and math is already available through the CASE Network. So anyone can go up and view and access those ELA and math standards. And in some cases, there is also science. Some states have the four core already listed, but for the most part, it's mostly ELA and science right now, and again, states will slowly be coming on board over the next few years.

So, for the standards that are not currently available via the CASE Network, EdGate is here to provide standards that would really complement what's already existing in the CASE Network. So, we're talking about social studies, SEL, world languages, art, HPE (Health and Physical Education), and anything that is not listed as part of the CASE Network. And again, if you're already an EdGate client and we have aligned your content, then we would be able to provide those CASE identifiers, specifically for those states that are actively using the CASE identifiers. If you're a client who is looking to license standards, and you want to use what's listed in the CASE Network, but also want other subjects, such as, again, you know, HPE, or maybe it's library media, we would be able to provide all of those standards in the CASE format. So for the sake of consistency, you're using the CASE format across the board. So we're really a single source for providing standards in the CASE format. And again, we would be actually mirroring what's available in the CASE Network, so we will have exactly what's listed in the CASE Network and more. And again, it's ultimately to make the lives of publishers and content providers easier.

This slide just addresses all of the subjects that we currently offer, so again, of course the four core, as well as technology, ESL (English as a Second Language), early childhood, we have Catholic Archdiocese standards, and lots of international standards beyond what's listed here, such as Brazil, Scotland, and many international standards. You can also find an interactive map on our website where you can go in and actually view all of the standards that we have internationally. As far as how to get access to the standards, I'm going to turn it over to our panelist, Jeremy, who will talk about how to get access.

I think you're muted. There you go.

Jeremy Ashcraft

Hey, can you guys hear me okay?

Gina Faulk

Yes.

Jeremy Ashcraft

Okay. So EdGate is going to be providing access to these CASE-formatted standards through a 1EdTech-certified CASE 1.0 API. And we're calling this the EdGate Standards Exchange. And we will try to maintain, you know, as Gina said before, we're going to be mirroring everything that's available in the CASE Network. So if you choose to get all your standards from us, you can still get all of the CASE Network standards via our API. So for any new clients, so people who come and are interested in this, you know, we'll provide some API credentials and… You do have to have an assigned agreement with EdGate. Unfortunately, this isn't free. And for our current clients, we can provide the existing CASE identifiers through some separate metadata in our existing deliverables or the existing API some of our customers use, or the raw bulk download files, and we'll give you those in addition to our own internal identifiers of use.

Can you go to the next slide, please?

Okay, so the EdGate standards change API, as I said before, it's, you know, 1EdTech-certified, we follow all the established best practices that are prescribed by 1EdTech for the CASE Network and for CASE Network provider implementation. So it's secure, using HTTPS/TLS 1.2, and we do our authentication using, you know, industry standard OAuth2 Client Credentials. You know, we offer all the required endpoints. And access is profile-based, so if you come to EdGate and say, “Hey, we only really need science standards”, then, you know, you only get access to the science standards. You won't have to comb through, you know, hundreds and hundreds of different documents just to get at the standards that you need. We will provide you access to just the ones that you want.

One of the nice things about the CASE specification is that it does allow for extension. So some of the things we have on our roadmap are that we're providing all of the–like I said before, all the required base endpoints to get access to all the standards information, and, you know, individual data pieces within that. But we're also going to be offering, down the road sometime, on demand, what we call “auto-crosswalking” between not just two documents, but two or more documents. So if you, say, want to crosswalk Common Core against, you know, Texas and West Virginia, you know, you'll be able to talk to our API and get that crosswalking back immediately. And some of the other things that we're kind of exploring the possibilities on are exposing some of the other functionality that we currently offer to our existing clients on our own API, but doing this through a CASE-enabled API, such as, you know, actually accessing correlations and alignments, and being able to pull that back and get that back in a CASE-compliant format. And some also be able to offer more than just standards and curriculum frameworks, and this is actually something that we've been talking about for CASE 1.1, which is being able to, you know, distinguish the type of data you're getting back in this kind of CASE package. Right now, it's just kind of curriculum standards and frameworks, but there's more talk about being able to do course catalogs, taxonomies, and things like that. And then some of the other functionality we can expose is being able to search inside of some of these CASE documents, and also being able to find when things are updated, and being able to kind of discover, hey, what's been updated in the last week? Or what's been updated in the last quarter, the last month? Being able to go and see some things like that.

Gina Faulk

Great. Okay, thank you, Jeremy.

Kathryn?

Kathryn Green

Yeah, absolutely. Thanks, Jeremy. That's really exciting to hear about all that EdGate is providing.

So, 1EdTech itself we have multiple kinds of memberships available for any of you who are thinking about joining or renewing your membership. We meet–well, you know, in the before times, we met in person at a quarterly meeting, which was so nice. We've been having those meetings virtually lately, and we'll have another virtual meeting coming up in November. And at that November virtual meeting, we're going to announce, and this is very new news, we're going to announce a new kind of membership, which is called a CASE Network Supplier Alliance. We'll have a set of terms and conditions that are required to join the CASE Network Supplier Alliance, but there are many benefits that we're still hammering out, so you'll see a brief list here, but it does give you free entry to 1EdTech; this is for suppliers only. The CASE Consumer Certification is available to you for free, and then a performance mark upon passing that certification, and then access to preferred services, which include EdGate. My email address is there if you'd like to reach out and hear more about either the CASE Network Supplier Alliance or 1EdTech membership in general. I'd love to talk to you about it. Thank you.

Gina Faulk

There we go, there's your email. I'll go back. And I think your email appears at the end again. So, EdGate, as I mentioned, we're all in with 1EdTech now, so there are some other ways that we will also be supporting 1EdTech. So, again, we're participating in several boards and the Task Force, their project specification group, and we are also going to be working with standards bodies that publish their own standards, helping to assist these organizations to convert their standards into CASE format. So it kind of goes back to what Kathryn was talking about. No more (hopefully) PDFs, Word docs, and Excel docs. We're trying to move everyone over to use the CASE format, so everyone is consistent. And again, as a part of our pledge to 1EdTech, we will preserve the CASE GUIDs in our system too. So, not only mirroring what they have, but also making sure that the GUIDs we're using are accurate. So, we'll also be working with school districts and state education agencies to assist with the publishing of their standards in the CASE format, so similar to my second bullet.

So that is… I think we ran through everything.

Audience Questions

Gina Faulk

Kathleen is one of our panelists, and she has been monitoring the Q&A. Any questions, Kathleen, that you have come across so far?

Kathleen Ideguchi

Hi! So, yes, we had a couple of questions.

One of the questions was, “Are we recording the session?” Yes, we are recording the session, and we will have a link to be able to share later after this session is completed. And then there's another question that is actually a technical question that Jeremy is responding to, regarding, “Will consumers of the content be able to access the aligned CF items and packages?” So, I'll defer to Jeremy for that.

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, it was actually–I was halfway through typing it out, but since we're here, I might as well just answer it.

Sorry, I'm going to read this real quick, make sure I'm understanding the question… CF packages… If it's available via the standards exchange, then yes. Although access is restricted to authenticated clients only, so someone kind of out in the wild would not be able to access the API. You have to be credentialed in order to access the CF items and packages.

Gina Faulk

Okay.

Jeremy Ashcraft

Hopefully, that answers your question.

Kathleen Ideguchi

So there are no other additional questions at this time.

Closing Thoughts

Gina Faulk

Okay, well, if there is–if there are any additional questions, I'm going to flip to the last slide, which shows my email address, as well as Kathryn's email address. Please feel free to email us if you have any questions at all about what EdGate will be offering. It's great news, Kathryn, about the ability for content providers to join the CASE Network Alliance, I believe it's called, so that's awesome, very excited about that.

Kathryn Green

Alright, everybody, thanks for joining today.

Gina Faulk

Thank you, everyone, for joining. This has been recorded, so we will post it to our website. Thank you so much

Webinar Summary & Transcript - AI-Enhanced Standards Alignment: Dialing in Precision at Scale

bford — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 18:02:46 +0000

Webinar Summary & Transcript - AI-Enhanced Standards Alignment: Dialing in Precision at Scale bford Thu, 06/25/2026 - 11:02

Webinar Summary & Transcript

EdTech Product Development

Summary

This webinar explores how publishers and education organizations can balance speed, quality, and scalability in an era increasingly shaped by AI. Featuring perspectives from EdGate, Book Buddy, and Middle States Association, the discussion focuses on how teams can build effective workflows, maintain pedagogical integrity, and prepare for long-term transformation.

A central theme throughout the conversation is the tension between efficiency and quality. As AI accelerates content creation and alignment processes, organizations face growing pressure to move faster, often at the expense of consistency and instructional value. Panelists emphasize that while AI can significantly improve efficiency, it must be implemented thoughtfully, with structured workflows and human oversight to ensure meaningful learning outcomes.

The discussion also highlights the importance of testing and iteration. Rather than treating AI as a one-size-fits-all solution, organizations are encouraged to break workflows into smaller tasks, evaluate where AI adds value, and scale only after validation. This granular, experimental approach allows teams to improve both speed and product quality without introducing unnecessary risk.

Ultimately, the panel concludes that success in the AI era will depend on intentional strategy, not reactive adoption. Organizations that prioritize planning, testing, and human-led decision-making, while leveraging AI as a supporting tool, will be best positioned to scale effectively and maintain trust with educators and students.

Key Takeaways

Scalability requires structured systems that can adapt across states, sectors, and frameworks.
Speed is one of the biggest threats to content quality and pedagogical consistency.
AI should be implemented at the task level. Not as a blanket solution.
Human oversight is essential to ensure accuracy, engagement, and instructional value.
Testing and documenting workflows is critical before scaling AI use.
AI can improve efficiency, but often delivers incremental gains rather than dramatic transformation.
Engagement suffers when content feels overly automated or inauthentic.
Successful organizations take a “crawl, walk, run” approach rather than rushing implementation.

Topics Covered

Scalability in standards alignment and content development.
Balancing speed, quality, and pedagogical consistency.
AI workflows in publishing and content creation.
Task-level testing and workflow optimization.
Human vs. AI roles in content development.
Teacher and student engagement with AI-generated content.
Institutional change and implementation challenges.
Future-ready schools and organizational transformation.

Featured Speakers

Rich Portelance

Host, EdGate Powers Webinar Series

Jeremy Ashcraft

IT Director and Software Architect, EdGate

Amber Berry

Vice President of AI & Strategy, Middle Sates Association

Brett Hodus

Chief Executive Officer, Book Buddy Media

Themes

Building Scalable Systems for Alignment and Content

Panelists emphasized that scalability depends on having systems that can adapt across multiple states, frameworks, and use cases. Without flexible infrastructure, it becomes nearly impossible to manage the variability in standards and requirements.

Notable Insight

“You need to have the processes and the systems in place… to be adaptable across all of those different sectors.”

Key Questions Explored

What does scalability mean in today’s standards landscape?
How can organizations manage variability across states and frameworks?
What systems are needed to support cross-sector alignment?

The Tradeoff Between Speed and Quality

The discussion highlights how pressure to move quickly, especially with AI, can undermine pedagogical quality and consistency. Rushed workflows often lead to fragmented content and weaker learning experiences.

Notable Insight

“Speed in publishing is one of the biggest limiters of quality.”

Key Questions Explored

How does speed impact content quality and alignment?
What risks come with rushing AI implementation?
How can organizations maintain consistency at scale?

Testing AI at the Task Level

Rather than applying AI broadly, panelists recommend breaking workflows into individual tasks and testing where AI adds value. This allows organizations to scale strategically and avoid unnecessary risk.

Notable Insight

“You don’t write a book with AI… break it down into steps and test each one.”

Key Questions Explored

How should organizations evaluate AI’s effectiveness?
What types of tasks are best suited for AI?
Why is a granular testing approach more effective?

What This Means for Education Leaders

For education leaders, this discussion reinforces the importance of intentional, strategic adoption of AI and technology. Rather than prioritizing speed or novelty, leaders should focus on building systems that ensure quality, consistency, and long-term scalability.

This includes investing in workflows that allow for testing and iteration, as well as ensuring that human expertise remains central to decision-making. Leaders must also consider how AI impacts student engagement and learning outcomes, particularly as students become more adept at recognizing automated content.

Additionally, the conversation highlights the need for organization-wide alignment. AI adoption should not be isolated to specific teams. It requires coordination across departments, clear policies, and shared understanding to be effective.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How should organizations approach scalability in alignment and content?

A: They should build flexible systems and processes that can adapt across multiple states, frameworks, and use cases.

Q: Why is speed a risk in content development?

A: Moving too quickly can reduce quality, consistency, and pedagogical effectiveness.

Q: How should AI be implemented effectively?

A: AI should be tested at the task level, with workflows broken down into smaller components before scaling.

Q: Does AI significantly reduce time and cost?

A: AI can improve efficiency, but gains are often incremental and require testing and refinement.

Q: How should schools approach AI integration in the classroom?

A: Schools should treat AI as a tool to support learning, invest in teacher training, and focus on meaningful instructional use rather than surface-level adoption or over-reliance on technology.

Featured Quotes

“Human-led and AI-informed… in that order.”

Full Webinar Transcript

The following transcript has been edited for readability. Timestamps have been removed and minor transcription errors corrected. Speaker comments and context have been preserved.

Opening Remarks

Rich Portelance

So, welcome, everybody, to the AI Enhanced Standards Alignment webinar. We're dialing in precision at scale. We're going to give attendees a few minutes to come in. So let's say two minutes or so, and then we're going to kick into the webinar, so hang tight, we're going to be on mute, and we're just letting people flood in. It's going to be an exciting conversation, so thank you very much for joining us, and we'll get started in just a minute.

Okay, we're going to get going here. And again, my name is Rich Portelance. I am the host of the EdGate Powers webinar series. Today, we are talking about AI-enhanced standards alignments and how do we dial in precision at scale?

With me, as always, we have some great panelists, and I want to let everybody know, if you're here, and if you know someone who you think would be a great panelist, please reach out, let us know, because we're always looking for people. And today is an exceptional group.

We have Amber Berry, Vice President of AI and Strategy at the Middle States Association. Brett Hodus, the CEO and co-founder of Book Buddy Media, and Jerry Ashcraft, the Director of Technology here at EdGate. And I will let all three of them provide a little introduction in just a second.

Today's conversation focuses on a question many educational leaders, publishers, and edtech organizations are wrestling with: how do we leverage AI to improve standards alignment without sacrificing quality, trust, or educational outcomes? We're going to explore the intersection of leadership, technology, and content development through three unique perspectives.

Before we get started, a couple of housekeeping items. All the attendees will be muted. Please use the Q&A button at the bottom of your screen if you have a question. We will either answer those in line if we can or at the end of the session. If we don't get your question while on the webinar, we will get to it via email afterwards. And thank you in advance for asking questions. We'll also send out a deck with content and contacts of our panelists after the webinar. So please, you know, watch your email for that in the coming days. Of course, we'll also send out a link to the webinar so you can share it with your friends.

So without further ado, why don't we start off with Amber Berry? Could you give us an introduction?

Amber Berry

Sure, again, I'm Vice President of AI and Strategy at Middle States, and I'm really looking forward to this conversation today, so I appreciate the invitation. I worked for 15 years full-time in schools. I was a middle school French teacher, world language department chair, and principal. A few years ago, I transitioned to working for the Middle States Association in AI, and I am the co-founder of RAIL (Responsible AI and Learning). And this is an endorsement series that we use with schools globally. We've worked with 100 schools so far, and the two endorsements are AI literacy, safety, and ethics, followed by the essential learning experience with AI.

And I come to this conversation not forgetting my roots in the classroom and what it means to have good, safe practices, to have standards for our students to be held accountable for that, and also understanding fully that the tension right now is that everything is so new. It's hard to set a standard in a new arena. This is not like technology from before. It's not like things we've studied before. I think a lot of us are building the ship as we fly it, and we need to do right by children, so that tension brings me to this conversation with excitement.

Rich Portelance

Thank you so much, Amber.

And Brett, little intro?

Brett Hodus

Hi there, thanks for having me.

I am the CEO and co-founder of Book Buddy Media. We are a content developer for K-12 publishers. I've been doing this for almost 25, 30 years, so a long time. I've seen a lot of changes in the market. We have about 100 publishing clients, and we're under a lot of pressure to find ways to integrate AI into workflows to reduce costs for publishers without negatively impacting the student experience. So, that's kind of our attention is trying to figure out how to keep publishers responsible and be competitive at the same time. But we don’t want to have any of this stuff impact education or impact the quality of instruction or alignment.

Rich Portelance

Excellent. Thank you, Brett.

And Jeremy?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Hi, I'm Jeremy Ashcraft. I'm the Director of Technology for EdGate. I've been with EdGate for over 25 years now, so I've been with the company all through kind of the evolution of our alignment business, even when we weren't an alignment based company, and I think that makes us uniquely positioned in kind of the transition kind of into an AI-based, you know, economy here. In that, you know, we're kind of uniquely positioned to be able to look at how we use our existing processes and smartly use AI to help enhance that.

Rich Portelance

And as we know, EdGate has been around for about 29 years. So there's a lot of history there and a lot of experience with standards, alignment and kind of that evolution. So we appreciate your passion for this, Jeremy, and your perspective.

Discussion

Rich Portelance

What I want to do, I'm going to ask each panelist a question, an opening perspective question, and then we break this conversation out into a couple segments.

So I'm going to start off with Amber. Schools are feeling pressure to adopt AI quickly. What's the biggest mistake leaders make when they begin that journey?

Amber Berry

I think school leaders are making a common mistake, and that's the same one we've made with edtech for, at this point, many decades, and that's they're leading with “How do we integrate AI into what we already do?” And there is a really important opportunity here that at Middle States, our perspective is that it's not about the integration, it's about redefining and reminding ourselves what is powerful learning for students anyway. And starting from there, in what ways might AI help that process, or maybe not?

And when you're jumping right to tools, you're really at the surface layer of what we're doing, and we feel strongly that it's important to go back to the foundations of a school, the foundations of a community, and that's your mission and your values. So we have modeled RAIL, Responsible AI and Learning, after Stuart Brand's economic model, the Pace Layer Model. So that bottom layer of any society, that culture doesn't change very quickly, and everything should align to that. So in a school, that's your culture, your mission statement, your “Portrait of a Graduate”, and your profile of a teacher. That's where you start, and then you move up to the governance layer, and you think about what are the policies that are aligned with the community that we're trying to create. Then you have infrastructure, and infrastructure is not about just the director of technology. Jeremy's not on an island at EdGate doing this work. It's about everybody's capacity. Maybe he's leading that charge, but it's about building everyone's capacity forward. And then you get to program and practices, which is what does this look like in the classroom? But a lot of folks are rushing to that top piece and, you know, AI could make a billion worksheets an hour, but that's not powerful learning, and that's not what we should take away for our schools. We should improve the system.

Rich Portelance

And just a note on that, Amber, because I had an interview or a conversation with a consultant who is working with Fortune 500 companies. She has 30 odd years of experience, and she was validating a proof of concept of what she's doing going into companies today, and she was asking my perspective. And she said exactly what you just said, what she was trying to validate is, do I go in and talk about the culture? You have to prepare people for this adoption. It's not just about the technology, it's about the people using it. So I appreciate that perspective.

Jeremy, everyone's talking about AI-powered alignment. What separates meaningful alignment from simply generating faster outputs?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, so, what's important with alignment is, again, like you said, not just getting it done faster, but maintaining the quality and the precision… Making sure that's the word I'm looking for here, making sure that there's kind of repeatability, that's the word I'm looking for, and reusability.

So, you know, having an AI-driven process is not just about getting more alignments done. You need to be able to have the base process in place so you know that results are repeatable and reusable. You know, in the future, you're not just doing it as a one-off, and then two weeks later, you have to go back and do it again for some other RFP (Request for Proposal) or whatever. You're doing or there's new adoptions, and then we have to go in and do it over again. It's just being smart with your process.

Rich Portelance

No, I appreciate that perspective. Building systems and repeatability is critical.

Brett, from the publisher's perspective, why has standards alignment become even more important in the age of AI?

Brett Hodus

I think it's a differentiator when you're creating products that are aligned to standards, but also having that nuanced understanding of having a human being on the ground in that district, in that state, to understand the way those standards are being used on the ground, and what's important to teachers. An AI will look at a standard and be very generic, very, very high level, and produce something that is technically aligned, but may not speak to any of that nuance that a human being would say, “Wait, we're really having issues with our writing standards, we need to be more robust here, or more robust there”, or some of these specifics that'll come out of experience and having human beings kind of weigh in.

The other thing is that as the temptation to create alignment documents with AI comes up and people will do that as an afterthought rather than building from the standard backwards, they'll try to take something and retroactively align it using AI, and create some type of AI gap analysis that's usually really flawed, and it'll put them in another direction so they can check a box off. But it's not aligned in the true sense. It's not aligned to the way students are learning on the ground, the way that things are being taught on the ground, and the way that those values and that culture that Amber was talking about is sort of integrated throughout curriculum and instruction on the ground level. So, AI can do a lot of amazing things, but it's not in the classroom. And you have to have people who are in that classroom to really align on those nuances.

Rich Portelance

I appreciate that, Brett. And it's interesting. I think when a lot of people think about AI, they think about the LLMs, the ChatGPTs and the Claudes. But really, when we talk about customized solutions, we're talking about something that was built with other technologies leveraging AI potentially to do something like alignment, that's inherently different than just going to ChatGPT to say, “I want to align this”. And like you said, those you may get it right once, but there's a lot of flaws that can occur, and it can send you off in the wrong direction.

Brett Hodus

Yeah, and also, there's a genius factor with AI, that it's so smart that it can take content that's not aligned and it can tell you how it is aligned. And we know instructionally it's actually not aligned, but AI can tell that story because it's smarter than a human being a lot of times, and it's also stupider than a human being in a lot of ways. But it can tell that story, and it's actually not a true story in some cases.

Rich Portelance

That's a really good point. I want to get into building the right foundation.

And Amber, you've said successful AI adoption starts with mission and culture rather than technology. What does that look like in practice?

Amber Berry

So, when a school engages in the RAIL process with us, and even when I'm kind of out on the road and doing keynotes and workshops with folks, when you get back to your roots and the “why” of things, that's when you stay human-centered. When you get away from, you know, “How do I catch a student if they're cheating?” When you get out of that language, you get back into why we are educating these kids to begin with. What is our purpose? You're really able to start to conceptualize what this looks like when you can do it right. And that's the mind, that's just the mindset that we need all educators, all leaders to be in and all communities, frankly, because this also applies to organizations. We just happen to be talking about school.

So what this looks like in practice is something really important when we are uncertain about the future of higher education, the future of jobs, the future of, you know, what do we need us as panelists and adults as skills in the next five, 10, 20 years, but certainly for our kids for the next 40, 50, 60 years. It's so important for us to go back to that “Portrait of a Graduate”. And so what really matters in any school worth its salt is that going back to character matters, critical thinking matters. You know, there are certain things that are evergreen that AI is not going to disrupt. Maybe kids are going to be learning how to manage multiple AI agents someday as opposed to doing certain things that we would have expected ourselves.

But ultimately, when they do that reflection as a community of who are we trying to graduate and what are we preparing them for, even though the future is in some ways ambiguous, that is where the best work happens with the schools that we are interacting with; where they're able to come together, commit to that, and deliver on what they've promised to families and promise to their community.

Rich Portelance

Thank you for that answer. And I agree, you know, those durable skills are so critical, and understanding how to embed those is going to be a real difference maker.

Jeremy, organizations often view AI as a shortcut, which it can be. Why does precision become even more important as we scale alignment efforts?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Well, as you kind of grow your efforts, alignment becomes more than just a way to sell more content into a school district. You know, it becomes… You know, you're now affecting outcomes within that school with the students. So having proper context and understanding of the standards and the content and how those alignments are made is critical.

Rich Portelance

Okay.

And Brett, when publishers begin developing new products, how early should alignment considerations enter the process? You kind of touched on this earlier

Brett Hodus

Yeah, and I think, you know, obviously in the age of AI, even more so, you know, at the beginning, kind of coming up with what is this structure? Why are we building it? What's the product? What problem is it solving in the market? And I think that really comes back to alignment at the end of the day because a teacher has a problem to solve, whether it's reading or math, or science, or whatever the subject is, they have a set of rubrics and standards that they have to meet. I mean, that's their job, is to educate kids in a specific way. They don't just get to do it any way they want; there's a specific way of doing it.

And a lot of times, when we build products, we start with engagement, which is a great thing. And, you know, “How are we going to get kids to give effort and try to lean in?” which I think is important, but it has to be within the framework of what is the teacher going to be teaching in the classroom? Because at the end of the day, from a publisher's perspective, we have to educate, we have to sell the product, and a teacher has to buy it, and they're not going to buy it if it doesn't check that box and say, “Yes, we are going to hit all of my standards. This is all aligned, and now we can get into engagement, pedagogy specifically. How am I going to teach it? How much time do I have in a day?” Some of those more nuanced questions, but it has to start with, you know, “I have a mandate, and my mandate is these standards, and I have to meet them”.

Rich Portelance

Yep, and that's not going to change or go away necessarily. So, you know, you got to start there.

I have a question for all the panelists, so use your little raised hand button at the bottom of the screen for the first person, and we'll kind of start there. Because this is open, anybody can answer it. Is alignment becoming more of a strategic necessity than a compliance exercise?

Jeremy?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, I mean, you know, it's sort of like my last answer. It's more than just a way to sell content. I mean, if you don't have alignment as a publisher, you know, you're not going to win RFPs, period. I mean, it's essential for, you know, a K-12 based publishing business.

And Brett, when we look at that being a necessity, you deal with publishers, you're dealing with state level compliance, I mean, with 50 states coming in and a lot of rules and regulations, I imagine you have a perspective here.

Brett Hodus

Well, yeah, and I'll just use the California adoption as an example right now. California is having a massive adoption and publishers are all coming to us. And it's interesting the way these conversations start. A lot of times you'd be surprised that the conversation starts with “Who else is competing in this space? Who else are we going to have to go up against in this space? How are they doing it?” But then it always does come back to, “Do we have something that already aligns? Can we retrofit something we've already built and make it align?”

And that's, again, a danger of AI. Ask AI to do that, the answer is always going to be yes. Oh, yeah, this aligns because AI is trying to please you. They'll say, “Oh, this is work. Yeah, this works right here. This works right there”. But it can be a real dangerous, a real dangerous trap.

And so I think what's happening now is the publishers who are building from scratch, seeing an opportunity like in California to build from scratch, and they'll say, “Okay, these are the standards, this is the alignment, let's get the engagement, and let's build the product going backwards”. Rather than some publishers that we've bumped into have said, “There's all this money in California, we have this product, it sort of works. How do we make it a fit?”

And I think that's a dangerous thing. But it's also capitalism and that's what happens in educational publishing, and I think with AI, there's more of a danger there, because there's more of this sort of easy path to retrofit things. But I also think publishers that are bringing some of those things to market are starting to see that it doesn't sell, so it becomes a strategic advantage to have an actual aligned product and not a compliant product. When a teacher digs in, says, this is not really aligned. I see that. The strategy of hitting a big RFP or winning at a real scalable level, it really does start with true alignment, where a teacher in that state will look at the product and say, “Yes, a human being who has taught in my state has seen this, and I'm agreeing with their assessment. This does align”.

Rich Portelance

Amber, anything to throw in there, or should I keep going?

Amber Berry

You can keep going.

Rich Portelance

Okay. So in the next segment, we're going to talk a little bit about human expertise versus artificial intelligence. I'm going to start with Jeremy.

You've said AI should augment processes rather than replace them, which I think, you know, we're starting to understand better. Where do you see AI delivering the greatest value today? We've kind of bashed it a little bit, but it does have value.

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it does have value. Otherwise, we wouldn't be trying to use it. I think the biggest thing for us is we see AI kind of like, you know, like I've said, we're augmenting our processes, so we're already taking kind of best practices and putting a force multiplier on top of it. It's like we're able to achieve a kind of higher bandwidth with individuals, you know, using AI, identifying what the tedious tasks are? What are the things that you spend a lot of time doing? And how can we automate that process, you know, in a smart way, not just… You know. Go analyze all my emails or anything. You need to have a plan in place for your AI adoptions.

And I mean, there's a lot of other… A lot of other things like just being able to do deep research, you know it's very valuable just to be able to go out, ask a question and not have to sift through a thousand search results. You know, you can get a nice concise answer. And some of what we're building into our own processes, which works really well, is actually having AI check itself. So, we're using it to augment our QA processes where, okay, we asked you to do a task, now go back and review what you just did, and then also to be able to take direction and have a little bit of an audit trail in its actions. So then, when you do find something that is like, hey, the quality of this isn't very good, you can go back and say, “Okay, where was the disconnect? What do we need to do differently this time? How do I need to change the prompt?”

Rich Portelance

Yeah.

Jeremy Ashcraft

You know, so those are the things it does well.

Rich Portelance

One of the things I know we talk about internally at my company is amplified human intelligence. And I think you just described that. It's great getting you there, but it's a mechanism to enhance what you do or be able to amplify or make it done quicker, but you can't take the human out of the loop in most cases because, you know, really there's inherent flaws, right? But it can make you move faster, or like you said, get more deep research or concise language, which are real advantages, Brett.

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, something else I want to add real quick, sorry, is one of the other nice things it can do for you is just being part of that human review process, especially dealing with the volumes of data that we have to deal with. It can help with the review process, but it can't replace it. It can, however, help you identify the things that need to be reviewed. You know, so if I've got a million records in a data set, having a human review that is not impossible, but it's very tedious and very long. But if you give us some parameters, it can go identify the things. It's like, hey, this doesn't look right. This doesn't look right, this doesn't look right, please review and tell me what to do. It's really good for doing that.

Rich Portelance

So, Brett, during our podcast interview a few weeks back, and I encourage everybody, if you're on this, if you're listening here, we do create podcasts. Each of the panelists graced me with about an hour of time, and those are posted on our YouTube channel, please check them out, because there's even a deeper level of information that was provided. And Brett, you said something along the lines of describing AI as a brilliant assistant that lacks common sense. Where should humans remain firmly in control, in your opinion?

Brett Hodus

At the beginning and at the end. That's kind of the simplest way to say it.

So when you're deciding in the context of product development, when you're deciding about what you're going to produce, that's what a human being should be thinking about. They should be looking at the market, the need, the why, all of those sort of strategy elements, budget, etc. And then when you get into it, then you can have AI helping, and I'll just give you an anecdotal example. I had AI help us with a product that we were doing for K-2 literacy, and we had put together a proposal for a publisher, and one of the things was going to be flashcards that were going to be part of this product. And when we brought it to the publisher right away, everyone in the room said, “I can't give these flashcards to kindergarteners or first graders. They're going to get ripped and bent. I'll have them for two weeks. You know, this is a bad idea”. And right away we were like, “Yeah. That is a bad idea”.

And I think that was an example of us maybe leaning a little too much on AI. I thought that was a great idea. And in practice, it is a great idea if flashcards grow on trees or flashcards are made super durable. But that was an example of the AI saying this would be great for students, but not understanding the nuance of a kindergarten classroom or a 1st grade classroom where a paper flashcard is not going to last the whole year, it's not going to work. So that's just an example of AI like, you know, needing a human at the beginning to plan the product, a human at the end to look through everything and make sure that this is sensible and logical and makes sense. In reality, not just in this digital super brain.

Rich Portelance

Makes a lot of sense actually.

Amber?

Amber Berry

Yeah. Yeah, that's right. They know better, exactly.

Rich Portelance

Brett, can I just say, I love your example because the human in the loop, that kindergarten teacher would say, “Well, that's why we spend so much money on laminators, you know”, because they know better, right? They know that extra step that AI missed.

So, Amber, many school leaders worry about AI literacy among the faculty. How do schools create safe environments for experimentation while maintaining appropriate guardrails?

Amber Berry

Yeah. So the fact is, the kids and the teachers are already experimenting, and school leaders who are paying attention know this. The way you do that is by, of course, getting to the policies. Too many schools, we've encountered still now years in, have yet to really set too many parameters. It might be a couple of bullets added to their acceptable use policy, but they haven't really robustly thought about what are AI guidelines, particularly for the adults. And so, teaching them about protecting data privacy and things like that, teaching them really good, I guess, like outline parameters is important.

A term we use a lot on my team as we started to develop RAIL a few years ago is creating sandboxes. But sandbox is not a global term, and we're a global company. So, for those who don't know what a sandbox is, it's the idea of, like, allowing a child to play in the sand, but there's like this little outline. So you can get messy in the middle, but you're trying not to spill the sand outside and there's a little bit of an outline space and, like, a good play space where you can do things, where you can try and fail, and that's okay to do, and it's encouraged. Schools that do this really well schedule it so they create time for teachers to come together optionally to start, right? It's Tuesday morning, come in and play in that sandbox together, ask questions, bring in a few people who are early adopters to encourage folks, here's something I do, and share and tell stories.

But truly, we believe in AI literacy training, and that the training doesn't stop as fast as AI is moving. It's not a one and done. It's what does continuous education in this field look like, and how is that different from a full-time classroom teacher to the staff member who welcomes families at the front desk? You know, everyone needs something and like, what does it look like to scale that in an education context?

Rich Portelance

So, you know, what I'm hearing is that all three of you are advocating for human in the loop processes and systems rather than fully automated systems. Are there any decisions that should never be delegated entirely to AI, in your opinion?

Amber?

Amber Berry

I might have an unpopular view on this. Our company tagline is human-led, AI informed, in that order. So, we fully agree that the human has to be in the loop and has to be the leader of the process. At the same time, I believe I'm crediting Eric Hudson with the idea of good questions and better questions when it comes to AI.

The good question everyone's asking my company is, you know, “Should we let the students write using AI?” And the English teachers flinch and say, absolutely not. But there's a big difference between why we ask a seven-year-old to write versus why you ask a junior to write, why you're writing in science class versus why you're writing in English class. And so with all of that nuance, I think my answer really is there could be a really good reason to bring AI in with children as young as seven in the writing process in some way. It's about framing for the educator what is the powerful learning objective in this moment, and does AI serve that or is it going to take away from this moment? And that to me is about the human discretion to make the decision, not yes to AI and writing and no to AI in writing. It can't be a binary.

Rich Portelance

Okay, and Jeremy?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah. So, I think, at least from an alignment perspective, you shouldn't ever just blindly trust what the AI has delivered. There always needs to be at least one layer of human review, mainly because alignment is, as much as we try to layer an objective process on top of it, ultimately alignment's still a subjective area. You know, even human-generated alignments that we do, a lot of times our customers go, “Hmm, I don't know if I agree with that”. You know, and so that's not going to change whether a person did it or AI did it. That's always going to exist.

Rich Portelance

I do want to remind everybody that we do these webinars on a quarterly basis. The Q3 webinar will be coming up in September. We're talking about K-12 adoption advantage and procurement confidence through a scalable system.

You know, if you're looking to win contracts and try to understand in today's day and age, how do you do that in a scalable way, please join us. Again, we'll always have some great panelists, and we hope that you join us as we send out materials. We'll try to include a link to register for that webinar

The third segment that we're going to get into is achieving precision at scale. And Jeremy, EdGate has spent decades, and we talked about 29 years in business, building alignment infrastructure. When you talk about how EdGate does things, you know, and I think if you could give us a little bit of information on that would be great. Why is infrastructure so critical when organizations begin scaling across states, frameworks, and markets?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, so, kind of what we've spent over the years building out was kind of a system, a taxonomy for identifying the concepts that are addressed within the standards, and creating a system to identify those concepts within content and other types of data as well. Then passing that alignment data onto our clients and helping them build out their own systems for identifying and displaying alignments to their customers and their buyers.

The thing that's so important about that is having the scalability built into it. And when we talk about scalability, in this context, it's having your alignments be applicable across multiple sectors, multiple data sets, and our systems allow you to do that, you know, kind of in one try. You know, and it's very important because there's so much variability across all the different states, all the different NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations), you know, other countries, other data sets, frameworks, rubrics. There's so much difference in what people are looking for that you need to have the processes and the systems in place to be adaptable across all of those different sectors.

And even in today's climate, being able to have the flexibility across even… You know, standards might be addressing the same things, but the political agendas in two different states might be different. So, you may have to adapt, you know, your content and your alignments accordingly. And so, you need to have the systems and processes in place in order to do that quickly and efficiently.

Rich Portelance

Well, that makes a lot of sense. I appreciate that.

Brett, how do publishers balance the demand for speed with the need for engagement? Pedagogical quality and accurate alignment?

Brett Hodus

I mean, the short answer is to plan better. Start things a lot earlier, but that doesn't always happen. I think the biggest thing that publishers are facing, the biggest obstacle right now, and AI is part of this, is there's a little bit of a FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) going on in which the publishers feel like, “Oh, every other publisher is using AI better than me. Every other publisher is integrating it faster than I am. We're behind. We need to get ahead”. And I think that, that fear, which is what it is, it's a fear of missing the market, is actually going to be driving publishers toward all putting out the same product.

And so the way to kind of push against that is to understand that in order to get engagement and in order to have a sound pedagogical process, you have to test, you have to try it out, you have to show a lesson to an educator, and you have to put a lesson in front of students. You have to start small and start small, get people nodding their heads along, and then scale with or without AI. That's a huge thing.

Now, when it comes to speed and moving quickly and having that same pedagogical consistency, it's not just AI that becomes a temptation. There's also a temptation that if you have 800 lessons to write, ideally, you'd like all those lessons written by one editor. Multiple writers writing them and one editor reviewing all 800 lessons. But when you look at your timeline, you say, “We can't do that”. So, let's have 14 editors each be responsible for a set of lessons. So then, how can you be sure that all your lessons are pedagogically aligned, that they all work the same, they're all written at the same reading level? It's sort of impossible. So, I think speed in publishing is one of the biggest limiters of quality. I see publishers asking us to move too quickly, or publishers themselves moving too quickly, and obviously with AI, there are a lot of times where publishers say, “Well, now that AI's here, we can do it. We're just going to plug in AI here to do this thing that we have never tested, and we don't know if it's capable of doing so, but we think other publishers might be doing it”. There's a danger there if we haven't tested that theory, and at the same time, with these new AI workflows and integrating AI into these kinds of rush workflows is that on the other side of it is a student, who every day and every week is getting better and better at identifying AI. And so our collective consciousness in terms of reading something and being like, oh, that's AI. And what happens to all of us when we think that you watch a cool video of, like, a monkey becoming best friends with a dog, and you're like, “I love this”. Then you're like, “Oh, that's AI. I don't, right?” But if you think it's real, someone's like, “No, that's a real video”. It's like, “Oh, that's amazing. That's so cool”.

The same thing is happening with our lessons, right? Like we, there's something subconsciously, we know it's a computer talking to us. There's a part of our brain that's going to shut off the engagement. And a kid who's six today, and he's 15 in nine years, is going to have such an advanced AI radar that we're gonna have to do really, really well to keep humans in the loop and make sure that the content is engaging, is consistent, and is pedagogically sound.

So I would say the thing is, publishers need to plan better, slow down, and start earlier.

Rich Portelance

So, you like the crawl, walk, run scenario rather than in the run, fall, fail scenario.

Brett Hodus

Yeah. Yes, exactly. Or just run. That's what I think we see a lot. Just run.

Rich Portelance

Yeah.

Amber, many institutions struggle with implementation fatigue. What separates schools that successfully sustain AI initiatives from those that stall?

Amber Berry

Sure.

So, for schools right now, there are so many forces at play, is how we term it. You know, they're dealing with more than AI, and there's enrollment, and there's mental health crises, and there's just so many things that are happening that can be unique to an institution, or just like everyone's wrestling with the same things, and it is overwhelming. If you say to a group of teachers, “Alright, it's time to get your AI literacy training done”, on top of all the other asks, many schools do not sunset. They don't take anything away, and year over year, they add to the educator's plate. They add to school responsibilities. So, this is a real question that is very, very important for schools to think about.

One thing that you know, one perspective we have is that AI is a leading, necessary thing that schools need to face, so it needs to be a top priority. At the same time, I think the schools that really get this understand that AI initiatives are not just about teachers in the classroom. It's about the whole institution, it's about your marketing, it's about your admissions department, it's about athletics and the growth of your athletics program, it's about everything. So, if you get AI correct in terms of foundations and mission alignment, then you're really going to be on track to help your entire institution.

And it's not just about the classroom practices and student outcomes. So, I do believe that, and again, we're talking about schools, but if I just put in the word organization, an organization that really gets it gets that everyone has to be involved. And if we all up our literacy and our, I guess, fluency, our ability to use AI effectively, then that will really help the entire company and not just me and my work on my plate. So, I think that's more holistic. You have to zoom out to see the importance, but I don't want to discount that schools are wrestling with so many things

And so it's not that the schools we've encountered are not, you know, maybe ignoring or stalling their practices on AI because they don't think it's important. It's that there are so many important things they just have yet to prioritize that one.

Rich Portelance

Okay.

I do have a kind of a cross panel discussion question, but I'm going to bring in a question. And thank you everyone that's typing in questions. They're great and we really appreciate it. There's one in here that kind of, I think, replaces what I was going to ask, and it's so what other processes will allow publishers to accelerate volume, efficacy, and quality.

Anybody?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Sorry, I'm rereading the question here.

Rich Portelance

No worries. I thought Brett was gonna jump all over this.

Brett Hodus

Where do I find that question? I'm trying to see it so I can answer it probably

Rich Portelance

It's in the Q&A box. If you click on that, it should pop up, and it says, so so what other processes will allow publishers to accelerate volume and efficacy slash

Brett Hodus

Okay, yeah. So I'll tell you what we're doing.

So, what we've done is we've taken every task that we work on at Book Buddy, every individual task from an editorial review, to an illustration review, to a video review, to a script, I mean, every single task, and we've identified over 400 individual tasks that we do. And what we're trying to do is create this giant database of how long does it take a human being to do this, how long does it take AI to do this, what tool should we use with AI, and is this a good idea? And that chart is being filled out every day, and we're learning a lot as we go through testing. And so that's the number one thing I would tell publishers and content creators is test trial and error. Test something out, test it at the subtask level. Get very granular in terms of… You don't write a book with AI. You ask what are the 50 steps of writing the book? Break those down, and then do one step with AI, and then compare that to a human being.

And I'll give you another, just a quick example. You know, we tested out having AI write a library book about the college, UConn, their sports program, their basketball program. And AI wrote us a draft of that book. But AI did not include more than 20% of the book about the women's team, and the women's team is the best thing about UConn basketball. They've won more national titles than the men's team, and so an editor would have looked at that and said, “Hey, at least half of this book should be about the women, right? Not 20%”. And so that's something that, right away, a human being would have identified, but AI didn't identify it.

And so, checking out things like that on a task-by-task basis, and then other times you'll see, for example, like, there's these, well… I won't get too specific, but there are other tasks that are repetitive, like Jeremy said, that when a human being does once and gives a prompt to an AI, and it's a subtask that's within another test, and a human being is going to check it later, and AI can do it 400 times. That's a great place for AI to be right. So, repetitive tasks, etc. But more than anything, it's a tested workflow. Don't assume the AI is going to be able to do it, and don't assume the AI is not going to be able to do it, because sometimes it's an incredible tool. Sometimes it does things better than you think it's going to do it.

And so I would say test, trial and error, document the test results, and then you can find small ways to impact. But publishers who think that AI is going to increase their speed by double and reduce their cost by half are not doing it right, right? It should be on the margins. It should help you by 15, 20% in a tested scalable way that's tested and then scaled.

Rich Portelance

Exactly. Exactly. And some say it would probably argue that 85% of that book should be about the women’s team and not even 50%.

Jeremy?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, so, just again, something else that's anecdotal, just kind of building on what he said, is like, yeah, I mean, you just have to spend the time testing things out. Like, we're working on something right now internally that, you know, it's a very manual process for a person to do. You know, we have an AI process that can go out and do that for that person instead. And as of right now, most of the results we're getting are fine. Some of them, there's a lot of outliers where we’re, like, “Okay, that's actually not that great”. But the comparison of the agent took 30 minutes to do it versus with a person, it would take 12 hours to do it.

You know, for us right now, it's still worth the time to do that, because then I'm gonna spend an hour cleaning up the mistakes, or I still saved, you know, 10 hours total. So, you know, like, it doesn't have to be perfect, kind of off the rip for it to be useful, I guess I'll put it that way.

Rich Portelance

Fair.

Brett Hodus

And also, the AI can find a way when a person does that first step. Let's say they're writing an outline for something, and the person again, this is what Rich said earlier about making people smarter, right? You're writing an outline, and you get to a moment in the outline where you want to give an example of something, and you go to AI and say, “Give me 10 examples of that”. And then you have a list to choose from and say, “Oh, do I like any of those?” And so you're not just getting an example, you're not saving any time, but you're getting the best example because now you've got 10 to choose from and a human being can pick the best one. The product got better. We didn't necessarily save money or time, but the product got better. So that's another way to use AI. It's not just about cutting costs. It's also about making us smarter, making our products better. Ultimately, we shouldn't have to sacrifice.

Rich Portelance

Cool. I thank you for those additional perspectives. We're trending in a good way. I do want to look ahead a little bit and I want to get back to Amber because I'm curious about what a truly future-ready school looks like. Three to five years from now, what are you seeing in the work that you do?

Amber Berry

A lot of our focus at Middle States is intentionally about helping school leaders enact change. And change is hard. It's hard in an institution that hasn't changed all that much itself in a very long time. So, how do you do that successfully in a community? And AI happens to be one change. But I wouldn't think of a future ready school as the one that has just mastered, harnessed… Whatever we want to call it, AI. It's a school that's ready for the next change because more change is coming in the future of this world, so that's the kind of work that we do.

We have every school create a change strategy and plan for their institution when it comes to AI, because some schools, they really do have a pretty forward thinking, lots of teachers experimenting. The wave is there, the readiness is there, maybe the infrastructure is there for them to move ahead at an accelerated pace, but some places aren't there. And so, in a world where teacher shortages are real and many schools are really struggling, they'd have to be careful, maybe “go slow to go fast” is the ethos for change for AI for them, learning how to confront change in a strategic way and in a very planful way with that eye toward the future is what we want all schools to be ready for.

But I guess going back to that “Portrait of a Graduate”, I want us to think about who are the kids that we need to be running this world in 10, 20, 30, 40 years and thinking about what are those durable skills, to use your term, Rich, that we want every child to become an adult and have in order to be ready for whatever is to come. And a lot of that is uncertain right now.

Rich Portelance

I thank you. I think that's a great answer and it makes a lot of sense to prepare the people well for the changes that are coming and we're going to do better.

Jeremy, how do you see standards alignment evolving as AI capabilities continue to mature?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, so I think alignment's going to evolve past just, “I've got this piece of content or this resource that addresses or teaches something within a standard”. I think we're going to move more towards having some kind of additional metadata about the alignment. It's like, “here's the specific concept, and you can sort of do that now. Here's the specific concepts that are being addressed. Here's why those specific contracts and how those specific contract concepts are being addressed within the content”.

And even moving towards, you know, here's the impact that this can make. You know within the classroom and also identifying not just these kinds of K-12 curricular concepts, but more of the kind of the real world skills. So, that type of skill acquisition if you're addressing this standard, you're not only teaching these concepts, but you're also, you know, helping students acquire these real-world skills at the same time.

Rich Portelance

Now, I think those concepts, underlying concepts and skills that are added to the standards are really critical material that's getting carried along. Do I understand that correctly?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yes. Yeah.

Rich Portelance

Hmm.

Brett, what trends do you believe publishers and edtech companies should be paying attention to right now?

Brett Hodus

Well, I think there's kind of two parts to it. The first thing I think, you know, to speak to what Amber's saying is we have to have schools that have a way of thinking about AI that's not rejecting it, that's figuring out how to use it as a superpower and how to train kids on how to use it, because we're going to lose trust in kids if we tell them AI is bad and it's not something they should use, and then they see us all using it every day all the time, and they see people in business using it. And so, I think there's a credibility issue with students where we have to give them some AI literacy and have a policy at the school level that is consistent. And, you know, one of the things Amber was talking about was just sort of individual teachers experimenting, which is great, which is a cool thing. But when we don't know the results of those experiments, and some teachers are better than other teachers, kids are going to get sort of a path forward on how to use AI based on who their teacher is, and that shouldn't be the case. It really should be at the school or district, or even state level, where we're getting some policies in place that say, hey, this is how you're allowed to use it. This is how you should use it, and we need some research to be done to show, “How do I use this to make myself a better writer and a better learner, but also to actually learn, right?” And so, and I think that's a skill that we have to teach kids how to do.

I have two teenagers, so I can tell you personally about that, you know, it's very easy to just write your paper with ChatGPT and not know anything about it, and then edit it afterwards so it doesn't look like ChatGPT. That's what they're getting good at, and that's not really the way we want them to use ChatGPT. That's kind of a scam. And so, we have to, like, teach them the correct way to use it, some of the stuff that we've talked about. So, that's kind of part one of that.

And then part two is on more of the publisher side of having their own plan of how they're going to use it and what risk they're going to take, what disclosures they're going to give to educators about how they've used AI, and I think that's another thing that we need to talk about at some point as a country in terms of, like, when we create educational content, just like when we sell food in the store, we should tell you what's in it, right? Right? We should let you know, “Hey, this is how AI was used to build this content, and this is how we used real human beings”. And so we do that with everything we do with our publishers, but it's up to them to disclose it to educators. But we make sure to let publishers know, “Hey, we're going to give you an option with AI and an option without for everything, and you get to choose how you want to build your product, we're going to fully disclose it to you. We're advising you to fully disclose it to the students and to the teachers. I don't know if they always do, but I think that would be a net positive. So I think one thing for everyone to pay attention to is, let's get this stuff in the light of day, let's not make it the big bad wolf, and let's not make it the silver bullet that solves everything. Let's have a real conversation about, “Hey, kids, you should be using it. Here's how you should use it. Don't use it like this, use it like that”.

Rich Portelance

Yeah.

Amber Berry

Rich, could I jump in there for both parts, Brett, of what you just shared? That first part is about how our second endorsement for RAIL is all about action research. So, it's teachers documenting the journey of how AI was used and then what are the results of that outcome.

And then for the accreditation side of my company, we do have a protocol, sustaining excellence is like all about action research to attain sustained over years, and that is the critical piece that I hope all edtech companies get held accountable for what are the gains, the measurable gains with and without AI that you are noticing, but also that schools are doing.

And I wish we weren't working at Middle States on a school-by-school basis, and we were working at the state, at the national level with these schools around the world that we are interacting with right now. That lack of alignment, that it can be an individual choice, is disheartening to me because I don't like that the experience from one school to another is different, let alone one classroom to another. So I have hope for the future that we get there, Brett.

Rich Portelance

I want to address Doug, who's out there in the ether. I see your comments. I’d love to talk to you about these offline. We're not going to address it because it's a little askew from where we are with this podcast, but it's relevant, I think, going forward, and I certainly agree with a lot of your positions here. I have some anecdotes I would love to share, so that's something we can have some conversations on.

The final lightning round is here. Because we are getting to the end of our time, I’ll ask each of you to complete the sentence. The organizations that will thrive in the AI era are the ones that blank.

Amber?

Amber Berry

I would say our human-led and AI are informed in that order. I think if we lose sight of that, we're doomed. Truly. And so, I really hope that that can be true. And I know that it's about modeling.

Brett, when you talked about showing the students ethical consent, you know, sharing with families, these are the tools that we use with your children and why that families in the home are modeling. I'm side-by-side with technology with my children, and so we use AI together on a regular basis and talk about the garbage, the good points, the “how is this useful”, and how is it not, and the ethical boundaries.

So, I really hope that as a society, we really move forward as a world, we move forward in a way that is human-led, AI-informed.

Rich Portelance

I love it.

Jeremy?

Jeremy Ashcraft

Yeah, so I think, you know, to piggyback on something that Amber said, it's like, organizations where kind of everyone's involved in the policy. And you're getting everyone to identify, okay, these are the issues we see, these are the pain points, and these are the things that are hard. And in figuring it out, how do we best automate those processes? How can we automate it? Do we use AI for this? Does it make sense here? Does it not make sense here? And just getting everyone to buy in because it's not going to be effective if you're just foisting and saying, “Hey, everybody, we're going to use AI. Figure it out”.

You know, you have to collectively come up with a plan of attack as to, you know, what's going to be best for the entire organization.

Rich Portelance

Great advice. Have a plan.

And Brett?

Brett Hodus

Yeah, I would say the organizations that are willing to crawl, walk, run, test, be curious, be optimistic, and be ethical.

Rich Portelance

Excellent.

Closing Thoughts

Rich Portelance

So, we're going to have a final takeaway question in a second, but thank you, our attendees, for coming today, for asking great questions and keeping engaged. Thank you to our wonderful panel. You provided a lot of, just, really well-informed insights, so we appreciate your time today. Today's discussion reinforced a common theme. AI may accelerate the work, but precision, expertise, and trust remain essential in what we do.

Amber, what is an action that school leaders should take this summer?

Amber Berry

If you are a school leader who is not quite as versed in this experience yourself in terms of literacy and fluency, start using it and start leveling up your own skills. And for those who are in the work, I mean, it's summer, summer break, right, in the U.S. at least, think about ways to invite people in. What are some optional ways that your staff and you can make some progress forward this summer? Read a book together, try something together, but take advantage of the weeks you have ahead.

Rich Portelance

Excellent. Thank you very much. Jeremy?

Jeremy Ashcraft

One action that publishers or an edtech provider should take, I think they should take a nice hard look at how they're using their alignments. You know, are we using it as just a sales tool? Or are we using it as something that does effectively, you know, connect the dots between content and standards in the classroom and students

You know, much to like what Amber said, you know. To be able to go in and say, “Hey, a student in your state, if they use our materials, if they move halfway through the school year, you know, to a completely different district, they're still going to learn the same things. They're going to be relatively in the same place”. You know, and just have that assuredness that students aren't going to fall behind just because they move.

Rich Portelance

And Brett. One action content teams should take?

Brett Hodus

This is really specific, breakdown all the things you do into tasks and subtasks, test AI workflows, and document it. And it's not ready for prime time until you've tested it and proven it. So don't sell that to a teacher until you know it works. Try it out first and test it.

Rich Portelance

Thank you, everyone, for joining the EdGate Powers Podcast. Have a great summer.

Take care, everyone.

Webinar Summary & Transcript - Future Ready Alignment: Re‑Defining Curriculum for What Comes Next

bford — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 15:28:49 +0000

Webinar Summary & Transcript - Future Ready Alignment: Re‑Defining Curriculum for What Comes Next bford Thu, 06/25/2026 - 08:28

Webinar Summary & Transcript

Future Readiness

Academic Standards

Curriculum Alignment

Instructional Materials

Summary

As artificial intelligence continues to reshape education, organizations are moving beyond experimentation and into implementation. This webinar brings together experts in curriculum, standards alignment, mathematics education, data literacy, and instructional policy to discuss what it truly means to prepare students for a rapidly changing world.

The discussion explores a central theme: AI alone cannot create better educational outcomes. Without strong alignment between standards, curriculum, instructional materials, assessments, and learning goals, technology can amplify fragmentation rather than improve learning.

Panelists examine how schools can balance innovation with coherence, support teachers through instructional shifts, strengthen data literacy and quantitative reasoning, and create learning experiences that prepare students for future careers and citizenship

Key Takeaways

AI delivers the most value when it strengthens effective teaching rather than replacing it.
Students need strong foundational knowledge to evaluate and challenge AI-generated information.
Alignment is not simply a compliance exercise. It serves as the infrastructure that supports meaningful learning outcomes.
Data literacy, quantitative reasoning, and critical thinking are becoming essential skills across all disciplines.
Schools should prioritize depth of learning over an increasing number of disconnected learning targets.
Teachers need support, coaching, and professional learning to integrate emerging technologies effectively.
Future-ready education requires collaboration across subject areas rather than isolated curriculum decisions.
Assessment systems must evolve alongside new learning expectations and emerging technologies.

Topics Covered

Artificial Intelligence in Education
Curriculum Alignment
Educational Standards
High-Quality Instructional Materials
Mathematics Education
Data Literacy
Quantitative Reasoning
AI Literacy

Featured Speakers

Rich Portelance

Host, EdGate Powers Webinar Series

Hillary Rinaldi

Vice President, Whiteboard Advisors

Larry Johnson

Senior Education Specialist, EdGate

Zarek Drozda

Executive Director, Data Science 4 Everyone

Peter Coe

Senior Director, Student Achievement Partners

Themes

Introduction: Why Alignment Matters in an AI Era

The webinar begins with a discussion about the education industry's shift from AI experimentation to practical implementation. As organizations begin integrating AI into classrooms, curriculum, and instructional systems, a critical reality is emerging: technology is only as effective as the systems supporting it.

According to the panel, alignment between standards, curriculum, instructional materials, and assessment serves as the foundation for successful implementation. Without that foundation, AI may accelerate inconsistencies rather than improve outcomes.

Notable Insight

"AI is only as effective as the systems it operates within."

Discussion Themes

Moving from AI excitement to implementation
Alignment as educational infrastructure
Balancing system requirements with student outcomes
Preparing students for future demands

AI Hype Versus Real Educational Impact

The panel explored where artificial intelligence is currently delivering measurable value in education and where adoption may be outpacing practical impact.

Peter Coe emphasized that AI is most effective when it helps educators strengthen existing instructional practices rather than serving as a replacement for teaching. Examples included curriculum adaptation, analyzing student responses, and supporting instructional decision-making.

Zarek Drozda highlighted the importance of distinguishing between two separate conversations:

Using AI tools to support existing learning goals.
Updating learning goals to prepare students for a future shaped by AI.

He argued that education policy has largely focused on managing the risks of AI while spending less time helping students learn how to use emerging technologies responsibly and productively.

Notable Insight

"We should position students as producers, not consumers, of emerging technology."

Key Questions Raised

Are students developing the skills needed to evaluate AI outputs?
How can schools prepare students to use AI responsibly?
What role should AI play in daily instruction?
How can technology support inquiry-based and project-based learning?

Human Oversight and AI Reliability

A recurring theme throughout the discussion was the importance of maintaining human judgment.

Larry Johnson shared examples of AI-generated outputs that appeared accurate but contained significant errors. The panel agreed that students and educators must develop the skills necessary to evaluate information critically rather than accepting AI-generated responses at face value.

Notable Insight

"AI should be viewed as a tool, not an endpoint."

Discussion Themes

AI hallucinations and misinformation
Human review and verification
Critical thinking in an AI-enabled environment
Building student confidence in evaluating information

What This Means for Education Leaders

For education leaders, this discussion reinforces that alignment is no longer a checkbox. Instead, it is a foundational system that directly impacts instructional coherence, student outcomes, and scalability. As standards become more detailed and vary across states, leaders must ensure that curriculum, instruction, and assessment are tightly aligned at a granular level, not just by topic but by what students are actually expected to do.

At the same time, leaders should prioritize depth over breadth. Overloaded curricula continue to limit meaningful learning, making it critical to focus on a smaller number of high-impact concepts while giving students the time to engage with them deeply. This also requires breaking down subject silos, especially as data literacy and real-world application become more essential, by encouraging cross-disciplinary collaboration and more coherent learning experiences.

Finally, successful implementation depends on supporting educators, not just selecting high-quality materials. Teachers need ongoing coaching, professional development, and space to adapt instruction in response to these shifts. Ultimately, leaders must build systems that are both coherent, adaptable, and capable of evolving with changing standards while maintaining a clear focus on student readiness for a rapidly changing world.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Why is alignment critical in the age of AI in education?

A: Alignment ensures that standards, curriculum, instruction, and assessment work together; without it, AI can amplify fragmentation and inconsistency rather than improve learning outcomes.

Q: Where is AI delivering real value in K–12 education today?

A: AI delivers the most value when it enhances effective teaching, such as adapting curriculum, analyzing student responses, and supporting instructional decisions, rather than replacing educators.

Q: Why is human oversight essential when using AI in education?

A: AI can produce inaccurate or misleading outputs, so students and educators must apply critical thinking and verification to ensure results are reliable.

Q: What skills do students need to be “AI-ready”?

A: Students need strong foundational knowledge, data literacy, quantitative reasoning, and critical thinking skills to evaluate AI outputs and apply them effectively.

Q: How should schools approach AI integration in the classroom?

A: Schools should treat AI as a tool to support learning, invest in teacher training, and focus on meaningful instructional use rather than surface-level adoption or over-reliance on technology.

Featured Quotes

“AI is only as effective as the systems it operates within.”

Full Webinar Transcript

The following transcript has been edited for readability. Timestamps have been removed and minor transcription issues corrected. Speaker comments have not been altered.

Opening Remarks

Rich Portelance

Today, we're going to be talking about Future-Ready Alignment: Redefining Curriculum for What Comes Next. Welcome to the EdGate Powers webinar. I'm your host, Rich Portelance, and today we have an outstanding panel of industry experts to discuss future-ready alignment.

And a few housekeeping items before we get going. All attendees' mics will be muted throughout the program, but if there's a question that you have, we're going to do a Q&A portion at the end of the session. So, please put your questions in using the button at the bottom of the screen. We will address it either in line and answer it through the interface, or we'll answer it live at the end of the session.

Over the past several months, one theme has become increasingly clear. The industry is moving beyond the excitement of AI and into the reality of implementation. And that shift is exposing something very critical; AI is only as effective as the systems it operates within. Without strong alignment across standards, curriculum, and data, AI does not create coherence. It accelerates fragmentation, inconsistency, and risk.

So, how do we avoid those things? And what's become increasingly clear is alignment isn't just a technical requirement. It directly shapes what students are able to learn and do. So, today's conversation sits at the intersection of systems that scale to meet market requirements and systems that support meaningful student outcomes. So it's really critical for what we do because without alignment as infrastructure neither is really possible.

So, without further ado, I'm going to ask each of our panelists to provide a brief introduction and then we're going to kick into the webinar.

Hillary, can you start?

Hillary Rinaldi

Thanks so much, Rich. I’m so excited to be here and join in for another EdGate webinar.

My name is Hillary Rinaldi. I'm a vice president at Whiteboard Advisors focused on K-12 research and policy. We're an education policy firm based in DC. While I do a lot of work across the K-12 landscape, I also have a unique purview into the implementation work happening in districts in mathematics and high quality instructional materials, as I lead the national math improvement project, which is the community practice of six largest districts in the country.

So, I’m really excited to dig in today and think about the connectivity to math in particular, as well as just how we support all students in building their skills necessary for success in the future.

So, thanks for having me.

Rich Portelance

Thank you, Hillary.

Next, Larry Johnson from EdGate. And you're muted, Larry.

Larry Johnson

Yeah, I just noticed that. Thank you.

Hi, I'm Larry Johnson. I have worked in the classroom in the education arena most of my life. I was primarily a science teacher for 30 years, mostly physics and a lot of geology along with that at the college level. And I've worked for EdGate for… This is my 22nd year, I think, here after retiring from teaching. I’ve worked on a variety of projects and heavily based lately in the third-party review section for EdGate of helping publishers be better aligned to the state specific standards in a variety of states that are now requiring it.

Rich Portelance

Excellent. Thank you, Larry. I appreciate that. We're looking forward to having some conversation around that.

Next, Zarek Drozda.

Zarek Drozda

Thanks, Rich, and thanks to the full group for assembling for this great conversation.

I’m Zarek Drozda, the executive director of Data Science For Everyone (DSFE). DSFE is a national initiative based at the University of Chicago and we're associated with the Freakonomics books and podcasts if you all know that. That series came out of the lab that economist Steve Levit had started at the university. And our mission really is to make sure that students are future-ready for a world of increasing data and AI tools.

We've been really focused historically in the K-12 mathematics realm and trying to modernize and update student learning targets to make sure that their quantitative preparation is relevant for the many digital and, you know, kind of complex information needs of today. And we've also been doing some increasing work in the science and social studies realms within the K-12 subject world. And I think more broadly we're just trying to make sure that school feels relevant for kids as they go through a world of many emerging tools and as we have some of our, you know, first AI natives.

So, very excited to dip into this and talk about the world of standards and updating learning targets, etc.

Rich Portelance

Thank you, Zarek, and we love what you're doing up there at the University of Chicago with Data Science For Everyone. So, thank you for all the great work.

And last but not least is Peter Coe. Peter?

Peter Coe

Thanks, Rich. It's great to be with you all.

I'm here with Student Achievement Partners (SAP), a national nonprofit focused on standards-based education. We began as a nonprofit, really as stewards of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). And now through our work, especially in high school math, we’re seeking to understand the landscape, build consensus around the math that matters most, and provide prioritized, modernized guidance for what students should learn in the first three years of high school.

So, I think it's really relevant to the conversation we're having today. I'm really happy to be here.

Rich Portelance

Fantastic.

Discussion

Rich Portelance

So, let's jump into some questions. The first thing I want to talk about is the AI hype versus system reality. So, my question is, where is AI delivering real value versus surface-level adoption? So, Peter, can I start with you to talk through that a little bit and how it works in the classroom, math, and real-world use?

Peter Coe

Sure. I think the headline would be that, you know, we see real value in cases where AI is making effective instruction more possible for more students. So, in other words, not as a sideshow, not as a workaround to replace effective instruction, but to actually enhance and make more possible. The really challenging work that it takes for educators to lead and orchestrate strong learning experiences. I think we see that in, you know, a couple of use cases, like helping a teacher to make sense of and adapt the curriculum for the particular needs of the students that they have. We see that in tools that help teachers quickly gather student responses, make sense of them, and enable the teacher to quickly act. You know, the challenges that come with effective teaching are many. And so, the more that we can organize our tools around the specific uses that make that difficult work more possible for educators, I think the more value we'll see.

Rich Portelance

And Zarek, you know, behind Peter's head is a sign that says, “Math that matters is future ready”. You know, as we expand this conversation into data literacy and broader systems, you know, how does that sit? Can you respond to that?

Zarek Drozda

Yeah, I think just, like, on your broader question, it's, you know, part of me thinks it's, like, too early to tell the impact in education at large of AI tools. But I want to… I want to make a division between using AI tools for existing learning targets versus updating our learning goals for students so that they're future-ready. I think in that first camp around, you know, take our existing curriculum and our existing school structures, where can AI be useful? I think the most impact is going to be… The most impact and value will be generated where you have the most precise, specific, targeted use cases. And so, as an example here, I always love to call out the work that Quill.org does in helping students with one very precise learning objective, which is how to write sentences better, right? And sentence structure, grammar, and argument pros. They're focused on, like, one thing, which an LLM or a large language model is already quite good at, right? Because it's text-based. And they've built a really, you know, long track record of getting an automated tutoring tool that helps students with that one precise skill. I worry that some of the broader claims in edtech right now that “AI is going to transform X” are a little bit overstated.

Now, back in the student learning target realm, my concern and optimism here is that all the policy energy around AI and student-facing tools to date has focused on risk mitigation and containment of the student-facing applications, right? But I worry we aren't concurrently building the student muscle around how to leverage the tools for productive academic purposes, or helping them to know how to identify the risks of those tools, and, you know, the hallucinations, the misinformation, etc., and be able to do that effectively as independent adults and citizens after they graduate.

Because the more we remove the tools from the classroom, the further we drive the use of AI tools underground toward unregulated, you know, social purposes, adolescent personal identity, romantic relationships, being a social media influencer, right? And I think as AI capabilities and AI tools proliferated in just the past few years, and kids began to play with them, they're applying those tools in the context of the digital social media culture we've built up over the past 10, 20 years, and it's reinforcing all the things around student anxiety, social comparison, you know, I think that's the unintended consequences of well-intended, but simplistic policy. And I think there could be a ton of value if we position students as producers, not consumers of emerging technology tools widely defined, including AI, and then we apply that, and we help them apply it to academic career life pursuits, right. So, it can allow students to, like, realize the promise of project-based learning and inquiry-based instruction if we're able to guide it in the appropriate way.

Rich Portelance

Hillary, any thoughts on that?

Hillary Rinaldi

Absolutely. I agree with Zarek there.

I think the, you know, how we support students in building their own digital literacy competencies, and certainly that includes of data science, quantitative reasoning, and the critical thinking necessary to engage in the digital-first world, which Gen Alpha is very much
that. I think students are already testing how and when to use AI. I think we also should be giving students more credit. There was a recent survey that Securly did about student use in AI across several large districts, and the data shows that most students are using AI within the guardrails of what their district is saying to use it for. Yes, there are a handful of students, or, you know, a small percentage that are just trying to get answers, but there is a way to use it, to engage, to actually build on that student’s ability to learn, right, and truly use it as a learning partner.

I think how we support students in advancing those skills also means we have to support teachers in how they are using tools. And this doesn't mean that the future of learning and the realization of AI's influence in education is that, you know, we don't need teachers. It's not that at all. We need teachers to be able to do what they are best at, and be strong practitioners that can leverage these tools to, you know, remove some of the administrative burden of those jobs, or to Peter's point, be able to do other things faster. That you can capture exit tickets in real time, and use that data to inform your next lesson in a way that used to happen for hours and hours after school. So, I think it's both, you know, to Zarek's, like, the two camps of where we are right now in that first camp, there's a lot of opportunity for both students and teachers, and I think we need to give more benefit to students' ability and capacity to engage in these spaces too.

Rich Portelance

And Peter, I'm curious, are we seeing more activity in certain areas than actual impact?

Peter Coe

Sorry, trying to find my mute button. I apologize.

I think, sometimes, yeah. I think that, you know, in the same way that one-to-one laptop instruction, students learning from a video, or that we replace that video with a chatbot, right, I think that can be really sound, really exciting, and really compelling, and I think there are great, you know, there's great technology and there's great potential there. And at the same time, I think we know that in classrooms, a lot of students just don't engage with those interfaces to the degree that they need to in order to be successful. So I think the kinds of actions and use cases that are really going to strengthen and reinforce the great teaching will happen with an individual educator or a team of educators in a classroom. That's the place where I think there's even more potential and room for further exploration.

Rich Portelance

So, let's go backwards a little bit to, you know, from the end use to at the beginning. AI is framing and providing a lot of value in the classroom, but there's, you know, extraneous stuff. If we go back to systems, and Larry, talking about alignment and what you do, when is AI layered into systems that aren't well aligned? What are you seeing? What breaks first when people are using these systems, and how might it affect the classroom?

Larry Johnson

Well, I'm going to tie that in with comments both from Missouri and Hillary that they just made. So, and I'll do that first, one of the things I found, because I've worked directly with AI in a couple of projects now at EdGate, and one of the things that I see as a risk and I'm concerned with on just a public, you know, national level… Worldwide level for that matter, is the tendency of people to, you know, buy in or believe what they hear.

So, my concern is, in AI, it isn't always right, and it doesn't always interpret the data that you provided it. It doesn't always interpret it correctly, and I've found that in projects I've done, you know, we've asked AI to graph out a certain set of data, for example, and what the graph
showed was totally wrong. It misinterpreted the data and then plotted it out incorrectly. So, my point is that I'm concerned that with AI tools, there still needs to be a top layer of help, evaluation, scrutiny, for students so that they don't just believe whatever AI tells them because that is a concern for me.

And as far as the first thing that breaks, coupled with that, that's what I see that breaks first is that the AI… What AI couples with your own human-driven stuff has to be scrutinized because it isn't always correct, or it misdirects, you know, it misinterprets the data to repeat that again, and then it misdirects the path in which, you know, a teacher or a student is my bigger concern. The student then takes the results based on that. So, you know, there has to be, in my opinion, there has to be a human connection with whatever AI generates because otherwise, there's no third-party review of the AI.

Rich Portelance

Yeah. No, that makes a lot of sense.

Hillary, you look like you have something to say.

Hillary Rinaldi

I just... We're still in the middle of the emergence of this technology, right? What if you use ChatGPT or Claude today, it looks remarkably different from what it did two months ago. And I don't even know if you could say it's the same as what it was two years ago. So I think there's both, maybe, you know, for those of us that have been early adopters or users, we see those shifts and how quickly it's moving, but it also doesn't… It's not already ubiquitous either, right? This isn't something that's happening for everyone everywhere. But if we anticipate that the future will mean you are interacting with AI in one way or another, and I think we still paint it as like a big bucket of just like, what is AI, what do our students need to know and understand?

And I think to Larry's point, and I think they're excited too, like, the hallucinations of AI and data is very much still true. The current role that it's playing is projecting back to you what can appear correct, right? And so, if you don't know what kind of rules, direction, and, like, explicit instruction you have to give your AI, then you're not going to get those same results. I think this is very much true in how we support students in understanding, you know, quantitative reasoning and data analysis, so that when they get something, like Larry's point, right, is the typical student right now going to be able to look at something that has been AI generated and one, know, that it's been AI generated, and two, be able to assess whether or not that is accurate, right? How are we looking at it that way? So, I think that's part of the throughline and connective tissue of why, you know, as many of us focus a lot of our time on K12 math, like why is this where we wanted to talk about the role of AI? And so I wanted to draw that triangle.

I suspect Zarek has things to add to that, too.

Zarek Drozda

The thing I just added really quickly is, I think Hillary makes a good point here, like, the gut-checking the output of an AI tool, and for a student to have a gut sense of whether it feels right, or it's far off, or it's like close to the ballpark. That's like, in a nutshell, why we don't just throw away all of our existing school subjects, right? It's like, you still need that knowledge base in order to just to make sure we're absolutely clear on… And we thought a lot internally about, like, what is the requisite change needed to update, for instance, the K-12 math progression for the new world that we're living in, right? And I think it's something around like a 30% change of content. It's not 100%. It's also not 0%. And I think if we're in that spectrum of imagining, okay, there's a substantial shift, but it's not, you know, the whole progression of content and skills that we currently learn.

I also think there's a shift away from really honing procedural fluency, to appreciating procedural fluency, and being able to have a much deeper sense of the conceptual understanding, especially the high school mathematics that students should be equipped with as they take those skills and apply them in a variety of problems post graduation. And we can dig way more into that. But, yeah, agree.

Rich Portelance

You know, one of my business partners calls it amplified human intelligence. And I think that's a great way to frame it up. It's, you know, if you don't have the human intelligence, then there's nothing really to amplify, and you can't trust the results.

So, I want to define high-quality digital learning versus low-value usage. So, Hillary, can you define quality engagement and outcomes in that scenario?

Hillary Rinaldi

Just a simple, straightforward question, Rich. I appreciate it.

No, well, I wrote a piece, I think, two weeks ago. I put something on the Whiteboard Advisors Blog about, like, the trends in youth tech, right? So, there is an active debate happening in state legislatures right now around screen time. How much screen time is too much? What does that look like at varied age groups, right? Does it look different for our youngest learners in K-2 versus high school? And how does that look?

I had a conversation with Dr. Francis Baez, who's the chief academic officer in LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District), and they're putting out district guidance around those screen time allotments and what that should look like, right? I think it's very important, and Zarek mentioned this, of, like, well-intentioned policy that has unintended negative consequences. Legislating screen time is a very challenging business to get into, because that creates so many downstream challenges at the classroom level, right? You can then be sitting in a classroom, and you have a teacher who's trying to figure out, well, “Today we're doing our exit ticket digitally, or we're doing all of those things”. I think what really… The root of that, of what, you know, many folks are concerned about around screen time comes into that not all screen time is created equal, right?

If you're that, like Peter said, if you're watching, if you're engaging with a video, or you're off task watching a video that's not actually what your teacher thought you would be doing, that's very different than using an adaptive curriculum and doing a module that is part of your core content, right? And so, I also think there's a little bit more nuance that needs to be applied in this screen time debate to ensure that we're not creating, like, the pendulum doesn't swing the other way and we've reduced students back to, like, solely using paper and pencil when, like, I don't very often write things by hand at this point anymore, right? Like, what does the current job market seek and need? And how do we ensure students are not being disserviced by an unnuanced policy conversation?

Rich Portelance

Okay. So, there's a quality versus quantity component to that.

And Peter, any thoughts to add?

Peter Coe

Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, when I see a question like, “Define high-quality digital learning”, I'm always going to start with defining high-quality learning, right? And then, what's the digital aspect that's going to really buttress and make that vision possible?

You know, when I think about math, I think about probably a lot of the aspects that other folks on this panel would say, and folks in the audience as well. This idea of a really focused and coherent experience. You know, you'll probably hear me say this a lot, and I'm sure folks are familiar with the idea, but you know, our high school math landscape is really cluttered. There's a lot of different content. And so, thinking about high-quality learning and high-quality digital learning that's really focused on a core set of fundamental ideas that students can come back to. They don't feel like they're learning something brand new every day, and I think I'll connect to that.

I think a little bit of where you were going, Hillary, just with this idea of durable skills, and how we can actually use digital tools to build the skills that are necessary in the modern workplace, right? So, you know, how can a digital tool that's providing this focused learning experience also engage students in collaboration, right? In creativity, in some communication, in ways that they're going to need as they proceed through K-12 and beyond. So, I would say really it's these
two ideas of a really focused and coherent experience for students, and one with an eye to the future, where they are building some of those durable skills. We've got a great report out where we looked at different “Portraits of a Graduate” across the country, and we found, you know, there are a few bright spots, but really this is an opportunity that states are naming. We want these durable skills to happen in classrooms. But the connection to math isn't always clear. So I think there's a real opportunity there for folks to build those experiences and those tools that are going to help kids engage in that way.

Larry Johnson

Yeah, I'd like to also just kind of add onto that, that, you know, one of the challenges of any school is that, in any given classroom, the potential of at least one of the students not having the ability of screen time at home is then to help that student be able to transition from screen time in the classroom to the absence of it at home. And being able to somehow apply those and leverage those. The lack of at-home learning with the presence of it at school can be challenging for a student.

Rich Portelance

I think that's a great point, Larry. I want to segue a little bit into why alignment matters, because it affects what students should actually be able to do versus being AI-ready, right? And to leverage the things that we talked about, and it's not just about the AI, it's about the students having these durable skills.

So, Peter, you talked about durable skills, math pathways, and quantitative reasoning. Can you elaborate on that a little bit? And then I want to kind of kick back to Zarek and what he thinks and how that's applied to data literacy?

Peter Coe

Sure. And there have been some great points made already about just our own experience with AI. And I think it's worth reflecting on our own experiences with digital tools, right? We've all used a calculator, and we've all used Google Maps. I think we've all had experiences where Google Maps or a calculator has given us the wrong answer, and we recognized it. I think we've also had experiences, perhaps where one of those tools gave us the wrong answer, and we didn't recognize it.

And so, I think that distinction is really, really important. Because I think that, you know, to be AI-ready or to be fluent with AI, you know, part of it means, I think, a real enhancement and emphasis on students’ conceptual understanding, their ability to quickly estimate answers, to assess the reasonableness of an output or a response. I think those things are only going to become more important. And so, in the same way that, you know, the invention of the calculator did not reduce my need to mentally multiply, I think that to be AI-ready, it largely does mean that the the conceptual foundations, right, I think, you know, Zarek was talking about, you know, that 70% or that there's a sizable chunk that's really important, and is perhaps only going to become more important as AI becomes more prevalent. So, I think part of it is definitely an enhancement, and an increased emphasis on conceptual understanding of the most important math, K-8, and certainly many aspects of high school math as well.

And I think on the other side of it, right, is understanding all the ways that AI can be a useful tool to you as a mathematician, or an engineer, or a social scientist, right? So, I think that is
beginning to find ways for AI and AI-enhanced tools to find their way into student experiences. So, being ready to use those to analyze a function or quickly synthesize a data set. I think using it as a tool in those ways is going to be equally important.

Rich Portelance

Zarek, how do you feel about that and the real-world applications of what we're talking about?

Zarek Drozda

Yeah. Well, I think Peter hit it really well.

And I think maybe just as a framing comment, also, like, on the alignment issue, right, that Rich you were trying to I think tease out. I think first is a guardrail, you know, and again speaking strictly in the world of, like, student learning targets and, like, what we're expecting of our high school graduates, right? So, throwing out all the stuff around like edtech and like changing the classroom experience just for a moment.

And then I think also a principle that we're really invested in, which is making sure that students are empowered, confident producers of solutions against, you know, complex challenges in the real world and not just passive consumers of AI tools and like digital tech. So, you know, we believe that data skills are fundamental to that, right, that's in our organization’s name. We think data literacy gives you both the toolkit to question and decipher the output of AI tools really well. It also gives you the technical skills to customize AI models as a student for a variety of use cases, right?

If you're able to manipulate and confidently load training data into your Claude Code space, or if you're able to, you know, make sure that you're able to work with customized AI tools in your future career, whether you're in law, or nursing, or whatever the sector is, that's going to be critical. And I think there's a whole broader set of conceptual thinking skills that are also math adjacent, but fall in science and social studies as well, around, like, design thinking and quantitative critical thinking, where you're looking for correlation causation, you're looking for reasonable estimations on the fly, probabilistic thinking, there's a deciphering skill, right, I think around, like, pattern recognition, abstraction, simplification frameworks from all the abundance of information we have out there. There's a bucket around validation, so error detection, you know, counterfactual thinking, sort of like meta-analysis, and, like, you know, those could go on and on. We have a pretty defined set of those learning targets that we've wrapped up into what we call the data science and data literacy learning progressions, which we are trying to create as a model to get some of those, like consensus learning targets, down on paper. And then we're going to be splitting those up, and then sending them, you know, half will go into math, a quarter will go into science, another quarter will go into social studies. For, like, deep integration with the existing core academic subjects that we have, blending some of those, like, newer age, you know, AI-relevant, data-relevant skills, which are really things that I think a lot of educators and school leaders have been excited about for a while. Like, these aren't brand new ideas; they're just that the AI is undergirding the importance of them.

The last thing I would say on alignment is that I think the challenge I see is that many people are building these frameworks, and many people are building an answer to what are the learning targets that matter most for an age of AI. And you're going to have states use different frameworks over time. And you could have a situation in which, five years from now, we have state education systems with wildly different standards as they have adapted their curriculum to, you know, AI skills, whatever we call that umbrella, in really different ways. And so, I think it'll be critical to bring some commonality to.

One resource I want to highlight just on that coherence question, the National Academies recently released, like, two weeks ago, a consensus study on the foundations of data and computing. And, you know, data and computing was the title. There were several AI foundations undergirding the text of the 300-page report. But, they put a stake in the ground from, you know, consensus built amongst the research community of, like, what are the foundational principles of some of the most important student skills to hone as we march into this world. And I think that that's one resource in addition to our framework that I, like, really point folks towards because they try to build some coherence around all these kinds of emerging frameworks.

Rich Portelance

So where are we falling short? Hillary's like, I think she's chomping at the bit to jump in.

Hillary Rinaldi

Aren't I always? Yes. Rich knows me too well.

I think, like, I also would introduce a companion piece to this, of like, how are we assessing these skills? Then it's one thing to say, like, "These are the learning targets and what we want to see students be able to do”. Then it's how are we measuring that progress and being able to report back on student outcomes? And so, I think there's a whole component of this of how assessment can also catch up in this space, right? Of, like, when I was working for the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP), and we were writing the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), that's where the Innovative Assessment Demonstration Authority (IADA) was created. States have not fully taken advantage of that, partially because there were, you know, there's a lot of regulation around it. But, we also couldn't have imagined in 2015 what it would look like in 2026, around how far psychometrics have come, and how we could use things in real-time data.

So, I think there's also, like, complementary to what Zarek is saying of there's additional opportunity for how we measure and support students and teachers in understanding whether or not these learning targets have been met. But that opens a whole different can of worms around alignment of how our assessments are aligned to those things there, which I'm sure Larry has thoughts on too.

Rich Portelance

You know, Larry, I'm gonna ask you a question. I liken alignment to, you know, to having the cars that run on the road. They need the gas, maybe that's the publishers, but the highways to get there is alignment, right? And with some federal regulations and local regulations, we can make them super highways and make them better, or we can make them worse in some cases.

So, Larry, you know, as we look at the lack of alignment in those outcomes, what are you seeing? And is it fair to say that outcomes are only achievable when alignment systems are working at the level that they need to be working?

Larry Johnson

Well, that's a great question.

First of all, I want to add something to what Zarek was saying about AI as a tool. And what I see that needs to happen is that culturally, we embrace AI as a tool, not an endpoint. And, you know, in our culture, we tend to grab on to the easy fix. So, the tendency is to, “Oh, this is what AI said, okay”, and that cannot be the culture. The culture has to be the perception that AI is a tool that I can leverage, but it isn't the endgame. And so that, I think, is the most important critical crossroads that we are in right now, the tendency to want it to be an endpoint, therefore, less work for me. But that, you know, that's going to be a challenge, I think, throughout the next 10 years in particular, that's really going to be a challenge to establish that culture. It's a tool.

But then, to your question, Rich, yeah, so states are varying, and they're becoming much more attentive to the descriptors of a standard. So there, you know, it used to be if the lesson was on photosynthesis and it was taught, and the lesson was about photosynthesis, for example, then yeah, we're good. But now states are, and they all vary, as has already been pointed out, they're all different. They all have their nuances, and yeah, this is what I want, and another state will go “Well, no, I want this”, and so that's a big challenge. So, the lesson on photosynthesis nowadays might look like “Students need to write an explanation as to how photosynthesis occurs in this scenario”. Well, now you have “Write an explanation in the lesson. In other words, a student has to be directed to actually write an explanation. Or, it could be to make a presentation using graphics that describe the process. So, it isn't like it used to be where, yeah, this lesson is on photosynthesis, cool. It isn't the case anymore. And that's where I think the tendency is, you know, Virginia, Texas, Indiana, there are other states, Utah, jumping on the bandwagon to hold publishers more accountable to these standard descriptors. Some people call them action verbs, but they're not actually verbs. They don't or aren't always action verbs. They're just action descriptors that are specific to what students have to do around the concept.

So that's the biggest challenge I see now.

Rich Portelance

And Peter, are you seeing that, you know, some of those nuances that Larry's talking about in the world of math as you're, kind of, developing some curriculum?

Peter Coe

Sure. Yeah. I mean, the fragmented nature of our ecosystem is well known, and I think that's really the role that Student Achievement Partners is trying to play right now is to really build consensus around, you know, a smaller number of competencies that we can really anchor high school math around. But, absolutely, I think this is one of the things I think with math in particular can be a real challenge. You know, we want a curriculum about functions. Well, there are a lot of different things you could do with functions. A lot of different tools and representations. So, I really do think those details absolutely do matter as you're thinking about building a coherent system. Right? If we're going to focus on functions, what about functions in particular?

Just to quickly respond, you had asked, you know, where do we see us falling short right now? I wanted to just quickly say, I think a big place I see us falling short is just too many learning targets, right? Too many standards. The cluttered nature of high school math, in particular, I think, is really important to name. And you know, Zarek was doing a great job explaining, you know, what some of these really rich learning experiences might look like in the context of working with data. And those are really only possible when we have a more manageable number of conceptual targets that we're trying to hit. So, I really just want to say, you'll probably hear me say this a lot, but just the more that we can bring focus to this enterprise and say, “Here's a small set of ideas that we're really after”, that just makes so much more possible. And before I'm criticized for, you know, watering things down and taking things out of the curriculum, I just want to be really clear that, you know, I'm talking about, maybe a smaller number of standards, but really at a deep level, where students have the kind of rich learning experiences and develop those lasting understandings.

Rich Portelance

Well, the skills are going to be the coherent piece that goes along.

So, Hillary, I apologize. I was going to ask the next question, but-

Hillary Rinaldi

No, I wanted to jump in because I think this is important for the relevance and rigor, especially in math high school pathways, right? What we don't want is to get back to a place where kids are being tracked in different math pathways based on preconceived notions, or implicit biases, or not, you know, getting them where they need to go, right. The goal should be that every student has options after high school that they're excited about. So, I think the relevance and rigor piece is really important, and also doesn't mean that everyone should be ending their high school career at calculus right there. But it's hard in the current discourse when calculus translates to being like the most challenging option, and a good litmus test as you're entering college admissions of, like, what is the ultimate?

I think Zarek and his organization have done incredible work to think about what other options there should be in high school, and I agree with Peter that maybe there isn't an overindexing on what standards are covered in the traditional math pathways. At the same time, we still have more students who are failing Algebra 1 on the first try, so certainly we should be. So, there is also that, of, like, we have to find the happy medium where we're supporting students on the pathway that sets them up for success, and that we're acknowledging that we can do a lot of this better, right? That not every kid is sitting in a math classroom with high-quality instructional materials and high-quality instruction. I think we're getting closer to that, and there's a lot of effort underway to do it. But we also know it can't just be that we're, like, taking away standards and not making sure that those students have mastered what they need to.

I think the question in the chat around, like, “Why does everything need to be assessed?” I think we're also using assessment in, like, a wide variety of ways, like, there's, you know, exit tickets, there's formative assessment, there's state summative, etc. I think I'll speak on behalf of all of us to say we're using assessment to mean a lot of different things and not just a state summative assessment, which we can talk more about assessing durable skills in that way. But just for the audience, we're using assessment to mean any of those points in time at which a teacher can get more information about a student's mastery of a concept.

Rich Portelance

And I want to get back to Zarek.

How does the lack of alignment limit those outcomes that we're talking about, and what are the gaps in data literacy that you're seeing in these systems that we're building?

Zarek Drozda

Yeah, I think… And I'll also try to react to what Peter and Hillary said.

You know, we've been tracking student achievement in the basics of data and probabilistic thinking, right? So, if you look at the subdomain of math scores, and if you look at just the slice that's around data, stats, ability to apply math functions to like real-world situations, those scores have not been doing great over the past decade, even pre-pandemic. So, there's just a large gap there that even though some of the data and statistics probability standards show up in math as a required expectation, they don't actually get taught in practice, because, to Peter's point, there's already too many concepts in a given year of high school math.

Teachers often run out of time by the time they, like, reach, you know, finals. And the first thing they cut is some of the skill areas that are, you know, maybe not assessed enough. Or they just were not part of the teacher's own math experience when they were going through school. And yet those are some of the skills that are the most critical to survive and adapt in a world of AI, especially as it impacts every sector. So, there's like a huge gap there. I think more broadly speaking, the overpacked and sort of cluttered nature of high school math expectations, which does not have as much coherence as it could, means that you have situations in which educators are sort of forced to run through a mile-wide, inch-deep of the concepts in math that do really matter a lot. You know, linear functions and solving those with automaticity, and exponential functions. Imagine if the whole country were literate in exponential functions pre-COVID. We would have had much better policy discussions on that topic, right? And you could apply that to a variety of different scenarios. So, I think, you know, if we can get to a world in which students are able to slow down and go through some of… A smaller number of concepts in the curriculum, but then spend a lot of time authentically with them, and they're able to apply them in the context of projects in the context of problems they care about.

I think the broader gripe I have, and this is departing from your original question, Rich, I'm now just ranting. You know, AI forces us into a situation in which students know that a good chunk of the things they were learning in school could be Googled and could be put into an AI tool and solved with a button. And so, in that context, we have to do a much better job of justifying to students why we're spending their time on teaching something. And why they're having to sit through a 60-minute class period learning about, you know, fill in the blank. If we can do… I think it's an opportunity to make that way sharper, and prove why, like, you know, some stuff in Algebra 2 actually does matter a lot, and why, you know, the foundations of physics matter quite a bit. But if we can do that on a more targeted, prioritized set of topics and then allow the time for exploration and depth, I think we'll be in a much better spot.

Rich Portelance

So, as always, we're having an incredibly vibrant conversation. I'm going to jump ahead a little bit because we're running tight on time. I want to talk about scaling across states, and really what changes when organizations move from one state to a national scale.

Larry, I want to start with you to talk a little bit about the complexity and fragmentation that happens or occurs. You know, from an alignment standpoint on the back end, what do you see moving from one state to multi-state, and then I want to talk to Peter about impact.

Larry Johnson

So, at EdGate, for example, we have a system approach versus a project approach. So, a system approach means that we have, available to us in our own database, we have all the US standards, all the different subjects, and we have… And then publishers send us their content, we correlate that, put it in the databases at the same time, and so publishers can then extract a report using the ExACT reporting tool. They can extract a report which then tells them, “Okay, these lessons in this particular course of ours match these standards in math, science, social studies, whatever they have. And it also shows them the gaps, so then they can focus on, “Okay, let's edit for Utah, let's edit this series of lessons that we see we have gaps. We're kind of in the ballpark, but let's edit the lessons so that we can better fit that particular state's needs.

Whereas if it's a project, then it's just simply, okay here here are the standards, and here are the lessons, and it becomes a manual project of looking at the lesson and then seeing if it fits the standard, and that's very laborious, very time consuming, and that is pretty much basically all human-driven, so the AI is not at a level yet which could actually do that on a detail level. So, that's really the advantage of a system approach, as it has just so many more options and scalability for large projects. To the point of your state versus national, state versus all states, is that is a huge challenge, and the only way that it can work is if you have a system set up like ours. So, what we do with publishers' content is that we assign the concepts that the lessons are meeting. That allows us then to… They can run a report on any state they want, because the concepts are on the standards, and the concepts are on their lessons. We let the reporting tool then associate them. And that's not specifically AI, but it is where a reporting tool allows publishers to then visually see where they are and where they aren't meeting a certain set of standards in a state. And so, it's a global alignment.

Rich Portelance

You're going from a one-to-one to a one-to-many component using the system to do that. And I can see in a world today where we have, you know, fragmented standards, you know, Common Core no longer exists, that this is really kind of a critical component, right?

So, Peter, talk about that impact on learning across states.

Peter Coe

Yeah, we really are seeing, you know, states move in different directions when it comes to high school math. We got a memo that came out this week, just noting some trends. You know, there are some places where states are moving closer together, and some places where states are moving farther apart. So I think the kind of careful alignment work that Larry is describing really is essential. Because, you know, one state may have a set of expectations around functions that looks one way, another state will have, you know, some nuance difference there, and it really is important to get that right. I think if you don't, you know, you run into these challenges where a student has been experiencing a topic one way with one product, and then they experience it a different way, it gets assessed in a third way, and none of it is really working together. So, I think, you know, having that shared set of clear expectations that are driving learning experiences, extra practice, assessment, right, having that all really be aligned to the same set of expectations is the only way to ensure real coherence.

Rich Portelance

So, from a practical standpoint, Peter, what should organizations do first? Let's talk about real, actionable steps.

Peter Coe

Sure. I mean I think that this isn't going to surprise you, but I'll just say find some focus, right? I think, you know, all of us are trying to decide what's the right framework, what's the one place I can look. And I think SAP does have some good resources out and is going to continue to put more out. But I do think, you know, thinking about those core topics that are most essential for success in algebra, in data science, right? Focusing on a small number of topics that you want to give students extra exposure to, with increased depth, is really the way to go. I think as you explore expansion, really consider each state's individual expectations as they, you know, as relevant to that set of core ideas. I do think that's going to be really important as well.

Larry Johnson

Yeah, I'd like to jump on that. I know you're more cognizant of time, Rich, than I am, but this is especially what Peter was just saying about focus for an individual state. This is especially
becoming apparent in the realm of career and technical education, where, for example, like a farming state, a state whose economy is based mostly on agriculture, they'll have a large number of agricultural sets of standards, and they may not have any IT standards at all. And so as you go across different states, this idea of a state's focus on what they need, per se, spans all subjects. This isn't relegated just to the academic arena; it's career technical ed as well. Yeah, it's a much bigger issue for publishers because it does demand that they have individual… They have state specific, that was what I should say, state-specific courses to meet those specific states.

Rich Portelance

Yeah. No, that's a really good point. And we know that there's, I think, something like, seven times as many CTE standards as education standards and yeah, that's an issue.

Zarek, data and literacy. Where are you seeing… What should people do first?

Zarek Drozda

Yeah, I think, like, something particularly concrete that a school or district leader can do is pull… Start a working group with, you know, some of your most entrepreneurial, passionate teachers around these topics, and begin to wrestle at a cross-subject level. So, you know, get teachers from math, get a couple from science, a couple from social studies, a couple from CS (computer science), and what is our collective plan for thinking about, you know, learning targets in a world of emerging tech, and can we start having some early conversations around those, and to integrate data skills into the curriculum.

We've been doing this with a cohort of school districts where we'll come in as facilitators, and we'll say, "Hey, let's like, you know, grab some teachers across those subject areas where it touches most directly. Because that brings in the opportunity to have a coherent conversation around how to adapt the curriculum for the world that we're running into, versus having it be a siloed one where math makes a change, science makes a change, social studies makes a change, no one talks to each other, and then, you know, you have, like, territorial problems. We want to bring some kind of coherence to that, and there are really exciting opportunities to finally create interdisciplinary learning experiences in high school as a result. And we've already seen some districts using, you know, data literacy, data science kind of activities as a bridge between the school subjects, because you can do that so much more easily with a really concrete topic-aligned data set. That's one strategy on the implementation side. But, like, I think a cross-subject working group is where I push people first.

Rich Portelance

And Hillary?

Hillary Rinaldi

I'm sure in working with some of the largest districts in the country that are grappling with how to improve student outcomes, there are several pilots underway within these districts to test new tools. Whether it be for teachers, or for students, or for both, right. And I think the desire to test and assess the success of those tools and how they're building them alongside is really important so that teachers are supported and coached on both their pedagogical practices, but also how they can and should be using these tools.

This is a new foray for our teachers just as much as it is for our students, and having that support. So, I don't want to lose the need to support teachers on all of this work. I couldn't agree more with what Zarek shared, and there are ways that we can include teacher and student voices as we pursue these new ventures across education and across subjects.

Closing Thoughts

Rich Portelance

So, I want to, because we're tight on time, I want to do a quick round here, one sentence. What's the most important shift education leaders need to make in the next 12-to-24 months?

Larry, I'll start with you.

Larry Johnson

Okay.

Well, I think more focus on making sure that their content actually meets the descriptors of the standard. That's the biggest piece I see in our third-party reviews is that, you know, yeah, this lesson is on the quadratic, but it's missing the part in the standard where the students have to write an explanation of how they got there. So, that's the biggest challenge I see for publishers.

Rich Portelance

Hillary?

Hillary Rinaldi

Support teachers in these instructional shifts, right? We say the first step was adopting challenging academic standards. The second is adopting high-quality instructional materials. The third is implementation, and that has so many steps therein. So, how are we supporting teachers and students in using the resources that they already have, as well as how do we work with these new tools and engage to support a fully, you know, literate, fluent, digital, math across subjects for students as they move through K-12. It's a run-on sentence, right?

Rich Portelance

I wasn't judging.

Peter Coe?

Peter Coe

I'm going to say do more with less. Find ways to increase depth and rigor, and, you know, all the rich learning experiences therein, with a smaller number of content objectives.

Rich Portelance

I like it.

Zarek?

Zarek Drozda

I'll second Peter’s. I think the other one I'll add is, you know, I think I'm going to come back to that edtech versus tech ed thing. I think there's a rush to buy edtech tools right now to do AI stuff, and I think instead we should not sidestep the question which I think is much more important, which is how do we adjust the curriculum to ensure students are durably prepared for a changing world? And so I think, continue to think about the tech ed side.

Rich Portelance

Ah, thank you for that. So, as everybody can tell, an amazing panel and panelists. This conversation was incredibly fluid. I would love to have you all on again because there's a lot we didn't cover. But one thing that feels clear from the conversation is that AI is not going to fix weak systems; it's going to expose them. And the organizations that succeed will be the ones that treat alignment not as a step but as infrastructure, and take care of their students' needs.

Thank you all very much for joining us, and if you have any questions, you can reach out. We're going to send out all the information via a slideshow, so anybody who did attend, we'll get this
to you. It'll include the links and the mentions today that Hillary and the others brought up.

But again, thank you to all our panelists. We appreciate your time today, and thanks for joining us. Have a great day

Webinar Summary & Transcript - Special “International Edition” Webinar - Align to Open New Markets

bford — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 15:10:30 +0000

Webinar Summary & Transcript - Special “International Edition” Webinar - Align to Open New Markets bford Thu, 06/25/2026 - 08:10

Webinar Summary & Transcript

Multi-State Standards Management

Summary

This webinar explores how curriculum providers, particularly those entering or expanding in the U.S. market, can successfully navigate the complexities of state-level standards, procurement processes, and evolving technology expectations. Featuring perspectives from EdGate, BOOKR, and Advancing Global EDU, the discussion focuses on practical strategies for alignment, market positioning, and long-term growth.

A central theme throughout the conversation is the importance of treating adoption as an ongoing process rather than a one-time event. Panelists emphasize that success in the U.S. requires continuous iteration, such as aligning content to multiple state standards, gathering feedback, and refining products over time. This is especially critical in a fragmented system where each state has unique requirements, and where alignment thresholds can be as high as 100% in certain markets.

The discussion also highlights the growing role of AI in both product development and operational workflows. While AI is accelerating processes like standards crosswalking and content creation, panelists stress that it must be used thoughtfully, with human oversight and a clear focus on student outcomes. At the same time, schools are still early in developing formal AI policies, creating both opportunity and uncertainty for providers.

Ultimately, the panel concludes that success in today’s environment depends on preparation, differentiation, and adaptability. Companies must align to standards, demonstrate value beyond features, and build scalable processes that support long-term growth across diverse and evolving markets

Key Takeaways

Entering the U.S. market is an ongoing process, not a one-time adoption event.
Standards alignment and crosswalking are essential first steps for scaling across states.
Many states require high alignment thresholds (90–100%) and formal review processes.
Gap analysis is critical to ensure content fully meets state requirements.
Vendors must differentiate their products rather than replicate existing solutions.
AI is accelerating workflows, but it must be paired with human validation.
Most districts lack formal AI policies, creating both risk and opportunity.
Success depends on reducing friction in adoption, including data privacy and integration readiness.

Topics Covered

U.S. market entry strategies for edtech providers
Standards alignment, crosswalking, and gap analysis
State-specific requirements (e.g., Texas, Virginia)
Procurement processes and adoption lifecycle planning
Product differentiation and market positioning
AI in content creation, alignment, and classroom use
Data privacy and integration considerations
Global expansion and multilingual content challenges

Featured Speakers

Rich Portelance

Host, EdGate Powers Webinar Series

Gina Faulk

General Manager, EdGate

Mike Campbell

President, Advancing Global EDU

Will Gordon

Head of Sales, BOOKR Kids

Themes

Treating Adoption as a Continuous Process

Panelists emphasized that entering the U.S. market is not defined by a single adoption win. Instead, it requires ongoing iteration, feedback, and refinement across multiple states and contexts.

Notable Insight

“For them, that was literally the beginning… The first moment that some of those teachers had seen our platform.”

Key Questions Explored

Why is adoption best understood as a long-term process?
How should companies plan across multiple adoption cycles?
What role does feedback play after initial implementation?

Alignment, Crosswalking, and Meeting State Requirements

Standards alignment is foundational to success in the U.S. market. Panelists outlined the importance of crosswalking existing content to state standards and conducting gap analyses to meet strict requirements.

Notable Insight

“You have to meet 100% alignment… if you’re going after Texas.”

Key Questions Explored

What is crosswalking, and why is it critical for market entry?
How do states verify alignment claims?
What steps should companies take to identify and fill content gaps?

Differentiation and Reducing Adoption Friction

Vendors must clearly differentiate their products while also minimizing barriers to adoption. This includes addressing pricing sensitivity, integrating with existing systems, and meeting data privacy requirements.

Notable Insight

“The easiest decision is just no decision.”

Key Questions Explored

How can vendors stand out in a crowded market?
What friction points prevent adoption?
How important are partnerships and integrations for success?

What This Means for Education Leaders

For education leaders, this discussion highlights the importance of evaluating solutions not just for their features, but for their alignment, adaptability, and long-term value. Leaders must ensure that curriculum and edtech tools meet state standards requirements while also supporting meaningful student outcomes.

The conversation also underscores the need for thoughtful AI integration. With many districts still lacking formal policies, leaders have an opportunity to proactively establish guidelines that support safe, effective use while encouraging innovation.

Additionally, leaders should prioritize solutions that reduce implementation friction, such as those that integrate with existing systems, meet data privacy standards, and provide transparent alignment reporting. As the market continues to evolve, flexibility and informed decision-making will be critical to success

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What is the first step for entering the U.S. education market?

A: The first step is aligning or crosswalking content to U.S. state standards and identifying any gaps that must be addressed.

Q: How do states verify standards alignment?

A: Some states require third-party reviews and detailed evidence showing how content meets each component of a standard.

Q: Why is product differentiation so important?

A: Because many solutions already exist, vendors must offer unique value rather than simply improving on existing tools.

Q: What role does AI play in curriculum development?

A: AI helps accelerate processes like content creation and standards alignment, but still requires human oversight for accuracy.

Q: How can edtech companies successfully enter and grow in the U.S. education market?

A: Edtech companies can succeed in the U.S. education market by aligning content to state standards, differentiating their products, reducing adoption barriers, using AI responsibly, and treating adoption as an ongoing process rather than a one-time event.

Featured Quotes

“It’s a process… It’s not like once you’ve landed an adoption, then you’re in.”

Full Webinar Transcript

The following transcript has been edited for readability. Timestamps have been removed and minor transcription errors corrected. Speaker comments and context have been preserved.

Opening Remarks

Rich Portelance

Welcome, everybody, to the EdGate Align to Open Markets: Special International Edition Webinar. We're going to be discussing how companies can access new markets effectively, including how mapping to curriculum speeds this process. This is our fifth EdGate Powers Education webinar. We do one every quarter, and we try to cover topics such as process technology and standards. We always do the state of the standards in Q4, and of course, accessing new markets. If you would like to suggest a topic, be a guest, or a panelist, please feel free to reach out to us. We'll be submitting material after the webinar, and there will be different ways in which you can engage with us. We'd love to hear from you and get some ideas, and continue this process as we inform and we are informed by the market that we serve.

So today, we have a great group. My name is Rich Portelance, I'm the senior marketing consultant here at EdGate, and with me are three wonderful panelists from three different areas of the education market. First, we have Gina Faulk, who is a general manager here at EdGate. Next is Mike Campbell, president of Advancing Global EDU. Finally, we have Will Gordon, head of sales for BOOKR Kids. Before each of the panelists provides background, I want to remind everyone on the call today that while your video and microphones will be muted, the questions can be submitted in the Q&A box at the bottom of your screen.

Please feel free to do so, and if you submit a question, you're going to be in the running for an EdGate mug! These coffee mugs are awesome, they're done by Miir, and so if you submit a question, we'll run a raffle afterwards, and we'll send one lucky participant a new mug.

Also, we're going to send out the recording of the webinar along with some of the slides and other information after the webinar, probably early next week, so you can share it with your friends and colleagues who are unable to join us today. In addition to the webinar, we have recorded some podcasts. Mike and I spoke last week; it's up on our YouTube channel, and I'll be speaking with Will next week, and that will also be on the YouTube channel, so check those out.

Without further delay, Gina, can you start us off with introductions?

Gina Faulk

Sure! I'm Gina Faulk, and I'm the general manager here at EdGate. This is, I think, my 25th or 26th year in publishing. I started on the production side of the business, working in typesetting, content creation, editing, design, and art, so I got to see that whole world. Then, I switched over to working for an edtech company that published digital literacy curricula. There, I was able to participate in lots of different state adoptions. That introduced me to EdGate, because we used EdGate as our standards provider. So, EdGate was actually the company that was helping me get together all the alignments, materials, and the proof that our content met learning digital learning standards for various states. Then, I moved, switched over, and started working for EdGate, so I kind of have been in this world for a while, and I know how important it is that publishers have their alignments and all their ducks in a row when they're submitting for adoption.

So, our focus at EdGate is really on helping companies, whether you are an edtech company, a traditional publisher, or even a state, ensure that your content meets state standards, international standards, and/or national standards so that your material will be used, adopted, and implemented in the classroom.

Rich Portelance

That's terrific, thank you very much. And Mike?

Mike Campbell

Thanks so much, Rich. I appreciate you guys having me on the webinar today.

I'm Mike Campbell, and I am the President of Advancing Global EDU. I started in this business as a teacher, then moved into educational publishing and was in publishing for about 15 years, and then moved into educational technology, where I was involved in a startup, and then after exiting that startup, I started doing consulting about seven or eight years ago. And since that time, we've been working with startups, helping them with their sales, marketing, and go-to-market strategies over that time, both here in the US and globally.

So, we work with companies coming to the US, and companies that are actually thinking about their strategies moving outside the US, as well as those that are from the US. As well, you'll hear in a few minutes about our latest initiative, and that is we are opening a school that is a dual diploma school that's bilingual, that's based here in the US and in Mexico.

Rich Portelance

Oh man, that's going to be an exciting project, Mike, and we can't wait to hear a little bit more about that!

Last, but not least, is Will Gordon.

Will Gordon

Hi, thanks, Rich, and I am also really glad to be on this panel. I’m excited to get into this discussion and some meaty questions.

I'm based in Durham, North Carolina, but I'm head of global sales for BOOKR. BOOKR is a European-based company, actually based in Hungary and in Budapest. My background, briefly, I'm a product of two teachers; both my parents were public school teachers for over 20 years. Also, the topic is close to my heart because I have two daughters, I have an eight and an 11-year-old.

I've been in the education technology space for about 15 years. I got into it initially after teaching English abroad for several years, and then returned to the US to a vibrant kind of startup community, and was really fascinated to combine language learning with technology. For the past decade, I've been focusing on reading and literacy in the different companies I've worked with, working with family-owned companies, working with International groups, taking a kind of US-based content and finding homes, partners, and schools for that content, and online platforms internationally.

My current role at BOOKR is to help expand our partnerships around the world for our classroom platform called BOOKR class, and that includes our expansion into the United States.

So, I think one perspective I'll bring to this conversation is, you know, we are a company that is focused on reaching children who want to read, want to develop a reading habit, and a love of reading no matter where they are in the world, or what their socioeconomic level is. So, that presents interesting challenges trying to align to the standards in different countries, including the US, different states, but also, it's an opportunity to sort of focus on a mission-driven objective, which is, you know, getting literacy materials to young readers.

So, I’m glad to join, and that's a brief summary of who I am.

Rich Portelance

Well, thank you very much, Will.

Discussion

Rich Portelance

And as promised, we have some diversity on the panel in terms of where people are coming from and what their viewpoints are, so let's kick in with a question for Mike. During our podcast, Mike, you and I touched on the complexities of curriculum development in light of the variations that exist today in state standards, particularly in relation to the Common Core. Can you provide us with an overview of what challenges you are seeing as it relates to those variations?

Mike Campbell

So, yes, that's a great question.

I think, you know, even today, the Common Core has been around for several years now, and we still see it changing year after year. 41 states are still on board with the Common Core, there are some with variations to that, and there are nine states that are not on board with that.

So, when we look at companies who are coming from, you know, global companies that are moving into the U.S., we always tell them… they are always are so excited about coming to the U.S. because they look at the a huge market that the US is, but then we have to tell them it's like coming to 50 different states or 50 different countries because of the Common Core, the differences in the Common Core, and the different states that have not adopted the Common Core. So, I think having a company like EdGate that can help those companies align those standards and find out the nuances between those different states is a huge help, because it will make their entrance into those markets quicker and faster.

And you have to look at those because, you know, teachers want to know or the administrators want to know how those standards are aligned, and how that solution is aligned to their local curriculum.

Rich Portelance

So, thank you for that, Mike.

You know it clearly is 50 different markets, and I appreciate you pointing that out.

Will, with BOOKR, you're relatively a neophyte when it comes to the US market. You've been in Hungary and the European markets. Which of the challenges resonate with you, and what processes are you and your team putting in place to overcome those challenges?

Will Gordon

There's an extremely long answer to that, which could probably take the full hour, but I think I might focus on a couple of key things.

I think the first key thing just focuses on making sure that we have a product or a solution that is different and unique, kind of speaking more broadly, no matter where we're bringing it to, and no matter what school we're going into in any market. So with BOOKR, when our founders created the platform, they really wanted to create a reading format that was unique and different, and so the format itself, kind of the content which is the core of the platform, is different from sort of a basic animated story with text and audio. We've built and scaffolded language learning elements, so we're really focused on English Language Learners, actually, is kind of our niche or our focus, and story-based learning in that way. So, that's kind of, globally speaking, that was an important thing to us, is to sort of make sure what we were building was globally unique.

Entering the US market, I think two key skills to have are listening, so really listening to people, that means listening to people, and as we begin to build relationships, meet people and hear what is really needed, and also clearly communicating what we are offering. In all the partner conversations I've been having over the last couple of months, one thing I've heard time and time again is that often, edtech companies in particular will struggle if they are not clearly communicating what they can offer, not in technical terms, but based on what a teacher really, really needs, and what the teacher really, really wants. So, it sounds very basic, but being able to empathize with the local needs, or the state's needs, or even bringing it down to a very local level of “Who is the teacher and the student we're trying to serve and how can we serve them?”

And then the third area I would talk about is sort of making sure that the product has the right nuts and bolts, that it's built in the right way to basically be able to thrive in the US. So that's where standards come in, working with Partners like EdGate and making sure that, you know, in our platform, a teacher can very quickly search the state standards using the US curriculum planner, they can find which books align to which state curriculums, and that means making sure our books are Lexile leveled, making sure that we are talking about informative assessment in the way that U.S. teachers would talk about it. Again, even though to Mike's point, there isn't a one-size-fits-all teacher, we have to be very specific about what we are offering and who we are trying to offer that to. There's more I could say, but I would say those are the three things that we've really focused on.

Rich Portelance

Thank you, Will. I think you mentioned some really important things, you know, getting into the Lexile levels, and obviously, the standards alignment, all really critical components in understanding your audience, which makes a lot of sense.

So, Gina. You've been in this publishing space, as you said, for about 25 years. From your perspective, what do you see as the most common mistakes made by edtech companies that may inhibit their chances of adoption at a state level?

Gina Faulk

Well, of course, I'm going to come at this from the standards perspective, as always, and I think the thing I hear the most is when a company, whether they're in the US already, or they're an international company, they come to the US thinking that they can just use the Common Core, or the NGSS (Next Generation Science Standards), or the NCSS (National Council for the Social Studies) sets of standards, but that as we keep saying it's not a one-size-fits-all, so that really won't fly.

It's always easier for me to illustrate something, so I asked Sharla if she could show one of my slides, and I know this is a lot of text, but I just wanted to illustrate one example I thought was really good. It's when you're taking a look at the Common Core 8 “Math Practice” standards that were created in 2010. There were just eight of these mathematics practice standards. Florida took that and expanded it into 35 standards. So, we went from seven to 35 in Florida, and if you multiply that across all the states… And this is just practice standards. So, you can see there's a trend in every state; they've taken the Common Core, and even if, like Mike said, they adopted it, it has expanded into something well beyond anything that anyone can really handle on their own. So, I think that's the number one thing that I would say is just, just remember that Common Core can't be counted on as the one and only set to go to.

Another example, if we move to the next slide, is around social studies, 32 states adopted the C3 Framework; the College, Career, and Civic Life C3 for Social Studies State Standards. Some adopt, so 32 in the beginning, many states have moved away from it, some have rewritten them completely and/or have their own sets of standards. So, again, it's just that it can't be counted on as the uber set of social studies standards to use. And then you have states that, of course, they have their own unique state history classes, and oftentimes that's fourth grade. But sometimes they don't have it at all, so it's just a crapshoot as to whether each state is going to have its own history classes. Then, we looked at trends. Do all states talk about the same American history, even? And they don't. We looked at just an example yesterday of which states talk about the Seven Years' War, and only 24 States even mention it. So, you're really going to get huge differences in every state as far as what they cover in social studies.

I would say those are two examples, and then we can kind of turn off the slide, Sharla, but… Yeah, well, actually, there's another slide I can show you about standards changing, sorry. The other, I guess the second piece of advice I would give to watch out for is that standards change all the time, and so, that's why we are keeping them up to date for our clients. We actually publish them freely on our website; anyone can go to this as a great resource, we are tracking all the standards in our system, and we publish every month what has changed. So, the scary thing about this is that sometimes a state can change standards on a dime, and you might be preparing your content thinking, “Okay I'm writing this to the New Jersey 2025 math standards”, then suddenly New Jersey will change its mind, and then there's a new set of Standards, so that's the thing to be worried about too is that they change all the time, sometimes they don't announce it, sometimes you have to scramble, it is what it is, we're doing our best to to keep up with it. But this is a great resource right on our website to show our clients or whoever. It could even be a different state showing what has changed, what grades, what countries, and again, it's not just the US that we're tracking, there are many different sets, both international sets and then supplemental sets, as well, so there's a huge library of supplemental standards on our website, too, that you can take a look at.

So, yep, that's it in a nutshell, the two big things to be wary of.

Rich Portelance

Those are really big things, thank you. There's a lot to digest there.

Okay, so Mike, as a consultant in an industry where… and you're also in the midst of launching this dual degree online school, which you mentioned at the beginning, what advice are you going to give your clients, and do you also take for yourself as you launch the school regarding the changing U.S. education landscape? Especially as it concerns this new administration?

Mike Campbell

You know, one of the key things that we're coming up against right now is this aligning, you know, much of what Gina was talking about here is the aligning to curricula. We have two curricula that we're aligning to our school as being accredited in New Mexico and in Mexico, and so, not only do we have to get the schools aligned, the two curricula together, we have to make sure that we're constantly keeping those curricula up to date, and making sure that those standards are kept up to date on that.

And, you know, when we talk to other companies that are thinking about looking at the U.S. market, that's another thing that we talk about. Not only, you know, are we thinking about NGSS, you know, but we're also thinking about Common Core, and we're thinking about computer science. There are multiple standards that we're looking at. And now, you know, one of the key things that we're hearing a lot about is CTE standards, and that will be a big one, I think, as more companies… Because that's going to be a big area that will be funded by the new administration. You think about allied health, you think about computer science, those kinds of things all fall into that category. So, as we develop new courses for our school, and as other companies think about solutions coming into the U.S., those are kinds of things that we're offering, you know, some strategic advice about where the money is. That's going to be one of the things about where the money is going to be, is like CTE courses.

Special education is another area that we're looking at, because we know that parents are looking for special education solutions, and those are another area that we look for and are making sure that those standards somehow can be, you know, you still have to align to Common Core, but those solutions still have to be, you know fit within those solutions that go along with that.

And then, you know, some of the other things that we look at are making sure that we're financially accountable. You know, here in the states, we look at, you know, there are more and more states that are looking for that financial push for vouchers, things like that. Those, and the federal government is really pushing for that. You see a lot of the things that the Trump Administration is pushing now, so you're going to see a lot more state and local control. In fact, there was an article today I saw in The Seventy-Four, which is a media piece that's out there about, you know, how can the federal government push for more money to private schools and things like that, so there clearly is a push for more money being pushed down to things like charter schools, private schools, and different things like that. So, I think in the next few years we're going to see more and more of that, and as a result, you know, where companies that have come to the US have really focused on districts and public schools, they're going to have to think about spreading their marketing and sales dollars out further to private schools, charter schools, parochial schools, things like that moving forward.

And then finally, I think there's going to be more competition out there because of that, because you're going to see more private schools come on board, because people you know will want to undo that. We are already seeing things like these microschools that are out there; there are multiple things out there. There was a conference this week called Delock that really focused on online education this week, and I've already heard from that conference alone there's been all kinds of specialized private schools that have come online for that, so there's going to be a lot of different kinds of schools, and as a such, we're going to see a lot more specialized content that comes from those. So, that's a long answer for that one, Rich.

Rich Portelance

But a good answer, Mike. I really appreciate it. I think people have to keep their ear to the rails on this and, you know, actively watch what happens with this new administration because things are going to change.

One of the things I want to mention before I ask Will a question is that EdGate offers, because you mentioned CTE standards, Mike, and Gina was talking earlier about Common Core, this is a free resource I want to make sure everybody out there knows about. It's really important. So, what EdGate has done is to compare Common Core and CTE, and does a comparison, so you can see at any state how close their standards are at the state level to the Common Core, or to the CTE standards, or NGSS, so it really gives you a good starting point baseline for how to prepare your content. So, that's up on the website, it's under the resource tab at the top of the site, so please take advantage of that. It's, like I said, a free resource, Gina and her team keep it up-to-date all the time, and this is also reflected in their tool, ExACT, which is the standards alignment and standards management platform, which also takes in the… When standards are updated at any state, it's automatically updated in the ExACT system, so that if you have alignments done, it'll go through and update those alignments. So that's a pretty, you know, neat resource to have available as things move quicker.

Okay, so, Will, in your opinion, how do edtech providers show the value of their product to K-12 buyers, pushing the product over the threshold of a nice-to-have to a must-have, and how can smaller publishers like yourselves and edtech companies best position themselves for success as they enter the U.S. market?

Will Gordon

Yeah, I think, initially, it comes back to making sure that you have something that's unique. So, bringing it to a kind of reading content… It's important that we are looking at what other reading platforms are out there. You know, I have two kids in Durham Public Schools here, and they both have reading platforms that they use, and, you know, many of us know the names of those platforms, and so we have to make sure we're not just bringing something that just repeats a little shinier version of what's already there.

I also think that with supplemental materials, it's an even bigger challenge in some ways, because the easiest decision is just no decision, right? It's not curriculum-based, we're not selling a textbook, we're not selling a tool that covers all of the NGSS science standards, that covers math, science, everything. Even in English language learning or reading, we're fitting a particular need, and so it's important that we are aware of that, that we're listening to price sensitivities, that we are following where the budget is going, a lot of the things Mike was talking about. It's important for us to reduce friction points for a school to adopt, so, you know, we're partnering with other platforms that are already in the US market. Platforms that deal with student data, security, and things like this, because that's an example of an issue that, oftentimes, products coming from outside the U.S. don't think about, since each state might have different data privacy rules or regulations. Luckily, we're coming from Europe so they have pretty strong data requirements there

And then the last thing that I would say is don't assume that you find one great salesperson, or one great opportunity, or you have one district adoption, and that's kind of your golden egg. I think that's a mistake people entering your companies, entering the US market as well, is that they put all their eggs in one opportunity or one pilot. And we are really taking approach of, again, trying to reach children where they are, so we have partnerships in the at-home reading space going on, we are talking to library consortiums, so we have a library version of our of our platform which can be used, we are piloting with schools on the East Coast and on the West Coast, and so, we're kind of taking a broader approach in that sense.

But I think each product and each company takes a different approach. I know of companies that have, you know, taken a different approach of opening an office in California, and hiring a salesforce there of people who really know the California schools market well, and that's their approach. But you have to really be thoughtful about what your approach is, and then really, really stick to it and follow through.

Rich Portelance

Well, you made a point there that I just want to kind of circle back on, because I think it's so important. I was talking to a former president of a fairly large publisher last week, and he had said, “Companies today tend to go from adoption to adoption instead of planning out a lifecycle of adoptions”. You know, what does that timeline look like? What does that framework look like? How can I plan it out? And you were saying the same thing, you know, don't just put all your eggs in that one basket of one adoption, because there are many more to come. Is that correct?

Will Gordon

I think that's right. I think even in the framing of this panel discussion, you use the word “process,” and I think that's a very good way of describing, kind of, what entering a new market means, especially in the U.S., it's a process. It's not like once you've landed an adoption, then you're in, and you figured it out. You haven't figured it out with that District because you're going to get lots of feedback, and that feedback is iterative and should go back into, you know, how you move forward with your product or your content.

Also, the market's going to change and your next adoption is going to be different, so, you know, this morning I was on training with a large school in the Middle East that we are onboarding. A school we met at ABET, actually. And I was thinking kind of more holistically about it, and how, for us, this moment of the training is sort of, like, we've reached some sort of end. Not an end, but we've reached the end of a certain process we were in, which was to get them to buy into our platform. But for them, that was literally the beginning, the first moment, the first moment that some of those teachers had seen our platform. And so, for us, we have to think about that process as kind of an ongoing process that doesn't just begin or end with a certain moment, or a certain adoption, or a certain success, but it's kind of this rolling process that hopefully will never end if you're successful.

Rich Portelance

Fantastic.

So, with that process in mind, Gina, what kind of preparation are you advising curriculum companies to take to elevate their chances of success in going from one state adoption to the next? So, we talk about that process and how ExACT can help out.

Gina Faulk

Yeah, a couple of different ways.

One, when we see, I know we've been working with Will and his team at BOOKR Kids this past year, and I think number one is to get your materials, what we call crosswalking. So, if BOOKR Kids had already had, and I think you did already have your content aligned to one set of standards, we're able to take that alignment and crosswalk it to the U.S. states. So, that's the first step. If the material is not aligned, we start from scratch, and we're reviewing it and using both human and our ExACT technology to do a global mapping of the content to all the state standards. So, this slide kind of gives a rundown of how that works. We can do that in multiple ways. Our clients can use our internal tools, the ExACT alignment tool, to do that work, where you're accessing our standards, you're aligning your content in our system, and then seeing the results and how your content aligns to all 50 states. So, that's the first step.

The second step is also to look for your gaps. So, there are quite a few states that make it a requirement that the content must meet at least 90%, up to 100% of their standards. So, for instance, when we do reviews for Virginia, this state actually requires a third-party review of its content, and you have to meet 90% of its standards. So, make sure that the work is done where you're actually doing a review, checking for gaps, and if you do have gaps, then you need to write content to fill those gaps.

Texas is a state where, according to their new IMRA, the Instructional Materials Review and Approval process, you have to meet 100% alignment to the TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills). So, if you're going after Texas, you really need to be spot on with your alignments. We can run gap reports automatically in our system, and that's where we'll yield a report, and it will show you exactly what standards you're missing in every state, so that you can write the content and fill in the holes.

So I'd say those are the two things that I would suggest first if you're coming from international to the U.S. Do the alignment or the crosswalking, find your gaps, and then go from there.

Rich Portelance

That's fantastic, thank you, Gina. And that follows along with that idea of process first and building it up so that you have something that's iterative and manageable, and it's not just going from one adoption to the next.

Let's go back to Mike here. During our podcast, Mike we spoke about the integration of AI in education. I think we agreed on its potential to enhance learning experiences, but there needs to be some guardrails on it. What are you seeing in terms of AI adoption in this space, and what warning labels should be applied to it?

Mike Campbell

Well, I think… I mean, we've all seen this, every single day it's changing, and every single day we're seeing new solutions that are out there. But the one thing I think is that… Most of the things that I'm seeing out there for schools and school districts are that most school districts have yet to put together a regulation for their school or for their district. And as we get into this AI marketplace that we have these days, it's really important, I think, that we have some kind of, you know, guardrails for schools and school districts because otherwise it becomes like the wild, wild west, and everybody's doing their own thing, and that is not what we want. We want the best of the best in the schools and the ability for teachers and administrators to use these, to use AI, not to replace teachers or administrators, but to use AI as a tool.

And we've both seen AI, you know, that can really be useful in the classroom, and we've seen AI that can help individualize learning of, you know, helping readers, help with math, you know, we've seen it in hardware now in multiple places, but we need some kind of areas that schools and school districts should really help provide that guidance for teachers and administrators. So, you know, I think we all have an opinion on that, and how that's going to be used in the classroom. I really, I think, you know, I was at a meeting a few weeks ago around FETC (Future of Education Technology Conference), and if you know that meeting, it's very early in the year in Florida. Someone had done a review of districts here in the states, and out of about 800 districts or so, only two had some kind of guidance in place for their instructors, and that was kind of scary that they had done that. So, clearly, we need some kind of guidance in place, but it's also a very exciting time to be in education with AI and the ability to do that. For students, especially in areas like special education, they could have an AI that is set beside them or with them to help guide them, to be their personalized, individualized learning helper, and could really change how we help these students learn and succeed on a day-to-day basis.

Rich Portelance

Well, I would agree 100%, Mike. And I appreciate that, you know, we're at the very beginning of that pendulum, so people realize that, you know, AI is in its infancy, it's already made a massive change, and there's a lot more to come, but we can control how it affects and what it can provide if we're thoughtful about it.

A question came in, so I just want to break the cycle here for a second and go to Gina. Jeff Dodds asked Gina, "How does a state like Texas verify alignments relative to the bar that they set if a content provider claims they have addressed 100%? How do they verify it, and do they just take their word for it, or what do they do?”

Gina Faulk

Well, Texas does require a third-party review, so that is part of the process, and EdGate has done that work. I believe they also use teachers, too, and some of those might be volunteers, some might have a stipend, but when I've looked at the Texas site recently, it looks like they have a review process in place where they're actually going through and verifying that the content does indeed meet the standards, that there's proof.

I think we have a slide that shows kind of what that looks like I believe in our deck, but it's the same work that we do where you're actually… Or we might have removed it, I don't remember, but where we go through and say, “Okay, of these three bulleted points within this standard, you met A and B, but you did not meet C, so it's a red flag”. So, they are doing the same thing within Texas.

Rich Portelance

When you do this third-party review, if EdGate does it with the publisher prior to submission, those red flags can be addressed before submission, right?

Gina Faulk

Exactly, yes. So we'll red-flag it so that the client can go back and fix it before they do their final submission.

Rich Portelance

Okay, awesome. Thank you.

Will, I'm going to cut over to you and BOOKR. When we talk about AI to inform the process, does what we were just talking about with Mike and Gina make sense, and does it resonate with you and what BOOKR's looking at?

Will Gordon

Yeah, I think completely… I think the biggest difference between sort of the advent of AI, and as a new technology compared to other things that have impacted education in the past, whether it's the computer, or, you know, word processing, or Google, or Wikipedia, or whatever it is… Spell check. You know, there's always this phase where these things come in, and I remember when I was in middle school, and my teacher told me, “You cannot turn your paper in spell checked. I want you to turn it in, just what you wrote as what you wrote”. And now, you know, I occasionally volunteer at the school I grew up going to, and students are required to spell-check their papers before they turn them in.

You know, I think the flash forward with AI, that process is happening so much more quickly, and part because AI was so ubiquitous, AI itself is kind of improving so quickly. And also, it's so, you know, there's very advanced uses for it, but using it on a basic level is very, very simple. A year ago, I wasn't using it at all in my work processes, and now I'll use it a couple of times a day for an email. You know, I'll write an email, and I'll say, “That email seems a little bit passive-aggressive, and that's not what I'm intending to do. Let me get some help, you know, improving this email in terms of tone, or something”. And I could do that, it could take 20 minutes, or I could do it with AI, and it takes two minutes.

So, I think on the product side, the way we're looking at AI is we're seeing that people want authentic content and actually content that they feel was created by people. That may change because this is a changing landscape, but that's one real value we bring is that we have a team of illustrators and story writers who are creating the content. We use AI to expedite some different processes, but everything we create is, you know, human-created, but in the product itself, we’re using AI in different ways. Whether it's from the algorithm that's recommending books after you read a book, to the vocabulary tool on the student side, which is an AI-driven tool, or speech recognition tools that we have, they’re all AI-driven.

And on the teacher side, there are huge opportunities, you know, teachers can create comprehension quizzes in an instant based on one book or several books, five questions or 50 questions, you know, and that is a task that would take a teacher to spend their evening after dinner creating a comprehension quiz for their class, so we're really looking at it in terms of the product. In terms of the classroom, I think you described it well. This idea that every student someday may have an AI assistant, you know, I think generally that's an accurate description of what it will look like, that everything we're doing there will be some kind of assisted element to it.

I think initially, part of maybe why there's not a lot of regulations is there's sort of this fear of the new, but as with all these standards, ironically, once a standard is put in place or a regulation, paradoxically, what it does is I think it frees you up to actually be free to use that thing, whatever it is. You know, a math standard feels like a limitation, but it actually creates a playground within which you can teach math or learn math, so we're kind of in that in-between phase. I'm not an expert on the US AI standards, but I'll tell you my daughter's elementary school doesn't have any AI policy yet, that's for sure.

Rich Portelance

Thank you for that, Will.

A question came in about BOOKR. Do you have products in other languages, such as Arabic?

Will Gordon

Very good question. This is a very common question. I would say for the U.S. market, we've got the most commonly… Questions come up in Spanish, because right now our library is fully in English. We do have a German version of our library, so we have a collection of… Actually, a separate version is used in Europe and in the Middle East to teach German and reading in German. We don't have Arabic titles left. We're working on a few Southeast Asian language titles for some specific markets, but my guess is that Arabic is in the plans in the coming months. As we say, it's in the road map, as we like to say.

Rich Portelance

And I'm sure if there was an opportunity, you guys would accelerate that road map.

Will Gordon

Yeah.

Rich Portelance

Excellent.

And a question came in for Gina. Do you have standards for the Middle East and Middle Eastern countries?

Gina Faulk

We do, we have some select standards, and we just added some too for a client. So, there is an area on our site where you can see all of the standards. I know we just added Kuwait, but I'd have to check and see exactly which ones we have in the Middle East. I have to be honest, they've been difficult to find some of them. It's hard to reach the right people, and it seems like they can go out of date pretty quickly. They're very buried on these sites in the Middle East, so we've had to use our connections, a lot of LinkedIn reaching out, like, “Do you know this person? Can you help me find these?” So, if you can let me know exactly which ones you're interested in, we… And we can research too.

We've done a lot of research in the past year. If you go to our website, you'll see on the standards update page how much international work we did last year. We added tons of European countries, Asian countries, and some Middle Eastern countries to our site. We hadn't done that in years, but now they're all up to date. And because we have some clients who have subscriptions to keep those up to date, everyone is going to benefit from that.

Rich Portelance

And Gina, when you talk about, you know, we're talking to curriculum providers, people here in the market that are looking to differentiate themselves. How can companies that are clamoring to win business find opportunity, and does AI, in your opinion, have a place for helping them advance their products?

Gina Faulk

Yeah, well, all three of us, Mike, Will, and I, were all at ABET, it sounds like, and so one of the things I heard when I was at ABET is when we were walking around, every stand said something about AI. So, it was clear that everyone is touting the fact that they're using AI to help build their product. And I had a couple of teachers walk by and say, “Ah, everyone's using AI, you know, now it's not so special anymore”. So, I think that it's great that you're using AI because it does save a lot of time to for the creation of the content, but what the teachers were expressing was, you know, what really matters in the end is not the fact that they used AI to build their product, but does the student understand the concept? Are they showing mastery of the concept at the end of the day? On the assessments, can they walk through a problem? Can they solve a math problem? Can they write? So that in the end was sort of, like, yeah, it's really great they're using AI, it's saving a ton of time, and maybe that's bringing the price down in the end for the consumer, but how does that affect the student?

The other thing I was thinking too is that… I think, Will, you were alluding to the fact that I've seen my own kids use it, and I halfway think, “Oh, that seems like cheating. You're taking a picture of a Shakespearean sonnet and picking it apart rather than using your brain”, so that's not going to work on a test. I see the benefit of maybe practicing and learning, but I also think that this could be a really good opportunity. And I've talked to a couple of companies who are working on creating, like, either a digital literacy program that teaches students how to use AI, and then also it could be for digital literacy for safety and how to use it appropriately. I mean there's two different products you could build, and it sounds like there's a rumblings from a couple companies that are starting to do that, but I see an opportunity in that right there, because it seems like students, my own included at home, are using it in ways that I think, I don't know if that's going to fly when you're taking a test.

But the other thing about EdGate is that we are using AI. We started playing around with AI a few years ago. We're using it on the back end, and in the end, it will help our clients save money because what we're doing is… It's helping us to crosswalk the standards. So, eventually we'll be able to… Instead of spending so much time on humans connecting all the standards across the states and internationally, we'll be able to use AI to do that work for us. So, we already have that in the works, and we imagine that, you know, it's only going to improve over the next few years, especially with CTE. We talked a little bit about, Mike, you were mentioning CTE, and yes, there's so much CTE out there, and the standards are enormous, so rather than us sitting down and having a human go and look at all of the agriculture courses across all 50 states, it's going to be a lot easier to use AI to connect the agriculture courses together using semantic matching. So, that's where we're going with AI.

Will Gordon

If I could piggyback on one point you made, Gina, which I think you're right, when you see your child using it, it's a funny feeling. But just like with any technology, the critical thinking skills that are taken to use, you know, ChatGPT, or come up with the right prompt, then receive the information, and then analyze it, you have to really think critically. And so, I think it is about teaching kids how to use it, just like we had to, you know, we had to learn how to use search engines, and be critical about the sources we were just sourcing when we're doing a research paper. You know, there was the other day, I asked ChatGPT to help me slightly revise an email that included dates in the email, and when I reviewed the email, it had changed 2027 to 2037, and so there's, you know, it makes mistakes, and so you have to really, really you know, think critically, review it, and analyze it, so it doesn't again replace the work. But I think I haven't seen products that are teaching those skills; someone's building it and working on it.

Gina Faulk

Good opportunity out there.

Rich Portelance

Well, I'm going to just let everybody know we only have a couple of minutes left. If you have a question, please submit it.

Audience Questions

Rich Portelance

We have a couple of questions in the queue. Mike, this one's for you. If you could actually answer George in the chat, that would be great.

There was a question here from Nicole, and I'm going to just ask it online or out loud here. Are there any recommendations for how to present standards in published content? For example, our content is lined up to Pennsylvania's early childhood standards, but we've sold plans in 48 other states. Can we do the crosswalk on our end? Or we can do the crosswalk, but how can we market to customers out of state when our plans specifically list PA standards? I’m going to guess Gina for you, okay.

Gina Faulk

I'm reading the question again. So it sounds like the actual proof that it meets standards is just for Pennsylvania right now. Yeah, I would suggest crosswalking it and showing, and that's something we can help with, or it sounds like you can do it in-house, but to show that not only does it meet the Pennsylvania early childhood, but it also meets the Florida early childhood, is probably going to be something that's going to be asked for eventually.

And then part of your question was, “How can we market the customers out of state?” Yeah, I think that you would need to show proof eventually. If it's for an adoption or an RFP (request for proposal) someone's going to ask for it eventually.

Rich Portelance

Would that be through something like the COI (Community of Inquiry)?

Gina Faulk

Yes. You know, either a company like EdGate could help, where we have an iframe that actually the teacher can pull up and see your content and how it aligns to Pennsylvania, but then there's a drop-down menu that would then roll up to Florida, and you can show reports on how your material aligns to the Early Childhood standards in Florida. So it's something that is in the power of the teachers on your website to actually go see those reports. It's very useful, so rather than taking up your salesperson's time or your marketing team, you can actually just publish it right on your website so the teacher can pull it up.

Rich Portelance

Excellent, excellent. Well, thank you.

Closing Thoughts

Rich Portelance

We're going to wrap this up, we're going to take the people that have submitted questions, and our marketing person is going to draw a name, and then we'll get in touch with you via email for the winner of the mug, so there'll be a mug sent out to some lucky person who submitted a question.

I want to thank our wonderful panel today, Will Gordon from BOOKR, Michael Campbell from Advancing Global EDU, and of course, Gina Faulk from EdGate. Thank you all for your time today, your great insights, and hopefully, the audience got a lot of positive and exciting information. Any last thoughts from any of you guys before we wrap it?

Will Gordon

Yeah, thanks so much. I feel like we could keep talking. I feel like there's a lot I could learn from Mike and Gina, so hopefully we’ll keep this conversation going offline.

Gina Faulk

Definitely.

Mike Campbell

Yeah, it was a great conversation. I always enjoy talking with Gina, and great to hear from you, Will. It sounds like we've got lots to chat about.

Rich Portelance

Agreed, agreed. And Gina?

Gina Faulk

No, yeah, I was gonna say, Will, it sounds like you need to get your materials translated to many languages after this.

Will Gordon

Yeah, Arabic is on the list. Yeah.

Gina Faulk

Okay, great talking to you.

Mike Campbell

Thank you.

Rich Portelance

Thank you, everyone. Take care now.

Gina Faulk

Alright, bye.

Webinar Summary & Transcript - The State of Learning Standards 2024

bford — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 14:23:07 +0000

Webinar Summary & Transcript - The State of Learning Standards 2024 bford Thu, 06/25/2026 - 07:23

Webinar Summary & Transcript

Academic Standards

Standards Alignment

Curriculum Innovation

Instructional Materials

Summary

This webinar explores how evolving standards, expanding Career and Technical Education (CTE) pathways, and emerging technologies like AI are reshaping curriculum development and adoption in K–12 education. Featuring perspectives from EdGate, Stride, Inc., and industry leaders, the discussion focuses on how organizations can manage increasing complexity while maintaining alignment, accuracy, and instructional quality.

A central theme throughout the conversation is the growing scale and nuance of standards alignment. As states introduce more detailed expectations and as CTE standards rapidly expand, alignment is no longer a simple mapping exercise. Instead, it requires deeper analysis, including unpacking standards into measurable objectives and ensuring content supports multiple levels of rigor and student understanding.

The discussion also highlights the importance of independent validation and collaboration. Third-party review processes are becoming more common, helping remove bias and strengthen confidence in alignment claims. At the same time, partnerships between organizations and subject matter experts play a critical role in refining alignments and improving overall quality.

Finally, the panel explores the challenges and opportunities presented by AI. While AI offers efficiency gains, it still struggles with nuance and requires careful implementation. Educators and leaders must balance innovation with support, ensuring that teachers and students understand both the potential and limitations of these tools. Ultimately, success in this evolving landscape depends on adaptability, strong systems, and a continued focus on student outcomes.

Key Takeaways

Standards alignment is becoming more detailed, requiring deeper analysis and measurable objectives.
Third-party reviews are increasingly important for validating alignment and removing bias.
CTE standards are expanding rapidly, significantly increasing alignment complexity.
Partnerships and collaboration improve alignment accuracy and product quality.
AI can accelerate workflows but struggles with nuance and requires human oversight.
Educators need support to effectively integrate AI into teaching and learning.
Alignment systems must scale to handle large volumes of standards across states and programs.
Continuous change requires organizations to remain adaptable and proactive.

Topics Covered

Standards alignment and measurable objectives
Third-party review and validation processes
CTE standards growth and complexity
Standards crosswalking and comparison
AI in alignment and classroom instruction
Teacher support and professional development
State-level policy shifts and requirements
Collaboration between vendors and subject matter experts

Featured Speakers

Rich Portelance

Host, EdGate Powers Webinar Series

Kathleen Ideguchi

Technical Solutions Project Manager, EdGate

Kristy Engel

Senior Manager of Curriculum Compliance, Stride, Inc.

Hillary Rinaldi

Vice President, Whiteboard Advisors

Themes

The Growing Complexity of Standards Alignment

The panel discusses how standards alignment has evolved beyond basic mapping into a more rigorous process that requires unpacking standards into measurable objectives. This shift ensures that curriculum supports not just exposure to content, but true student mastery and progression across varying levels of rigor.

Notable Insight

“We can’t just say that just because a student touches an experience one time that they master that.”

Key Questions Explored

What does it mean to align content at a deeper level?
How do measurable objectives improve alignment accuracy?
Why is rigor an essential component of alignment?

The Role of Third-Party Review in Validation

Panelists highlight the increasing importance of third-party review in validating alignment claims. Independent verification helps remove bias, strengthen credibility with states and districts, and improve the overall quality of curriculum alignment through expert feedback and collaboration.

Notable Insight

“It’s really important to remove the bias from the process… of determining what curriculum you want to implement.”

Key Questions Explored

What is the purpose of third-party alignment review?
How does independent validation impact adoption decisions?
Why are states requiring more formal verification processes?

The Rapid Expansion of CTE Standards

The conversation explores how the rapid expansion of CTE standards is significantly increasing alignment complexity. With multiple programs of study and varying state requirements, organizations must adopt scalable systems and strategies to manage the growing volume and variability.

Notable Insight

“It’s not one set of standards… it’s every CTE program of study.”

Key Questions Explored

Why are CTE standards more complex than traditional standards?
How are states prioritizing CTE pathways?
What challenges does this create for alignment and curriculum development?

What This Means for Education Leaders

For education leaders, this discussion highlights that alignment is no longer a static requirement, but instead a dynamic, system-level priority. As standards become more detailed and vary across states and programs, leaders must ensure that curriculum, instruction, and assessment are aligned at a deeper level, with clear evidence of rigor and measurable outcomes.

Leaders must also account for the increasing complexity introduced by CTE and other emerging areas. Evaluating curriculum now requires understanding how well materials support diverse pathways and real-world applications, while still maintaining coherence across the broader instructional system.

At the same time, supporting educators through change is critical. With the rise of AI and other new technologies, leaders must provide clear guidance, professional development, and space for experimentation. Ultimately, success depends on building adaptable systems, leveraging expert partnerships, and keeping student learning at the center of every decision.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What is a third-party review in standards alignment?

A: It is an independent evaluation process where experts verify that curriculum alignments accurately meet state standards, helping remove bias and strengthen credibility.

Q: Why are standards alignment processes becoming more complex?

A: Standards now include more detailed expectations and require deeper analysis, including measurable objectives and varying levels of rigor.

Q: How are CTE standards different from traditional standards?

A: CTE standards are more numerous and vary by program of study, creating significantly more complexity in alignment and curriculum development.

Q: What are the limitations of AI in education?

A: AI struggles with nuance and complex subject matter, making human oversight essential for accurate alignment and effective classroom use.

Q: How can education companies keep up with changing state learning standards?

A: Education companies can keep pace with changing state learning standards by continuously monitoring standards and legislation, using technology to streamline alignment, validating content with subject matter experts, and adapting curriculum to evolving state requirements.

Featured Quotes

“Don’t hide… stay informed and stay involved.”

Full Webinar Transcript

The following transcript has been edited for readability. Timestamps have been removed and minor transcription errors corrected. Speaker comments and context have been preserved. Please note that the original audio experienced intermittent technical difficulties. While all efforts have been made to accurately transcribe the available content, some portions were unclear or inaudible. Sections where audio was completely compromised are marked as [Audio Difficulties].

Opening Remarks

Rich Portelance

Hello, everybody, and welcome to the State of Learning Standards with EdGate, Whiteboard Advisors, and Stride K12. We are going to start officially in about two and a half minutes. We’ll give people a few just to come in and get set up. We're super excited about our panelists today and looking forward to digging into this wonderful conversation, so just give us a couple of minutes and get yourself settled, get a cup of coffee, or a cup of eggnog as a seasonally appropriate drink, and we'll get going shortly.

As we get set up here, and we've let people come in before we kick off the webinar officially, we're excited about this panel and about the topic. There's a lot of changes happening with learning standards within the community of education, within the CTE (Career and Technical Education) standards, and internationally. Throughout the world, we're seeing tremendous change, not only in the standards themselves, but in the ways in which the legislation is being handled, and at the state level, so I think what we're going to have the opportunity to discuss today are a myriad of issues that people are facing, how they're being handled, and how others are having success. There are lots of great opportunities if you know how to manage through this changing world of learning standards, so it's going to be an exciting conversation.

Okay, just a couple of house-cleaning things. Everybody who is in as a participant will be muted. We are asking people to submit questions in the Q&A down below in your Zoom panel. Please send in questions; our moderator will aggregate those, and we'll attack those towards the end of this session. We will also be sending out material afterwards to everybody that's appropriate from Whiteboard Advisors, Stride K12, and EdGate, so you have a little background information that's germane to the conversation today, and we will make sure if we don't get to a question that is asked, we will answer it within the follow-up material. We'll probably be sending that out over the holidays or right after the holidays. We want to make sure everybody has a chance to look at that material and respond to it. And, of course, all our panelists' contact information will be available through that material as well, so you're free to reach out to them, too.

So, without further delay, we're going to kick into the State of Learning Standards: Untangling State-to-State Adoptions Using Advanced Technologies. And as I said, my name is Rich Portelance with EdGate. I have a wonderful panel today. I'm going to let them introduce themselves, and then we're going to kick into some questions. So, without further ado, let me start first with Kristy. If you could give a little background, and then we'll go to the next person.

Kristy Engel

Sure, thanks, Rich.

Good morning and good afternoon, everybody. I'm Kristy Engel, and I'm the senior manager of curriculum compliance with Stride K12. I've been with the company for 12 years now, starting as a teacher in one of our online schools in Michigan, and then supporting teachers in the role of learning coach, or, excuse me, as an instructional coach, as well as in training and services, a professional development manager, and now in this particular role, I get to work with a fantastic team that's responsible for maintaining standards research, legislative research, our stride skills tree which unpacks all of the academic learning standards across the 50 states, as well as managing high stakes curriculum applications, and our online provider status application supports in a variety of states that we service. I’m so happy to be part of this conversation!

Rich Portelance

Thank you, Kristy. We're really happy to have you here and joining us today.

Next, we're going to jump over to Kathleen from the EdGate team.

Kathleen Ideguchi

Hello, I'm Kathleen Ideguchi, and I'm the Director of Client Services here at EdGate. I work with our clients with regard to their standards and alignment needs, helping the team and supporting them to make sure that the clients have what they need. Whether it comes to international, national, and/or U.S. standards.

Rich Portelance

Fantastic. Excited that you're here, Kathleen. Thank you for joining. I know you're going to bring a lot of intrigue and information to the panel.

And finally, we have Hillary from Whiteboard Advisors.

Hillary Rinaldi

Hi, Rich, thank you, I'm excited to be joining. I'm Hillary Rinaldi, vice president at Whiteboard Advisors, focused on K-12 research and strategy. Whiteboard Advisors is an education consulting firm based in Washington DC. I'm based on the West Coast in Oakland, California. I work with our clients, nonprofits, for-profits, edtechs, start-ups, and foundations in expanding their footprint and understanding what the needs of states and districts are within the U.S. My background is in federal and state law policy, so I worked as the deputy chief of staff at the Tennessee Department of Education. And then prior to that, I was on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) in the U.S. Senate, writing the Every Student

Succeeds Act (ESSA). So, I know a whole lot, and I'm excited to get in the weeds on things like learning standards. There aren't that many things I know a lot about, but I feel like this topic, this group right here, we can get in the weeds, and so I'm excited about it.

Rich Portelance

That's fantastic, thank you so much, Hillary. We're excited to hear from you.

And just another note here, we're going to kick in with a few questions. If you could go back one slide, please, as well as these webinars, we do podcasts too. So I want everybody to, you know, if you have a chance, please go to our YouTube channel. Hillary and I had a great conversation a couple of weeks ago, it's posted to the YouTube Channel, and then Kristy, one of her teammates, and I are going to have a conversation after the holidays, we'll post that probably by January 15th or so. So, please come check those out, they're really good conversations, we get super deep so, you know, within a format like this, we're able to touch on things, get somewhat deep, but then we can really dig down with each of the panelists on their particular expertise, so please check that out on the YouTube channel.

Discussion

Rich Portelance

All right, so let's get into it, Hillary. My first question is for you. You've had experience at both the federal and state levels, as you were saying. Considering we have a federated system within education, as the new administration comes together, do you anticipate any major changes to educational policy and learning standards?

Hillary Rinaldi

It's a big question, right? Anytime we have a presidential election and we hear about what will happen in the new administration, we always want to have the crystal ball of what will happen next. I think I said this on our podcast too, Rich, that the best predictor of future performance is past performance. We actually, you know, we know what the first Trump presidency looked like, and I think we'll get more of the same. And much of that is about ensuring that states can do what they want to do and be able to do, right?

We're on the 9th anniversary of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), that's the law that re-authorized the ESEA (Elementary and Secondary Education Act), replacing the No Child Left Behind (NCLB). Under that law, you saw the greatest effort to give more autonomy back to states. I think it's important that we remember that as one nation, we have 50 state systems, and they're in 15,000 district systems, so I think even as we think about how, you know, at the core we have learning standards that are set by the state and adopted by the state, what that looks like in the classroom varies exponentially. So, I think we have to hold the bar on rigor there, and I expect more of that.

Rich Portelance

That, you know, I think rigor is a great word. We're probably going to circle back on that throughout this conversation. We all know that the states are running quickly towards autonomy more and more. Let's discuss state-to-state differences in the state standards and adoptions, and how companies like Stride K12 are managing that.

Kristy, what do you think? You know, can you give us a little bit of description on how you're handling those state-to-state differences?

Kristy Engel

Sure, Rich. So, as I mentioned, we do have a portion of our team that diligently takes a look at academic standards and learning standards, and provides a quarterly update across our network, and that team really digs in. They are the experts of the learning standards across the 50 states, and that really helps to guide our curriculum development across the company so that we are able to provide the most up-to-date and aligned curriculum to all of our stakeholders: students, teachers, and school leaders. And so, you know, really managing that, being familiar with it, and maintaining it in a location of high visibility is something that we take great pride in. We unpack all 50 state standard sets across the core four content areas, and we do have some exceptions with elective courses, additional courses, and CTE courses in certain states where we have those requirements with our partnerships. And then really, you know, we love the breaking down of those standards into learning objectives that we connect to all of our content, so that our consumers are able to see how tightly aligned our curricula is across all 50 state learning standards.

Rich Portelance

And you know, it's interesting, a phrase that we will not hear much today is “Common Core”, because everything's becoming so decentralized. However, Common Core is still an indicator and still a guidepost, and so, I want to ask Kathleen about the new maps that EdGate has published on the website and what you hope to achieve with those maps.

Kathleen Ideguchi

Yes, so that is true, EdGate has firsthand knowledge of how states approach standards differently, and the EdGate repository includes the K-12 educational standards for the United States for all of the subjects, as well as national and international standards for 30-plus states. From the EdGate website, you can view some of the semantic standards comparison maps we have developed. These standards comparisons show how semantically similar or different each state's learning standards are compared to national sets like Common Core, Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), and the College, Career, and Civic (C3) Life Frameworks. And then, on these maps, you can see the graphical analysis of the semantic matches for language arts, math, science, and social studies. But this analysis is also applicable to other subjects like arts education, health and PE, and so on. So, the analysis is mathematically derived, and shows the semantic similarities between states and national standards, and reveals which states did incorporate those national standards, to what extent, and what the outliers are, which provides valuable information for educators, decision-makers, researchers, and publishers.

Rich Portelance

Hillary?

Hillary Rinaldi

Yeah, Kathleen, I was just going to jump in because I think it's a really good point that, like, we talk about course subjects of ELA (English Language Arts) and reading, math, science, and social studies. At the same time, right, with Rich's first question around federal, right, there's no assessment required in social studies, so that's something that's wholly driven by states, and some of the more contentious conversations around state standards have been in social studies. I think also in the last few years we've seen more shifts around graduation requirements related to other topic areas, right, so, like, financial literacy being one, and the standards that come with that.

There are states that are taking on changes to their accountability system, like Virginia, that puts an emphasis around work-based learning and CTE (Career and Technical Education), and so I know we're going to talk more about CTE later on in the conversation, but I just think again that pendulum swing for states taking on not just more autonomy, but there's more action happening too there. There are more sets of whether it's, you know, African-American history, or financial literacy or LGBTQ+ history that's being embedded. Those are all new efforts that are happening at the state level, too, and I anticipate they will continue to grow in that way.

Rich Portelance

Thank you for adding that in. I appreciate it.

As we talk about standards, you know, we also have to talk about things that go beyond standards when you're actually trying to align and gain contracts. So, there's a growing list of legislative differences from state to state that need to be contended with, and so I want to ask Kristy about how those are being addressed at a company level. You know, it's one thing to say at a state level, but when you're a company, and you're trying to get in, how are you dealing with those legislative differences?

Kristy Engel

Yeah, Hillary set that up fantastically with some of those high-visibility topics that we definitely are seeing in our line of work. About a year ago, our team expanded beyond standards research because as we were looking at newsletters and listservs that we were a part of, and listening to the news, we were seeing lots of conversations about things that were happening that were being initiated at the legislative level that didn't have anything to do with academic standards or learning standards changes, and we were finding a lot of our stakeholders reaching out, asking, you know, “What's happening with these things?” And one driver was really trying to remove that need for our stakeholders to reach out, and us to shift and be able to share out. We have noticed this happening at your state level, here are adjustments to curriculum that you can take advantage of, here are some resources that we've developed for schools to use, etc., and so, you know, I think that expansion of standards research to additional legislative research, we do that on a monthly basis in order not to miss anything, so to speak, because it is fast changing, and it is a little unpredictable, which we know in education, the only thing that is certain is change.

And so, that's an exciting new adventure for us that we've done, as I said over the past year. And so, where we have opportunities for curriculum that is more specific to a state, based on partnerships that we have, we also are able to add specific topics or areas of focus, like financial literacy, into those pieces of curriculum. Or, we're able to devise courses and offer those up for schools to use in order to meet those legislative initiatives. Where we don't necessarily have partnerships that mandate an exceptionally specific curriculum, we have a phenomenal team of experts that create collections of learning material that then teachers and school leaders can access from our internal learning management system.

And so, we do have fantastic collections of curricula that deal with financial literacy, that deal with diversity, equity, and inclusion, that deal with ethnic study topics. And so, those are available where legislative initiatives are impacting our schools, if schools want to pull those in. And then we also support schools with embedding that into their curricula when needed, or when driven by certain partnerships that we have, so it's ever evolving, and a really exciting opportunity for a lot of our curriculum developers to really stay abreast of topics when we share out what we're finding, and really bring their expertise to the table to support all of our stakeholders with curriculum products that meet the needs of all the states.

Rich Portelance

Thank you for that. You know, it reminded me, and I want to make a note about those maps that Kathleen was talking about because the intent for EdGate is, you know, this is when legislative initiatives become more and more important. We're hoping to add more content to those maps. Now, you know, I don't know exactly what's going to be added, but I would say that's something you should keep checking back on, because Kathleen and her team are working on challenges or requirements, so, you know, we want that to be an important resource for people that they can look at and really gain a lot of information because, you know, trying to understand on 50 different state bases is what's going on, how to attack it, and then actually be able to get in compliance, right?

Kristy Engel

Yeah, absolutely, and working with students and not spending an exorbitant amount of time feeling that they have to create content based on different types of legislative initiatives. Not that that's something really providing them with the material based on the research that is able to be used by them, so that they can shift their time and energy into other tasks.

Hillary Rinaldi

You know, talking to some of the leadership in Chicago Public Schools in Illinois, they have a requirement around civics education for middle school for one semester, right? So I think understanding how it can be layered in, and not to mention that we also know it's more interesting and engaging for students if we are cross-curricular, right, if we're embedding things, knowing how those things connect lets us both support teachers and then helps to allow them to support students.

Kristy Engel

Yes.

Rich Portelance

So, Hillary, you and I both spoke about math proficiency specifically, and I know it's a topic that's close to your heart. Can you tell us a little bit about that work and how you're addressing standard differences?

Hillary Rinaldi

We know that they review their standards between every, you know, five to eight years, probably on average. Then you have the subset of 18 states or so that have their textbook adoption process or instructional materials process in which the districts have to choose from the selected text that the state approves, and then there are, you know, other states that offer that but don't require it, and then the rest is up to the districts. So I think there can be an information vacuum of understanding, you know, what is the alignment to the given standards in the state, how do the instructional materials meet that alignment, and then also the quality, right? We could do a whole separate conversation just on high-quality instructional materials, how do we define that, and what does that mean?

But in terms of standards alignment, we know that the intricacies of both math standards and also the graduation requirements are fascinating to me. So you have most states that require three years of math, not four years of math, to graduate high school. But most postsecondary institutions require four years of math to enter into postsecondary. So, part of my work with some of the largest school districts in the country has been thinking about how do we ensure that there are enough pathways for students in middle school through high school, and enough on-ramps and off-ramps, especially for advanced coursework, that they both can and want to take four years of math and be prepared for more opportunities? Some of that is thinking about the question of, like, how much Algebra 2 does a student need? Can you bake in some of geometry into what we're doing within algebra? How does competency-based education play a role in this, right?

And so as more states, I think, grapple with the idea of more personalized learning opportunities and more competency-based learning opportunities, that requires further interrogation of how are we meeting all of these standards for all of these students so that they do graduate ready for whatever their next step is.

I think similarly, I had the opportunity to visit a classroom in Miami last week that was a CTE classroom in aeronautics and aviation. And so they have flight simulators in their high school classroom, and the amount of math that goes into preparing to take off or land is incredible, right? And that's actually a difference that could be its own math course, and many times it is. So how are we thinking about, again, being student-centered, meeting the standards, holding that bar of rigor, but all in the name of what that student wants to do in the future

Rich Portelance

So, clearly, there are a lot of challenges facing publishers and edtech providers, as well as the educators within these disciplines and these places, so thank you for that, Hillary. We really appreciate your level of knowledge.

I'm curious about some of the solutions that are available. We do want to talk a little bit about, you know, the title of this webinar has “Advanced Technologies” in it, and AI is out there, so I'm curious, Kathleen, can you discuss the advanced technologies that are being deployed to aid alignment of standards to content, along with EdGate’s patented alignment methodology and and subject matter experts, has EdGate made other advances in evaluating standards?

Kathleen Ideguchi

Yes, yes, we have. So, we have taken our expertise with standards to the next level with advanced technologies, including AI, advanced technical analysis, natural language processing, and machine learning. When it comes to standards, no two entities go about it the same way, and you can see this on the EdGate website, where we've trained the models to compare the standards on a semantic level. And this can be done not only to national standards, which is what you see on the website, it can also be used for comparing standards state-to-state, and newer versions of standards to the previous version of standards, provide endless possibilities for understanding how similar standards are semantically.

This provides valuable information for clients to make decisions with regard to content development.

Rich Portelance

So, Hillary, we keep hearing about AI. How do we leverage this one technology and other technologies to help keep pace with the rapid changes that are occurring at the state level? This can include teaching the topic of AI, as well as its implementation.

Hillary Rinaldi

Yes, AI is not going away, and you and I talked a little bit about this, both teaching about AI and teaching with AI, right? And so I think what Kathleen is speaking to is the power of using AI to do things that human experts can train AI to do well. Similarly, I think the power of AI in education is also in supporting teachers to be able to to lift some of the burden of tasks, where they can then spend their time doing the things that really require a teacher's knowledge and expertise, and supporting students.

So we have both the teaching with AI and teaching about AI conversation unfolding. What this means and in terms of, you know, legislative tracking, we have a whole bunch of states that are passing guidance or passing some type of legislation. I know Kristy's tracking this as well, but almost half of the states at this point have released some kind of guidance related to AI, and I think that looks like having it incorporate a task force, developing school guidance, or requiring professional development of teachers.

I think this all also closely ties to efforts around cell phone bans and social media as well. So, I think we have… Our students are currently digital natives, right? Any student who's in K12 right now is the touchscreen generation, but that doesn't mean that they necessarily know how to use technology well, or necessarily use it safely, and that seems to be what's coming to a head with a lot of these cell phone ban conversations, and I think we'll see more of that, right? We have 18 states that have passed policies related to cell phone or device bans, and three states that have signed statewide efforts. But this question from Angela May about media literacy standards I think is an important one, because there are many states, certainly the states that have worked with ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education) in signing on to their digital literacy standards or digital citizenship, but those also… The opportunity to update those as well. That is something that I would anticipate we'll see more of, this idea of just because, you know, even if the U.S. goes the way of Australia and says, “No social media before you're 16”, that doesn't mean that students are magically going to know how to engage safely and constructively at that age. I really appreciate there there was a great oped earlier this week for U.S. News & World Report about, you know, the analogy of, “You don't just toss kids the keys to the car as they turn 16, right? You have to take an assessment, you have to practice and be able to do that”, and I think there's a similar opportunity for digital citizenship, digital safety, and media literacy in the same way, and I think more states will be turning to that as well.

So, I got a little bit on my soapbox about cell phone bans, but it's definitely a hot topic.

Rich Portelance

It is.

You know, you got me thinking about technology in general. I've been in the technology space since… I date myself here, around 1993. You know, technologies continue to evolve and come along, right? None of this is brand new, I think there's fear when something that is introduced to the public becomes big, like AI, and people get concerned about its effect, and as they should be wary as it becomes deployed, and there's a lot of, you know… We had ASU+GSV (Arizona State University + Global Silicon Valley) last year and this year again, they're going to have the AI conference where there's going to be over 250 vendors. I mean it's certainly taking hold, but, you know, a thoughtful application of any technology can produce exceptional results, and I know just from watching the way EdGate has done their work, they've been doing this with standards since 1996. It's been a very thoughtful progression. I haven't seen any technology added that's been superfluous or just done because it's trending. Everything has a purpose to serve to help to evolve the application of what they're trying to do of getting standards out there, to align them, and to, you know, help people understand better.

And so, I think that that's important to look at as you look at players in the market, as you try to apply these things to what you're doing as a company, to look at the companies that are thoughtful or the groups that are thoughtful about how they apply technology. Don't be afraid of the technology itself because it's often, you know, not aligned; the fear is not always justified.

So, while technology plays an important part in the change we're seeing, there are other, not-so-obvious changes that some companies are making to adjust to the requirements being enacted at the state level. So, Kristy, can you tell us a bit about how Stride, Inc. has adjusted and perhaps how the company looks differently today than it did a few years ago as a result of those adjustments?

Kristy Engel

Yeah, so it's super exciting. This is our 25th year, we're celebrating that with Stride K12, and being part of the company for about half of that, there's been a lot of change in that amount of time. And just thinking back to when the company started, and how it has evolved over time is pretty exceptional. And I think what's even more exciting about that is seeing all that change and being a part of that, and to Hillary's point, especially with technology, with AI, and, you know, making learning accessible, we can't run away from it or hide, we have to meet our learners where they are at, and provide them with the absolute best education in order to prepare them, so that they're not hopping into a car for the first time at 16 with a pair of keys.

And so, I think, you know, as as I look to Stride, Inc. and the things that we've done, you know, really being intentional with our focus areas and the teams that are created that weren't in existence years ago, based on the needs that have bubbled up and have developed over time, and, you know, really being intentional, listening to our stakeholders and what their needs are, and making sure that we have the right people in the right positions, and really carrying that passion of offering that personalized learning experience so that all learners are able to achieve and succeed. And I think that's also one of the pieces with online learning that's really exciting, is we're able to adapt to a lot of these things in relatively quick time, so as these things are rolling out at the state level, we're able to create and deliver that in a really seamless manner. And really thinking about how that can change the landscape of education and the students that are accessing or are looking to access education in a different way, and meeting all of those learners where they're at.

And I think really the last thing, you know, to Hillary's point, you know, we have the high-quality instructional materials, we have the textbook approval process, and that's really been something over the past year year and a half that we've really taken a look at in order to be able to support all of our partnerships and the stakeholders that we have relationships with, and making sure that we remain competitive in all facets of the educational industry as an edtech leader over 25 years.

Rich Portelance

Okay, thank you. Yeah, and it's a long time, and I would imagine within that space of time, have you seen the number of people within your curriculum department grow? I mean, you add these new positions, so you're finding that it has doubled in size or has it tripled in size? How has the footprint changed?

Kristy Engel

So, I think… You know, that's a little bit of a challenging question, because we have folks that have gone on, you know to different opportunities. But then also, taking the personnel that we have, and moving folks around in areas where they're exceptionally passionate about, or maybe where they have grown and built their skill set up since when they first started. And so, you know, there's definitely been expansion, but also, you know, making sure that we are maximizing our efficiencies with the teams that we have in place, because one of the things too that's really, I think critical in education, is when you've got those subject matter experts, those individuals that know your systems, know the processes and the platforms, really leveraging them to the utmost degree and allowing them opportunities to grow. And so, I don't have the employment statistics for you, unfortunately, but I know that by looking at efficiencies and making sure that we've moved everybody around, it's definitely been a really amazing thing to watch happen over my time at Stride, Inc.

Rich Portelance

I can imagine. You know, all these changes and there are different things that need to be addressed, whether it's from the legislative end or the compliance end.

So, Hillary, I want to talk a little bit about HQIM (High-Quality Instructional Materials) and coherence. Could you give us some background?

Hillary Rinaldi

Yeah, well, I think even just what Kristy was just saying of, like, even how district central offices, especially in the bigger systems, have certainly expanded, right, that we actually have more educators… Like, the educator-to-student ratio has continued to increase in the last few years, even though the teacher-to-student ratio hasn't increased, and part of that is because of what they're trying to tackle, right, at the district central office level. And I would argue that part of that is because of the implementation of new instructional materials and high-quality instructional materials.

I think that although we can of debate the formal definition of HQIM, I like to think that we're far enough in the industry to have concretized the definition somewhat of what “high-quality” means in high-quality instructional materials, and the research that shows that teachers who use HQIM with fidelity are going to see those positive outcomes for students. Certainly, the work out of Johns Hopkins University and much of the work that the CCSSO (Council of Chief State School Officers) IMPD (Instructional Materials and Professional Development) network has put out at the state level. I think there's just this idea and this goes back to the the TNTP report of the opportunity myth that came out almost decade ago of, you know, students that are less likely to have access to those high-quality instruction materials are more likely to be students of color, are more likely to be students in high poverty areas, and that our expectations for those students are lesser, right? Regardless of whether we want that to be true or not, the research shows. So if we can level the playing field and ensure that every student has access to the same high-quality instructional materials within a district, we're doing a greater service to all of our students. But that is incredibly difficult to just say, “We're implementing a wholesale new curriculum”, whether you're a brand new teacher to a district, or a teacher that's been a veteran for 20 years, and been teaching the same subject, that change management is very difficult.

And so, I think in talking to some of the chief academic officers and in some of the largest districts, and hearing how they approach this, it's almost similar to how we, like, work with students in our own classroom in that, like, gradual release model, right, of, like, teachers need to internalize these instructional materials, and be able to to teach them with fidelity. Not that they're, you know, reading from a script or everybody's on the same page in every classroom, but that you have to know what the expectations are in that book so that the students have the opportunity to meet it. And that's a tough change to make happen, especially at scale, but it's exciting to see happening, and I've had teachers who are, like, “I never thought my third graders would be able to do something like this, right, and then you give them that opportunity and they keep rising to the occasion”. It's exciting to see, but it takes a lot of effort, and I think it also takes that investment from the state and local to be able to make that happen, so, for our states that have formal textbook adoption processes, there are dollars connected to that.

But I think we'll continue to see the challenges in a post-ESSER (Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief) world of tightening district budgets, and how do we ensure that districts have the funds that they need to be able to do this work well?

Rich Portelance

You know, that's a thread we could pull for a long time.

Hillary Rinaldi

It's true!

Rich Portelance

So, one of the additional challenges companies are facing is the third-party review process, which is becoming more and more familiar and prevalent. Kathleen, can you outline the EdGate process, and then, I know you work with Kristy on this, she can expound on the experience of working with EdGate and how that's being handled?

Kathleen Ideguchi

Yeah, that sounds good.

The third-party review process is one of the many standards-related services that EdGate provides to clients. When clients submit alignments to states for an adoption of their content, a third-party verification of those alignments is generally needed. And then EdGate’s subject matter experts review and evaluate client-supplied alignments on a standard-by-standard basis, reviewing the content material to determine if the alignments are a good fit, and provide feedback. Results are then summarized and shared with the client, along with a letter stating that EdGate performed the third-party service.

Rich Portelance

Kristy, any thoughts or additions to how that process is going for you guys?

Kristy Engel

We absolutely adore our partnership with EdGate, and are able to lean on that partnership in order to, again, meet the requirements of several states where we have particular requirements to be an approved online provider. We've also really expanded beyond that, which was really where a large portion of our partnership with EdGate resided over the past several years, to now really going into the arena of states that are approving curricula in order to be on approved lists. Whether it's, you know, mandated for use or recommended for use, and that's where we have now expanded our partnership with EdGate, and are taking those one-by-one, and are really eager to see the outcomes of that expanded partnership in those states that we're working with. But it's an invaluable resource with Kathleen and her team. I really need to give a shout out to Larry Johnson, who's the main point of contact that we do a lot of work with, because I think too what is valuable about that partnership is the dialogue.

It sharpens both organizations, in my opinion, because it's subject matter experts passionate about what they know and are doing, and it allows us to reflect on where we feel alignment is, and really take that feedback as to how it can be better, or sometimes, you know, engaging in conversation where there might be a disagreement. But ultimately coming to that agreed-upon decision, that is then able to be given to the state or the school districts in order for it to have that third-party mark, which I think is… It’s really important to remove the bias from the process, with that, you know, piece of determining what curriculum you want to implement at your schools. So, having EdGate’s partnership is phenomenal for us.

Rich Portelance

Thank you, that's awesome.

And you know, that rolls very nicely into the discussion we had when you and I were talking about skills for measurable objectives. I know this is something that you're intimately involved with at Stride, Inc., and would you be able to shed a little light on why that's an important initiative?

Kristy Engel

It really drives a lot of our different products, and it drives, predominantly, the curriculum that is developed. You know, we kicked off this session with that amazing educational word, rigor, and we know that academic or learning standards have varying degrees of rigor, and we can't just say that just because a student touches an experience one time that they master that. And that's the value of taking those standards, unpacking them, so that we can, again, ensure in our work with EdGate, in our work in other areas with states, that our curriculums are tightly aligned because we take all of those master measurable objectives, and connect them with all of the pieces of content, so that, again, students can see it in their courses, teachers can see it in their courses, and it helps with those alignment resources that we provide to our teachers and school leaders, so that helps them with their, you know, their instruction and instructional mapping, so it's a labor of love, I will tell you that. And that the team that is responsible for that work day in and day out. They are phenomenal to work with and talk to because it's sometimes just amazing to think how one standard can be looked at in so many different ways, but ultimately, they have the students’ best interests in mind in order for them to be successful. Like Hillary mentioned, when it comes time to graduate and go on.

Rich Portelance

It's such an important topic, and I will throw a shameless plug in there that EdGate and the ExACT system has now added standards authoring within the platform, so if you don't know about that, you should contact Gina Faulk or Kathleen, and they'll give you a demo of that system, what's happening, and how that's bringing alignments and reporting all together with the with the construction of those standards.

Hillary, I know you have some thoughts on CTE standards as well. Many may not be aware that CTE standards outnumber education standards by nearly seven to one, making it virtually impossible to hand correlate them at a pace that can be sustainable. Can you share some thoughts on that?

Hillary Rinaldi

Yes. I think we will continue to hear CTE be a callout and a priority across states. We just had Gavin Newsom, the governor of my home state, announce today efforts related to career connection, K-12, higher ed, and workforce, and thinking about bringing down some of those barriers. CTE will certainly be a part of that. I anticipate as, you know, State of the State addresses start for all governors in Q1 and Q2 of next year, we'll hear almost all of them say something about career and technical education, and that means, you know, that that makes work for the Departments of Education within those states in meeting the needs of are there new CTE Pathways that are being formed, when was the last time those standards were updated, are there other courses that need to be included, I mentioned the aeronautics and mathematics, that crossover class that needs to happen for those students, so I do think that there's so much that can and should change within CTE.

And depending on where you are in the country and what district you are in, your student experience can be profoundly different. I think that it's a big shift in how we think about what the potential for CTE is for students, and I think we'll just see more students entering CTE Pathways. All of that just means that there's, like, a bright light being shone on CTE, and that does mean that states will be… Whether they're putting more funds towards it, but certainly more attention means that those standards are changing, right, because we can't put it in the same bucket as just science. It's not one set of standards for each grade level; it's every CTE program of study, which in some states are, you know, you could have 20 some programs of study that then each have their own standards.

Rich Portelance

Kathleen, I know I'm going to throw something at you here. I know that you've done significant work and EdGate has done significant work with CTE standards, primarily for Journeys Map, but also it's touching on the ExACT product. Can you give us a little bit of description of what's happening and why that's significant?

Kathleen Ideguchi

[Audio Difficulties] …the analysis that we talked about for the K-12 standards we have done for CTE standards, also, so yes, we can make those same comparisons across the different states to see and look at the national set of CTE. [Audio Difficulties]…So yes, to see where there are similarities based on the semantics of the standards for CTE across the different states and within the different pathways.

Rich Portelance

So, I want to encourage everybody that [Audio Difficulties] …for Kristy, or for Kathleen, or for myself, if you really want to hear me talk anymore, please put them into the Q&A, we’re going to [Audio Difficulties].

I'm gonna throw this next question at you, Kathleen. Anna Appel said, “I have found that AI struggles to find the nuances in language to complete alignment tasks across multiple states, especially in subjects such as [Audio Difficulties] to complete more nuanced alignments.

Kathleen Ideguchi

So, in EdGate's case, we have the patented correlation methodology where we use the concepts to crosswalk the standards. So we're using the tools [Audio Difficulties].

Rich Portelance

So, when, you know, kind of looking back at the concept of using concepts as the basis for the alignment, when did that evolve? When did that [Audio Difficulties]?

Kathleen Ideguchi

[Audio Difficulties]…Starting with actually going out to get open educational resources and aligning those to standards, and then publishers caught wind of that, and they were interested in having their content aligned to standards. And so we expanded our service to that to publishers as well, and [Audio Difficulties]... content, or even standards to standards.

Rich Portelance

And another question came in, so I'll just keep you going on that thread, what is EdGate using as a national standard [Audio Difficulties].

Kathleen Ideguchi

[Audio Difficulties]… I'm sorry, I don't know the exact reference to that, but there is that national set that's advanced career technology standards.

Rich Portelance

Okay. And I know that within the database, [Audio Difficulties] -million or so are CTE standards because they proliferated so much, right? And so, you know we built those specific alignment tools to address that.

Hillary, you know, when looking at AI, and you and I had kind of a deep discussion on that topic, there are some other challenges there that we were talking about, can you give me a little bit more of a description? And I think the audience would appreciate your perspective on this.

Hillary Rinaldi

Yeah, I think the challenges are profound in that you have teachers who are concerned, right? More out of fear, like, this is outside of their wheelhouse, this is not something that they anticipated they would be using in their classroom, right? You have, you know, at both ends of the bell curve, you have those that are all in and already using it, and those that are like, “Kids are only using this to cheat”, right? And I think we really need to figure out the middle and the majority of that normal distribution of supporting educators and understanding how they can use it both to support teaching, but also to support students in understanding how to use AI, and the challenges, right? It's certainly not perfect, and we talk about this in like, math and AI. ChatGPT cannot solve in-depth math equations right now. There are certain things that'll come up that you'll struggle with, and you've seen the memes online and all of that.

So, I do think the states that are moving forward in in developing those of AI, like Georgia has an AI study committee, Oklahoma has a task force, there's a lot of effort in thinking about what is this, what is our state's plan to determine how we'll allow AI and integrate AI, and I think there are really good partners out there that are doing this work too. I think TeachAI, which launched formally last year, has been helping states in figuring out what that is, what that guidance can look like, and what professional development needs to look like. Because I don't think it should be as known or shouldn't be so concerning or scary, and it just means that we have to get a little bit more creative with what we do in the classroom, right, which maybe is something we could have already been pushing for. I think the fact that we have a profound and all-time high number of students who are chronically absent and disengaged in school, maybe this is another way that we can engage students so that they want to show up, and are thinking beyond “Why do I have to do this if AI can do it for me?” Well, it's much more interesting to think about what the limitations of AI are that then requires your human brain to be able to do this, and I think just to, you know, answer Anna's question in the chat of like, “There are limitations and nuance, and so how do we work with our students to know that?” I have a dear friend who's a high school history teacher, and one of his assignments says, “Have AI write your essay, and now critique it, and tell me what they missed”, right? And so there are a lot more… Like, that's a small example, but I do think we have to get further outside the box of how do we create the infrastructure to support teachers, but then allow students to have that soft place to land when we don't know what this technology will be? Talk about building the plane while we're flying it. This is very real, and I first and foremost want all of our students to be safe.

Rich Portelance

Thank you for that.

Closing Thoughts

Rich Portelance

You know, we're getting close to the top of the hour, so we're going to be wrapping up here in a few minutes.

So what I would like to do is do a little “round the board” and make sure everybody has a chance to give a final thought. I want to thank everybody who's been here and who joined us. We had lots of great participants, and I did get a note in the chat about the national standards for CTE. I'll put that link within the deck that we send out, but it's the career tech career clusters framework, so we'll add that in there.

So, I'm going to start with Kathleen, and then go to Kristy, and then go to Hillary, and if you could each give a synopsis, I think it would help the audience, and again, we really appreciate everybody joining us today for this exhilarating conversation.

Kathleen?

Kathleen Ideguchi

Yeah. So much is changing so fast, and the technology to support and being able to make comparisons across standards should be very helpful in benefiting students not only in the United States, but across the globe, so I’m looking forward to seeing what educators and decision-makers can do in that regard.

Rich Portelance

Thank you so much.

Kristy?

Kristy Engel

Yeah, I think, you know, don't shy away, don't hide, make sure you get involved, make sure you're doing all of the research and the reading, look to experts in the field, and you're not alone. I think that, you know, everything that changes and changes so fast what we have shown, especially in the world of education, is that we are exceptionally versatile, and the one thing that we all have in common is wanting to see students succeed. And so, be that example, you know, don't be afraid with all the changes, because what's ultimately going to be the guide is keeping your students on the right path towards success, and so, you know, look outside, look for the help, look for those that, you know, also have a passion for it. But whatever you do, don't hide, don't hide, stay informed and stay involved.

Rich Portelance

Excellent.

Hillary Rinaldi

I love that, Kristy. I don't think I have a better tagline than “stay informed, stay involved”, I think it's just… I'm anxiously awaiting the start of the legislative session, and knowing that states have a lot of ideas going into the next year, and I think that we don't necessarily have to think too much about what's happening federally until the new administration gets its feet under them and makes some decisions. And at the end of the day, it's going to be up to the states, and we've already seen a lot of efforts in movement in the states. We have, you know, probably 40% of states in the last few years that have changed their diploma requirements. Some of those things are related to standards in financial literacy or civics, and I think we'll continue to see those changes, and so it's also about being nimble and in service to students. It's not just tick boxes; this is about empowering students to be engaged and be prepared for what comes next, so that they can also stay involved and engaged.

Rich Portelance

You know I'm a big proponent of CTE and finding your own passion for whatever it is, so I appreciate what you just said, and I appreciate the panelists today.

On behalf of EdGate and myself, Richard Portelance, thank you for joining us today. It's been a wonderful conversation, and we'll be following up with material. I know there are a couple of other questions that didn't get answered. We will answer your questions going out with our material soon, but everybody has a very happy holiday, and thank you again for attending.

Hillary Rinaldi

Thank you so much.

Kristy Engel

Thank you.

Kathleen Ideguchi

Thanks.

Webinar Summary & Transcript - Paradigm Shift: States Redefining Standards and Skills for the Future

bford — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 14:05:43 +0000

Webinar Summary & Transcript - Paradigm Shift: States Redefining Standards and Skills for the Future bford Thu, 06/25/2026 - 07:05

Webinar Summary & Transcript

Summary

As states across the country confront rapid technological, economic, and societal change, education systems are undergoing a fundamental shift in how they define student readiness. This webinar brings together policy leaders, education organizations, and practitioners to explore how standards, curriculum, and instructional priorities are evolving to better prepare students for an uncertain future.

A central theme throughout the discussion is that future readiness is no longer about preparing students for a fixed set of outcomes. Instead, it requires equipping students with adaptable skills, strong conceptual understanding, and the ability to apply knowledge in unfamiliar contexts. Panelists emphasize that while artificial intelligence and emerging technologies are accelerating this shift, they are not the root cause—they are amplifiers of existing strengths and weaknesses within education systems.

The conversation highlights the growing importance of alignment across standards, curriculum, instructional materials, and assessment. Without this alignment, even the most innovative tools risk creating fragmentation rather than improving learning outcomes. At the same time, states face significant structural challenges, including long implementation timelines and increasing variability in standards.

Ultimately, the discussion frames this moment as a paradigm shift in education, one that requires balancing innovation with coherence, prioritizing depth over breadth, and ensuring that all students are prepared not just for the next step, but for a constantly evolving future.

Key Takeaways

Future readiness is being redefined to include both academic knowledge and durable, transferable skills.
AI is most effective when it enhances aligned systems, rather than being layered onto fragmented ones.
Students need strong foundational knowledge to evaluate, challenge, and apply AI-generated information.
Alignment across standards, curriculum, and assessment is essential for consistent and meaningful learning outcomes.
Overloaded standards are limiting depth, making it difficult for students to fully master and apply key concepts.
Data literacy, quantitative reasoning, and critical thinking are becoming essential across all subject areas.
Increasing variability across state standards is making it more difficult to scale curriculum and instructional solutions.
Education systems must prioritize depth, coherence, and real-world application over broad content coverage.

Topics Covered

Redefining student readiness and success
Durable skills and workforce alignment
Artificial intelligence in education systems
Foundational knowledge and conceptual learning
Data literacy and quantitative reasoning
Curriculum design and prioritization
Alignment across standards and instruction
Assessment and measurement challenges
State variability in education standards
Scaling across states and systems

Featured Speakers

Rich Portelance

Host, EdGate Powers Webinar Series

Gina Faulk

General Manager, EdGate

Hillary Rinaldi

Vice President, Whiteboard Advisors

Lisa O’Masta

Chief Executive Officer, Learning.com

Dr. Keven Ellis

Member, Texas State Board of Education / NASBE

Themes

Drivers of Change: Redefining Future-Ready Education

The webinar opens with a discussion on the forces pushing states to rethink what it means for students to be “future-ready.” Panelists point to a combination of factors, including post-pandemic learning gaps, budget constraints, and the rapid emergence of artificial intelligence. These pressures are forcing states to move beyond traditional academic benchmarks and consider how students are prepared for real-world environments.

Rather than focusing solely on long-term outcomes, states are responding to immediate challenges while also trying to anticipate future workforce demands. This has led to a broader definition of readiness that includes both academic knowledge and transferable skills.

Notable Insight

“Being ready for the future is really a reaction to whether we are ready for right now.”

Key Questions Explored

What is driving states to redefine student readiness right now?
How are current challenges influencing long-term education strategy?
What does “future-ready” actually mean in today’s context?

Durable Skills and the “Portrait of a Graduate”

A major theme throughout the discussion is the growing emphasis on durable skills, often framed through “"Portrait of a Graduate"” initiatives. These frameworks define the competencies students should have upon graduation, including critical thinking, collaboration, and adaptability.

Panelists note that while these skills have long existed within standards, they are now being made more explicit and intentionally integrated into instruction. The challenge is not introducing new skills, but ensuring they are clearly communicated, consistently developed, and connected to real-world applications.

Notable Insight

“It’s not that academics are taking a backseat to skills; it’s that they are interconnected.”

Key Questions Explored

How are states defining and prioritizing durable skills?
What role do "Portrait of a Graduate" frameworks play in system alignment?
How can skills be meaningfully integrated into academic instruction?

Balancing Innovation with System Constraints

The panelists highlighted the difficulty of implementing change within large education systems. State processes for updating standards, curriculum, and instructional materials can take several years, creating a gap between innovation and classroom reality.

This lag requires leaders to think several years ahead while maintaining system stability. Rapid change is not always the solution; instead, thoughtful, aligned updates are necessary to ensure long-term impact.

Notable Insight

“Curriculum changes we start today may not reach classrooms for several years.”

Key Questions Explored

Why does education system change take so long?
How can states balance innovation with stability?
What should leaders prioritize given long implementation timelines?

What This Means for Education Leaders

Focus on aligning standards, curriculum, and assessment before adding new initiatives.
Prioritize depth of learning over expanding content coverage.
Support teachers with professional development and practical implementation tools.
Integrate AI thoughtfully, ensuring it enhances, not replaces, instruction.
Encourage cross-disciplinary collaboration to build coherent learning experiences.
Plan for variability across states when developing or adopting solutions.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What is driving changes in education standards?

A: Workforce demands, AI, and post-pandemic learning challenges are pushing states to redefine readiness.

Q: What are durable skills?

A: Transferable skills like critical thinking, communication, and collaboration that apply across careers.

Q: Why is alignment important?

A: Alignment ensures standards, instruction, and assessment work together to support meaningful learning outcomes.

Q: How is assessment evolving?

A: Toward competency-based and application-focused models rather than traditional testing.

Q: How are states redefining future-ready education to prepare students for an AI-driven workforce?

A: States are redefining future-ready education by aligning standards, curriculum, instruction, and assessment around durable skills, AI literacy, and deep conceptual learning, using frameworks such as Portrait of a Graduate to prepare students to think critically, apply knowledge across contexts, and adapt successfully to changing careers and technologies.

Featured Quotes

“The shift is from content coverage to knowledge building, and that requires students to think, apply, and understand why learning matters.”

Full Webinar Transcript

The following transcript has been edited for readability. Timestamps have been removed and minor transcription errors corrected. Speaker comments and context have been preserved.

Opening Remarks

Rich Portelance

Good morning or good afternoon, depending on which coast you are on. Welcome to the EdGate Powers Webinar. We have an exciting panel today and a great discussion in store. We're going to give it about two minutes for all the attendees to pile in, and then we'll get started. So, hang in there, get your questions ready, get your cup of coffee, and be prepared. It's going to be a great conversation.

While everyone's waiting, I am really pleased to announce that we will be doing our next webinar on March 19th, 2026. That's the preliminary date, so, mark your calendars. We're going to be talking about future-proofing curriculum through future-ready alignments, covering the importance of structured data, clean metadata, and automating alignments to keep pace with change. So, make sure you mark your calendar for March 19th, 2026, in the new year for the next EdGate Powers webinar. And we do have a record number of registrations for this webinar, thanks to our wonderful panelists. So, it should be a very engaging session.

We’re going to kick in now. So, today's topic is Paradigm Shifts: States Redefining Standards and the Skills Needed for the Future. I want to welcome everyone. My name is Richard Portelance. I am the moderator host for today, and I want to be the first to wish everybody a joyous holiday season. We're hoping that this webinar kicks off and gets you in a good mood.

I'm here with some of these wonderful people. We have Lisa O’Masta. She is the CEO of Learning.com. We have Hillary Rinaldi, who is the Vice President from Whiteboard Advisor, and Keven Ellis from the Texas State Board of Education. And they are all experts in their respective fields. We also have Gina Faulk, the general manager here at EdGate. And they're all going to do a quick intro, and then I'm going to tell you about the purpose of today's webinar. So, why don't we start with Lisa, and then Hillary, then Keven, then Gina? Just do a quick intro so everybody knows your background?

Lisa O’Masta

Great. Well, thank you so much for having me, Rich, and everyone. So, at Learning.com, we work with states and districts across the country to support students in what it means to build healthy and proficient relationships with technology. And so, that includes digital citizenship, AI literacy, and early career awareness, all grounded in that research standards alignment and classroom realities.

So, my perspective today really comes from working across multiple states. And we're seeing that navigation of those changes, shifting standards, growing expectations around future-ready skills, and those very real constraints on time, funding, and teacher capacity. So, I'm honored to join the rest of this panel and look forward to the conversation. Thank you for having me.

Hillary Rinaldi

Hi all. I'm Hillary Rinaldi, formerly Knudson, vice president at Whiteboard Advisors focused on K-12 research and strategy. I genuinely love being a policy wonk. Prior to Whiteboard, I was at the Tennessee Department of Education, and before that, I was on the Senate Education Committee, working on the Every Student Succeeds Act.

So, when we talk about the shifts at the state level, it is what I was working on before and now in my current role. I get to advise nonprofits, foundations, and startups in the edtech space on what policy means in practice for them, and inform their work. This is certainly an enduring topic of what it means for students to be prepared for the future of their choosing and different paths. So, I'm really excited to talk more and get in the weeds today. And I think Rich's job will be to make sure I don't get too far into those weeds.

Dr. Keven Ellis

I'm Keven Ellis from the Texas State Board of Education. I'm just wrapping up my ninth year on the board. Our governor appointed me chair of that board for a four-year term between 2019 and 2023. Before that, I spent five years on my local school board in my hometown of Lufkin, Texas. Being on the board, I also sit on our permanent school fund, which is a $60 billion fund that supports education in Texas. I am also the immediate past chair of the National Association of State Boards of Education. I have been a commissioner for four years with the Education Commissioner of the States. Moreover, I got to spend some time with Hillary in a math thinkers meeting where we worked with Whiteboard Advisers.

Being part of NASBE (National Association of State Boards of Education), it's really interesting to see how states do very similar work but in many different ways. In Texas, we focus on our curriculum standards, which are fully developed by the State Board of Education. And then a lot of what we're going to talk about is the high-quality instruction material, which we develop in conjunction with TEA (the Texas Education Agency).

Gina Faulk

Hello, everyone, I'm Gina Faulk, the general manager here at EdGate. I've been in textbooks and edtech for the last 25-plus years, actually, working K12 but also with higher ed publishers, nonprofits, NGOs (nongovernmental organizations), states, districts, a little bit of everybody. My focus has always been on business development and partnerships, but I've worked on a lot of state adoptions. The past couple of years, that's all I've been doing.

I help EdGate work on adoptions, but also on supporting publishers who are chasing after state adoptions. We'll talk more during this webinar, but EdGate focuses on helping publishers, anyone who has content, align their content to standards. However, we also sometimes review standards alignments that companies or states have already done, or for states that are vetting publishers who have submitted materials for adoption. So, through all my work with RFPs (requests for proposals), I've really gotten to know standards more than I ever dreamed I would. So, we'll talk more throughout the whole webinar, but that's our focus, all standards related.

Rich Portelance

Thank you, Gina. So, you can tell that we have a high-powered panel here. We're going to get into it in a second. If you have questions during the webinar, please put them in the question link at the bottom of your screen, and we'll get to them. If it's in line with the questions that are being posed, we might cover it in line, but most of the time we'll cover those at the back end of the session. So, stay tuned and stay with us through the full hour, and then we'll get to the questions later. We will be sharing the slides, content, and a copy link to this presentation for this webinar afterwards. So, expect it to come probably between the holidays or just after the first of the year. Everything gets jammed up this time of year, but we will be sending out a packet with the link to the webinar. So, stay tuned for that.

Discussion

Rich Portelance

So today, we're bringing together these terrific leaders from policy, state education, and edtech publishing to help you understand why states are redefining student readiness, what "Portrait of a Graduate" means in practice, how Texas is addressing graduate skill proficiency, how standards and accountability systems are shifting, and what durable skills and AI literacy look like in content and assessments. I'm highlighting the word “assessment” because that's very important, and Hillary will talk a little bit about that. We will also be discussing how publishers and states can prepare for the next five years and beyond. So, we're going to get into it. The questions are going to be fairly open-ended. I want to quiet myself and let these experts talk to you about these topics.

We're going to start with drivers of change. So, my first question is for Hillary Rinaldi. What forces are driving states to rethink what future-ready means?

Hillary Rinaldi

So, a quick, easy yes-no question. I appreciate that, Rich. No. I think right now, no matter where your area of expertise lies or what your day job is, there are certain things that we are all feeling right now.

Some of that is budget constraints, certainly if you're sitting in a district chief superintendent role, and trying to make more happen with fewer dollars. If you're sitting in a state house, you are trying to figure out what to do in the era of AI, how to regulate within states, how to interpret what the federal government is saying, and struggling with everything being more expensive right now. It doesn’t matter what you're purchasing or if you're supporting your whole staff.

I think when we talk about being ready for the future, it's a reaction to whether we are ready for right now. And so, both the real-world context and also having students that appear further behind, right? Our NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) results show that we're seeing a steady decline. We haven't rebounded from pre-pandemic levels. Both Keven and Lisa have heard me say this before, but the goal shouldn't be to just return to where we were pre-pandemic, either, right? I think when we talk about future-ready, it's both this need and desire for students to have a choice after high school that results in a high-wage, valuable job that's also vital to them, and being productive members of society. So, it's like, what is it that we're building here?

The reason for that, and what you and I talked about on the podcast, like some of that comes from things beyond academics, right? Every student is going to end up in the workforce. That's the plan, and there are certain things that you need to be successful there. So, that's how we got into the conversation around durable skills, competencies, and how those come from portraits of a graduate. We can go in any direction from there.

Rich Portelance

Well, let's get Keven to tell us a little bit about what factors are taking shape here in Texas. The State Board of Education's approach to readiness and standards. What's happening there, Keven?

Dr. Keven Ellis

Yeah, there are lots to talk about with readiness and standards, but I think it's the same factors in Texas that we're dealing with that every other state is dealing with. We're all trying to squeeze every bit of improvement we have with the resources we're given. Of course, we're never happy with where we are right now. We always want to improve, specifically in math and literacy. We want more students entering kindergarten ready. We want more students to be reading at grade three. Also, we want students ready for advanced mathematics in high school and to be ready for a college career or the military at the end of their educational career.

We do in Texas the requisite training grades three through eight in high school, but the academic readiness metrics I really watch are third-grade math and reading, and that they're getting off to a good start. We look at fifth-grade math as a gateway to advanced middle school math. You know, we're watching what they're doing in eighth-grade math and reading, and in our college and career and military readiness, that their CTE programs are strong, that we have college-ready students with dual credit, AP, IB, etc., in the military readiness.

But you asked about what the State Board of Education's approach is, and I look at that as we're just a piece of the system that's responsible for five and a half million students here in Texas. You have the legislature as part of the system that's responsible for the Texas Education Code, and all the rules and laws that we work under. We have the commissioner and TEA (the Texas Education Agency), which does all the things that commissioners do. But below that, we have 1,200 school districts in Texas employing over 350,000 teachers. All of us are working together and turning all the levers we can to get this improvement. And there are lots of these. Some of these are specific to the State Board of Education, and the levers that I think of a lot are curriculum standards. What we call the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS). You may hear me refer to that as TEKS. That's our curriculum standards, which are fully under the control of the State Board of Education. And now we also have authority over the high-quality instructional material. So, I look at the curriculum standards as a lever that's not the most critical lever when you think of the others, like HQIM (high-quality instruction material), like professional development, like high-impact tutoring, strengthening our ed programs, just to name a few. But the high-quality instruction material is a lever we didn't have before. So, we had our curriculum standards, and we had our high-quality instruction material. But prior to 2024, we didn't have any authority over the instructional material. Anytime we wanted to effectuate change, we had to change our curriculum standards, which is not always ideal for continuity of the system.

So, I'm excited about the process that Texas is undergoing now, which started in 2024 with high-quality instructional material and marrying that with what we're doing with our standards. So those are a couple of the things that I think about when we talk about how we're getting our students academically ready. But also looking at how we do that within our standards.

Rich Portelance

I mean, when you talk about millions of students and 350,000 teachers, it's a big undertaking to move that bar, but it sounds like you guys are doing a great job.

Lisa, what new expectations are states and districts placing on content providers like Learning.com?

Lisa O’Masta

When we talk about those new expectations, the three themes I keep hearing consistently across states have been around clarity, simplicity, and responsibility. And so, standards obviously are hugely important, Keven, as you talked about.

When we think about that, like the first around clarity, for example. So, states and districts want providers to be explicit about how content supports graduate skills like problem solving, ethical technology use, and adaptability. "Portrait of a Graduate" kind of has raised that bar, and leaders now want to see how those skills are actually developing over time, not just kind of that they're labeled in a standard.

The second really is that kind of simplicity piece, which is with teacher capacity, as you guys talked about, being stretched so thin. Districts are prioritizing solutions that are really easy to implement, clear scope and sequence, ready-to-use lessons, and professional learning that's built in rather than this thing that they have to add on to their day. And across states, we're really seeing this strong interest in platforms that integrate things like digital citizenship, AI literacy, rights, and career awareness, as opposed to treating them as a separate thing that happens in the back of the room.

And then the last focus on responsibility. I really think about this as almost the most important with AI, and that states expect a level of transparency, an age-appropriate design, and alignment with guidance and their policies. And since they're still kind of, as we talked about in many different places, states, and districts, they are still trying to figure out what their guidance is, and still trying to figure out what those policies are that are helping them. And that innovation is welcome, but only when it's grounded in that trust in that research. So, really kind of thinking about beyond just the standards, how do we make things consumable for where we are today, and meeting our educators where they are in this process?

Rich Portelance

Well, those are really important drivers of change for education. Gina, are you seeing this all come together? Because EdGate sits right in-between what Lisa's doing at Learning.com and other providers are coming up with, and what Keven's expecting at the state level. Are you seeing some of these drivers come forward from your perspective?

Gina Faulk

Somewhat. We did some searches this week to see while prepping for this webinar about skills being added or separated, and we're not seeing that really. But the other thing that I will comment on is that the states are slow to catch up, too.

Shifts are happening all the time, and so I think that for things to change on the state end takes a long time. Sometimes a year or two. Some of the skills-related topics, those we do see in the process standards, so they've always been there as part of the process standards, like communication, collaboration, and being a good digital citizen. But we're not seeing, you know, something that's huge and right in our face that's so different. We'll get more into that, but not yet.

Hillary Rinaldi

So, I think I'll make another point, Rich. I think it's the connection between what Lisa and Gina are saying too. That it's not that academics is taking a backseat to skills; it's that they are interconnected, right? I spend a lot of time with math teachers right now in my work on the National Math Improvement Project. A math teacher is going to be the first to tell you whether or not you know that creativity, problem-solving, and collaboration are happening in their class. And Keven knows that that's part of the process standards that also exist.

So, I think there's also, you know, whether it's the terminology that we're using or which state you're talking about, but really at the classroom level, these are things that are happening every day. The challenge when you get beyond the practitioner level is how are we ensuring that students also know that those are the skills that they're building? How do we support teachers in being able to articulate that those are the skills being built and in connecting the dots so that, to Lisa's point, it's not something else that we're asking teachers to do either?

Lisa O’Masta

Well, if I could just add to that really quickly, Hillary, when students learn the skills, they understand why they need to why they need those skills and they connect those skills to careers. I mean even as early as kindergarten, first, second, third grade, there's no reason why they can't understand. “When I learn this, it helps me with this, this, this, and this”, right? And so, making those connections really early in the process.

Rich Portelance

So, if you're looking at this interweaving of skills with the standards, and you have to look at the end goal, if we're talking about "Portrait of a Graduate", you know there's this progression. Are you seeing that today's academic and CT standards are being redefined to meet that end goal, Hillary, or what are you seeing?

Hillary Rinaldi

Yeah, we've got a lot of questions built in there. So, I think through a landscape view of when we talk about a "Portrait of a Graduate", or a profile of a learner, or really a competency framework. So, like, what Texas does, or Colorado, that has its graduate competencies. If we use that category, most states have something in place. I think it's like, 38 states that have something articulated at the state level. Now there are many districts in those states and outside of those states that have also articulated their own "Portrait of a Graduate". The intention being that it's saying when you graduate from our high school, when you progress through K-12 in this system, these are the things that you are left able to do and hold those competencies. It's also a nod to learning happening beyond the confines of a classroom, right? We're not just limited by, or we shouldn't be limited by, seat time or not. And things like work-based learning and CTE concentrators are able to do more within the school day, or get credit for those experiences.

Now, where those shifts can happen at the state, and where we're seeing, I think, is in the place of innovation, right? So, if we look at states like Kentucky, which had a pretty lengthy process to articulate their profile of a learner through United We Learn, and that was a full strategic planning process that also really cultivated community support and development alongside that. They also developed their local labs of learning that tested different types of accountability metrics that they would want in place. So, I think it's both, yes, there's big state action happening. Indiana is another example of changing graduation rates and creating direct admissions processes, but it's also what's happening at the local level to make those things meaningful. And to Lisa's point, connect the dots of, if I'm learning this in my classroom, does it have currency beyond the classroom and in my community, too?

Rich Portelance

No, that's a really good point. And you know, when I spoke to Keven, we were touching on some of that currency, and how Texas is preparing students for what their future looks like. So that leads us into you know, the next question, Keven. How does Texas balance innovation with stability in its system, and what are you seeing as the need for these students in terms of preparing for graduation?

Dr. Keven Ellis

Yeah, that's always the needle we're trying to thread there. And I want to touch on something that Gina talked about with how long things take to implement change. And I'll bring up an example of our curriculum standards, our TEKS, that we've begun the revision of social studies, which is going to take us a good chunk of 2026 to get that done. After that, we have to allow a year for the textbook publishers to write new material for our curriculum standards. That's 2027, and then it will need to go through our instructional material and review process in 2028. And so, curriculum standard changes that we begin here at the end of 2025 probably won't be implemented in the classrooms until 2029.

So, it's a good example of just how long progress takes. But I think to your question about balancing innovation and stability, it's a huge challenge. Now, in my role, I'm a little bit different from some of you who do this for a career for a living, but I'm an elected official. Some of my colleagues from across the country have been appointed. When you join the system as an elected official, you want to make improvements. And how do you make improvements? You make improvements by changing things. And we all agree with a continuous improvement model. But the challenge is making those targeted changes, but giving those changes time to result in improvements to the system.

I want to give a couple of examples of what I mean by that. With our state assessment system, what we call our STAAR (State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness) test, we have cut scores that are between the different differentiators with that. The legislature said they wanted those to be consistent for five years to allow stability in the system, so districts could make the changes they need to do at a local level, and see those results in a consistent accountability system. But then, after five years, when it came time to change those cut scores and to look for the progress that the state expected from our districts, it led to a huge change instead of five small incremental changes. And then you had districts that basically had the exact same score, but were dropping a letter grade because the standards stayed the same for five years, and then made a big jump after.

The same works for industry-based certifications (IBCs). Those have to come and go based on whether they remain high value or in high demand. Some may add or drop the list. But, districts have budgeted and planned for teaching those certifications. So, what the state has said is that “we want those now only modified every five years, consistent with the accountability changes, so that they marry up”. I mentioned a little bit about the TEKS changes that can take four, sometimes five years from the time we start till we get into a classroom. But even just some amendments that we make to our curriculum standards result in changes to the 5.5 million students that I mentioned earlier, the professional development for the 350,000 teachers that I talked about earlier. It creates new instruction material requirements for publishers, and then, in our accountability system, new assessment questions.

Another area that I look at the stability for is a program that's relatively new to the state, the Teacher Incentive Allotment. It's a way that we're paying our best teachers to stay in the classroom and give them a chance here in Texas to make a six-figure income without having to go into the administration route to stay in a classroom where we want them closer to our students. And that's shown a lot of promise, but that program is dependent on a stable funding system.

So, Texas has made great progress in changing these funding formulas by making these changes specific to the formula, not just a grant system. But I think to answer, you know, to summarize to answer your question, we have to listen to concerns from the field, when target improvements need to be made, what those strategic changes are, provide some consistent time for those improvements to take place, and then also importantly, as we all know, provide those consistent financial supports.

Rich Portelance

So, Hillary, you know, we just heard from Keven that there's this time gap and, you know, you have to be a little bit of a prognosticator to understand where things are going to be in five years. That's a challenging component to building these standards and making them relevant. Where are states experiencing the most friction as they evolve their standards? Are you seeing other things?

Hillary Rinaldi

Yeah. So, I think that the structural elements that kind of stay in place are those standards review cycles, right? Every state has its own process and pretty comparable timelines of about eight years or so. Alongside that, you have over a dozen states that have formal curriculum review processes, like Keven was talking about in Texas. There are another dozen states that do that as well. That doesn't mean that things aren't also moving at the district level simultaneously.

So, if we take, like, California, for example, the math framework took a long time to get out, was delayed, well over a year. I work closely with Los Angeles Unified, and they had moved forward with adopting their own HQIM outside of that process. So, I think even if the state's role is to kind of maintain those guardrails and support their districts, it also means that districts do still have some flexibility to move things forward.

I think where districts are more at the mercy of action at the states is also related to graduation requirements, right? And so I mentioned Indiana, the changes to their diploma requirements, and trying to create more pathways for students while also ensuring that you're maintaining rigor. And so that kind of friction between “we want students to have more opportunities, more personalized learning experiences, more experiences outside of the classroom”, there's still only so many hours in the day. So, what is going to shift to be able to accommodate those things? That friction between maintaining rigor and creating opportunity and choice is a definite challenge for both states and for districts, right?

I think my concern is always that we are putting the onus on the student to know at the ripe age of 13 what they're going to do with their life, to be able to choose what pathways are the right fit? So, I think I would love for Lisa to jump in and share more about, like, how do we think about whether a student is learning that applies to any pathway that they choose, and being prepared to take on those different opportunities? It's reasonable to expect that a high school kid might change their mind, because we also know most college kids do too.

Rich Portelance

Lisa, you want to take that on?

Lisa O’Masta

Yeah, I mean, the common theme between both Keven and Hillary is that moving faster isn't necessarily the answer. It's building smarter. But I also think there's a recognition, and I think to your point, Hillary, that there are the jobs of tomorrow, we don't even know what they are yet, right? And so, there's this concept of those durable skills and we think about it like the language, whether you know whatever we call it.

"Portrait of a Graduate" has kind of created that common ground to kind of create those common languages, and it's around the durable competencies, the critical thinking, all of those components, those are consistent. And I would venture to argue that they're probably not going to change, even though the jobs themselves will, and so from our experience, we're thinking about it from like a modular flow. Whether it's us or publishers of any kind, what does that look like, how can we make sure that we're building those skills and introducing ideas?

Hillary, you talked about a career, you know, going into CTE in high school. What we're seeing is that a lot of the schools and districts that have really invested at the CTE level in the high school, those students who are halfway through are kind of losing interest, like “is this really what I wanted to do?” I mean, we're adults, and we probably ask ourselves those questions, like partially, throughout our careers.

So, I would argue that introducing earlier, we're seeing a lot more introduction in middle school around not necessarily CTE, but hey, when you learn this skill, these are the types of jobs that this skill can connect to. These are the types of careers that people do today. Here are, you know, when you think about, like I mean, AI, right? Like, here's something that shows how AI is being used in healthcare, in business, in you know, hundreds of different careers. Isn't that interesting? And so, you're not necessarily putting them on a path yet, but you're just giving them little tastes and helping them to see that so that they're not being forced into a pathway too soon before they really know what they want to do.

Rich Portelance

So, as we go forward, we're seeing the world of CTE becoming more relevant in some regards. It's always been relevant, but it's interwoven with what we're doing academically.

There's actually a question here from one of our attendees, Gina. I just want to throw it out to you. In terms of correlating the world of academic and learner standards to the world of what job seekers are looking for in CTE standards, you know, what are you seeing? And I know you've done some work with ExACT on, bringing all that into the system. Can you talk about the correlation of those things, and what is the expected outcome to meet some of the challenges that Lisa, Hillary, and Keven were just talking about?

Gina Faulk

Yeah, CTE has been particularly hard, and it filled up, I think you mentioned earlier, Rich, it filled up half of our database, which is full of CTE standards because they're so vast. They don't get the attention that we'd all like them to have because the four core subjects get the most attention, with CTE probably being last on the list. But we probably have over, you know, three or four million CTE standards in our database. We can align those, or we can provide those CTE standards to companies that need access to those. We have a library of CTE standards across all of the various pathways and clusters, not only for the states, but we're beginning to look at actually adding CTE for international regions as well.

We can load those up into our database, and they can be aligned to via ExACT, or our clients can actually hire EdGate to help them do that. So, either way, it is hard to know what the states will be doing at any given moment because there's not a lot of notice given about, oh, you know, suddenly we'll look and see, wow, the state just loaded up all brand new CTE standards. So sometimes there's a little lag because of the fact that they're changing all the time with no apparent heads up on the fact that they'll be doing that.

So, but yeah, we definitely do that work and it can be done either via our subject matter experts, or the standards could be loaded into our tools so that they can be aligned to. Oftentimes it might be a direct alignment, too, so that you would be looking at it in a nicely organized fashion, so that you can look at the standards and directly align your content to those standards.

Dr. Keven Ellis

Hey Rich, can I kind of jump in a little bit there and just talk about CTE, because I think as an elected official, that's always a challenge to, you know, we work in our little bubble, but the decisions we make are affecting so many different people, and CTE is an example of that.

Texas probably 10 years ago tackled all our CTE standards at one time, and I don't even know how many courses we have. It’s hundreds. And literally, I wasn't on the board then, but my colleagues told me that they had three-ring binders of the curriculum standards that were literally from the floor up to almost chest level when they did all the different courses. It was just a beast. And so, what we're doing now instead of trying to do that again in 10 years is doing bite-sized chunks. So, we're continually doing CTE. We have all our core subjects and our enrichment subjects, kind of like what Hillary was talking about, an eight- or nine-year schedule, but CTE is constant. So, we're taking the ones, and you know math and science is a relatively static research field, but still the standards change with those, but you can imagine how much the need for CTE is to change when the industry is changing so fast. So, what we're trying to do is almost like a continual process of CTE revision, so we're keeping up with those important ones that the field is changing, and hopefully that'll be helpful for the field.

Lisa O’Masta

Well, and if I could just add, you know, Keven, we work across most of the states in the country, but I would say Texas is doing a fantastic job. We work very closely with Texas, and your state is really leading the way as it relates to thinking about how some of those kinds of durable competencies meet those CTE requirements. I've been so impressed with so many of the districts that I'm working with in Texas, where they're like, "Hey, Learning.com, how can you know you specifically help us bring the integration of these digital skills into the CTE?” Your state's doing it faster than I've seen a lot of other states do it. So, kudos to what Texas is doing for sure.

Dr. Keven Ellis

Always nice to hear because my complaint inbox usually ends up bigger than the compliment inbox.

Lisa O’Masta

I hear you on that one.

Rich Portelance

So, Keven, kind of continuing that thought, you know, you're adding competencies and character traits to your TEKS to evolve these expectations. Is that something, you know, similar to what you're doing on the CTE side, this continual development? Can you talk a little bit about those character traits and other components that are, you know, helping to create what a future-ready student looks like?

Dr. Keven Ellis

Yeah, that's actually a little bit of a different process, and I'll go back a little bit to give you the timeline. In 2019, the legislature required that the State Board of Education integrate character traits into its teaching curriculum standards. And some examples of that were- I didn't memorize this, I am reading from a list right now: courage, trustworthiness, integrity, respect, courtesy, responsibility, fairness, caring, good citizenship, gratitude, those types of things that are now required to be part of the TEKS.

Legislature came back in 2021 and added personal skills to the character traits. Things like self-management, interpersonal skills, responsible decision-making. So, the way that's working, again, different from what we're doing with CTE, on almost like an evergreen cycle. Beginning in the 2021 school year, each of those things that I just listed, each of the individual character traits must be taught at least once in a grade band. The grade bands are K through 2, 3 through 5, 6 through 8, and 9 through 12. So, somewhere in each of those four grade bands, you have to teach all of those character traits. They can be taught as a standalone course, or they can be integrated. When you look at the Texas curriculum standards or TEKS, we have chapters. We have a chapter for science. We have a chapter for math. We have a chapter for social studies and on and on. What we did with this was we went back and forth. We did not integrate them into, say, social studies or into English language arts. We made them their own separate chapter. And I think that's something important that publishers should pay attention to because you're not going to find those character traits in the social studies TEKS or in the ELAR (English Language Arts and Reading) TEKS. They're a separate chapter, but districts are required to integrate those somewhere in their curriculum that they teach.

So, if a publisher adds those as part of their curriculum, I think it's a bonus for districts and it makes it a little easier for them to figure out where and what grade they're going to teach those character traits.

Rich Portelance

Oh, that's fantastic. Thank you. I want to shift the conversation a little bit towards assessments and future skills. Lisa, what innovations do we need to measure digital and AI related skills? Big topic.

Lisa O’Masta

Yeah. You know, especially whether it's digital skills, AI-related skills, it really requires a different mindset, right? So, if you think about it in terms of first, we need to focus on the application. So, it's not just does a student understand a specific technology like do I know how to use a tool; it's what they can actually do with it, how do they evaluate, for example, how do they evaluate AI output, is it accurate, is it not accurate, is it biased, is it not biased? And how do they start to think about that? Can they explain their reasoning in terms of understanding that, and being able to demonstrate that? And then can they be safe about it and use it ethically in terms of their decision-making and processing?

So, when I think about it from an assessment perspective, I think about it, you know, can a classroom teacher, you know, can she observe different changes? Like, are there different things that she's seeing in that process? What can they do differently with it? If you think about what are those early indicators, we always look at, you know, is there a physical change in behavior?

So, one of the examples I like to talk about is I was talking with a student, a seventh grader once, and I was asking her, you know, what tell me, you know, after using some of these digital skills that Learning.com teaches, what can you talk about differently? You know, she's like, “well, I don't really use social media”. And I'd like to laugh because I asked her, I was like, "well, how many followers do you have?" And she's like, "I have 672." And so, for somebody who doesn't use technology, she can tell you the exact number. But when I asked her, I said, "So, what have you done differently?" and her answer was “well I guess now before I post online, I pause for a minute and I think to myself ‘what would I do if my mom saw this?’” And I think that is such a critical moment and a life changing moment, and so how do you assess that? It really comes down to kind of everyday learning, you know, what do those assessments look like? How do we track and how do we monitor different types of behavior in those? Whether it's AI or any other types of digital tools, and being able to be able to measure that activity, which I think again going back to it's a different mindset to assessment than what we've had in the past.

Hillary Rinaldi

Yeah. I think of it almost as like what we call invisible assessments almost, right? So, what teachers are able to use in their day-to-day, it's not another summative assessment. It's not even necessarily a formative assessment. It's the way that just evolves naturally within really well-taught classrooms, right? Teachers need the support and the pedagogical practices to be able to do that well. And so, with tools like the ones Lisa is talking about, you're able to do that. But I think it's also that if we treat teachers as the professionals that they are, and allow them to tell us how they know these things about their students, I think we're also better poised to be able to do these things. It's not necessarily another test in the way that any of us have experienced tests in schools either.

Rich Portelance

And what do you think those measures are?

Hillary Rinaldi

Well, Rich, if I could answer that... I think there's a lot of opportunity in just how far we've come from a psychometric standpoint, and I don't pretend to know enough to really speak to that eloquently. But, I think from coming from you know state assessments or summative assessments, you have more states that are thinking about things like, through-year assessments, right? And how do we have multiple checkpoints to acknowledge that students are making gains. But it also speaks to competency, right? At what point is a student competent to meet the standards of that coursework to be able to say that they can, you know, move on when ready, right? This is part of what happens in accelerated math classes like Keven was talking about in middle school acceleration for math. I think the skills for the future pilot that is underway with five or six states, in partnership with ETS (Educational Testing Service) and the Carnegie Foundation is trying to determine just that. To figure out how those states want to pursue assessing those skills and those competencies that they want to see in their students.

So, I think there's work underway, but no one I don't think anybody really knows the answer quite yet. But, I think Lisa makes a great point to say that it is a change that is part of the paradigm shift. It is a change in mindset of what do we even mean by assessment?

Lisa O’Masta

Well, and if I could just add, you've used the word competence a lot, which is what's the definition of competence, right? Is the competence now that I know what 4 plus 3 is, or is the competence that I understand how you know that when I see the answer for 4 plus 3, that I know it's correct? Is the answer that I know that 4 plus 3 is correct and that it's, you know, not misrepresented in some form or fashion. And so I think competency now expands to more than the answer to 4 plus 3 equals 7, right, and what does that need to look like and how do we measure and evaluate that?

Dr. Keven Ellis

I think it's a great conversation to have about how we're looking at traditional versus non-traditional metrics and how we're ensuring that our students are where they need to be. From a personal viewpoint, I looked at it differently when I was on a local school board with 7,000 students versus a state board with over 5 million students. So, it's a completely different viewpoint, but you know, in Texas, we're looking beyond the traditional achievement. We're looking at the growth metric that I think a lot of other states are doing. We have redesigned our STAAR test, as Hillary was mentioning, a three-year design that's going to have a beginning of the year, middle of the year, in addition to the end of the year that's also adaptive. But we look at things like in our accountability system, the college and career and military readiness and all those different types of things. AP and IB dual credit, level one and level two search, military enlistment, all those types of things. Closing the gaps are just other ways that we look at it. But,

I think one of the other unique things that Texas is doing is a local accountability system. And this is a process where districts can apply for a local accountability plan that meets the needs of their local community. There was conversation earlier about portraits of a graduate and Texas really doesn't have that at a state level, but there are districts that are doing that. Frisco ISD (Independent School District), which is in the DFW (Dallas-Fort Worth) metroplex, has done something like that. And interestingly enough, they have merged that with this local accountability system. The community has said this is what we want for our skills, and what we want our high school graduates to look like. For Frisco, that's things like a certain percentage of students taking specific coursework about making sure that they have differentiated learning experience and a positive culture and environment when they're at school. They've merged that what I would look at as like a "Portrait of a Graduate" in with their local accountability system plan, and I think that's a pretty unique and innovative approach that some districts are

Rich Portelance

All right. So, a lot is going on over in Texas. I want to circle back to Lisa. During your podcast interview, you spoke about durable skills, stating that publishers like Learning.com have the responsibility to lead with innovation and integrity by providing curriculum and resources that are research-based, standards-aligned, and easy to implement. Thereby reducing complexity and schools for schools and teachers.

First, how is Learning.com delivering on that responsibility? And second, can you really see a path to reduce complexity for schools and teachers?

Lisa O’Masta

Yeah, great question. So, I guess a couple of pieces that I think if I could just say responsibility and complexity are where providers like Learning.com and others really can make or break trust, right? And so if you think about that from that perspective, you know, one of the things we focus on at Learning.com is how do we help states and districts take complex expectations into really clear learning pathways? Like, what does it actually look like to take the ideas and the vision that they have and help them bring that to life? I think that's kind of with our work across different states and districts across the country, you know, what does it look like across different grade bands? What does it look like in terms of involving the school's tools in that process? Helping them in terms of identifying what are the problems that they're trying to solve and what are the different tools. I don't think tools by themselves are going to help. It's really around that relationship you're creating with the organizations that you're working with. It's about thinking about them as your partner and then articulating and helping. Companies like Learning.com help them diffuse the complexity of those ideas.

And again, we'll just go back to AI and AI policy because that's kind of that hard piece that so many schools and districts are working on right now. How do we take that vision and give them kind of some clarity? We just launched a new tool that is solely available for states and districts to help them with their thinking. It's an AI policy tool just to help them think through, freely available, just kind of be their thought partner. And so, how are organizations like Learning.com providing resources that can help break down some of that complexity to help partner with districts and schools to create those pathways that get them to the outcomes they're looking for?

Hillary Rinaldi

I think that's true. Not like AI is the, you know, maybe the hottest topic and the toughest one to grapple with because we don't know, right? Every day it's new. Even if we were having this conversation a year ago, it would look very different than what it is like now. But I think for the core subjects, there is still movement and momentum there for states to rethink. Like there was a great paper that SAP (Student Achievement Partners) put out about the durable skills that are baked into math class that we don't necessarily talk about it that way. Or math teachers might not even think about it that way, but there is opportunity to ensure those things are braided, right? And as we think of more subjects being connected in that way and the potential for an interdisciplinary approach, that can help them free up time, so to speak, in a given day to go do things, like a work-based learning opportunity or that way. So, as we want to ensure that students are thought of as holistic individuals, what their school day looks like can also have that opportunity. It's very difficult to operationalize, but it is possible. And some of that is thinking about the pieces that have been highly regimented previously or up until now.

Rich Portelance

And do you feel that, Hillary? Do you feel like we can see a path towards de-complexing? I want to go specifically towards teachers right now. Their workload and their job in bringing in these skills and doing this work.

Hillary Rinaldi

I think there are definitely ways that we can make the administrative burden of teachers easier through things like tools and tech that exist right now. What we cannot do is replace the teacher-student relationship. So, what I'm excited to see is how tools can come alongside teachers to allow them to, like… it's not just make their job easier, but also make them better at the parts of the job that only teachers can do. So, for example, if you're sitting in a class of 27 students and we know that more of them are maybe behind grade level than you would hope, right? Or than in years past. What does it mean to differentiate for those students? There are a lot of tools that I think are much smarter now to be able to ensure that students still have access to high-quality instructional materials, but also are able to meet them where they're at, so they can make progress within their coursework, too.

Lisa O’Masta

I would add to that integrating as much as possible right so whether you're integrating in terms of like making sure that these things aren't separate and that they can integrate it really helps to help the students and the teachers gain time, and it creates more consistency and clarity across the board when the systems start to integrate at the same time.

Rich Portelance

So, we have some good questions coming in. I want to remind everybody that on March 19th, please mark your calendars for the next EdGate Powers Webinar. So, you know, we're crossing over into 2026. These topics will continue to evolve, and we'll continue to bring forward wonderful panelists like today's. I do have a final prompt, and then I want to answer some of the questions that have come in, which are great questions. So, please stick around.

I want each panelist to consider the following. What single shift do you believe will define K12 education in the next five years? Take your time. Raise your hand if you want to start. I think Hillary's ready to go.

Hillary Rinaldi

Is it that? No. I just knew you'd pick on me, so I was glad that I knew about this question. The rest I usually just can go. But yes, I will give my fellow panelists time to come up with their answers. I am most excited by and see the most potential for rethinking a student's high school experience. For most students in most places, it looks exactly the same as it has if you're moving between classes for a set number of minutes. And that's just honestly unfair to students and preparing them for how the world works today.

To be able to actualize a truly transformed high school experience, there are a lot of pieces of the puzzle that need to be figured out, supported, and funded, right? I think there's innovation happening across the country that has potential to be replicated, but that also takes changes. It could take changes in policy. I think in a lot of places those policies are there, but they're not necessarily incentivized for districts and schools to take advantage of. So, I think that's something I'm hopeful for because it should be fun, right? It should be that you know you enjoy the work that you are doing in high school that prepares you for the future, and being able to have things like interdisciplinary courses and be out doing learning from other practitioners of having those kinds of robust internship experiences.

Students are, I think, more prepared for that than we typically give them credit for. So, bringing them into those conversations to really make that happen. There's a very exciting report coming out about the future of high school in about a month. So, I'll follow up when that's ready, but I've been working with the XQ Institute on that. So, we're excited to release that. So, high school is my answer, Rich.

Rich Portelance

Thank you, and we'll be happy to share that report when it comes out as well. So, you know, if you get it over to us, we'll post it out to this group. Keven, what are you thinking?

Keven Ellis

Yeah, you know, I think to answer your question directly, the 800 lb gorilla in the room is artificial intelligence and what it's going to do there. And that's a whole other podcast for a whole other day, but I'll actually take your question and flip it a little bit. I've used this kind of quote before that there's no silver bullet in education because we're not hunting werewolves, and that's why there's no one single thing.

So, I think one of the things as an elected official I try to do is make sure that we are continually keeping our heads on a swivel. If we focus on one area for too long, whether that's our curriculum standards, which we know that the State Board of Education did for a long time, mainly because that was the only authority we had. We weren't paying attention to the quality of our instructional material. I think my answer is almost the opposite of how many different things we have to keep our eye on the ball when we're talking about instructional material. We're talking about TEKS, we're talking about our teacher ed prep programs, when we're talking about professional development, just career pathways. I think really the answer is what I try to focus on are all those things, and how do we make sure that we're not letting something slip past us in this important time.

Rich Portelance

And I want to ask Gina because you see it from a different perspective, what shift are you seeing?

Gina Faulk

Well I'm going to take it from the standards perspective of course but I think that, one, the durable skills like critical thinking, communication, creativity, all of that. And it kind of goes back to P21, too, the partnership for 21st century skills. Those skills are always going to be important, those durability skills. Because with AI, like Keven was saying, they're going to need those skills, wherever and whatever the kids decide to do.

But secondly, I think CTE because of AI, we need to fill those other positions that are going to be stable, like vocational skills. So, I would love to see the CTE standards really take off and be attended to, and CTE programs expanding. Just in my own personal experience, in my life, that's what my kids are focused on right now, those types of jobs that are going to be around forever, no matter what. So, I think that's where I would focus on, or think that that's going to hopefully get more attention in the next five years.

Rich Portelance

And Lisa O’Masta, what are you thinking over there?

Lisa O’Masta

I appreciate being last in this one. So, you know, I was listening to all of your answers, and I think there's almost a bridge there. When I think about it, it's an important shift from content coverage to knowledge building, right? And I think that kind of bridges across all the things.

Now, obviously, you know, Hillary, you talked about high school. We're very much focused on K-8. And so I believe that content coverage shift to knowledge building needs to start way sooner. Because I actually get concerned when we wait until high school. There's so much focus at the high school level that we haven't prepared students for the understanding of the depth they need to have that reflection. And so I'm starting to see signals from schools and states around that making sure that students have the skills and the knowledge for this unpredictable future is really important, and that requires keeping things human-centered, right? Really being thoughtful about how we use whether it's the technology or the standards of any of those things, and then building those strong partnerships, because I think there are systems that get those things right.

Because AI, and Keven you said this, AI is going to be a huge push in these futures, but AI is only as good as we teach students to understand what it is and what it isn't. And not just students; it’s students, educators, and administrators of what it is and what it isn't, and how it can be used, because I can imagine you know in 5, 10, 15 years from now, students aren't going to need to understand like a formula or physics in the same way that they do today. They're going to need to understand why it matters. They're going to need to be able to think. They're going to need to be able to think critically. And I think Gina, that's kind of what you were talking about, like, but they're really going to need to understand how they apply the knowledge, which is different from let me tell you a formula or let me tell you a specific area. And I think that's going to need to be a fundamental shift that we have. And that starts with humanity and the ability to think and apply knowledge differently.

Closing Thoughts

Rich Portelance

Thank you, Lisa. Now, I want to, you know, typically I do a little wrap, but I don't think I can articulate it quite as well as our panelists.

I want to come back to Hillary because she asked a question at the very beginning about the paradigm shift and about what we want all of you as attendees to take away to be able to understand this paradigm shift in education, and what does it mean in five years? So, Hillary, were we able to answer the question, and is there anything you would like to add?

Hillary Rinaldi

I think we answered some really good questions and gave some food for thought. It's always hard to be on the spot to predict the future. Hopefully the next time we have this conversation, we'll feel further along in supporting students, what they actually want to do next, and being prepared for very dynamic work experiences, because no one's staying anywhere for their lifetime, let alone only, you know, this idea of you go to college and then go into a job and then you're there forever. I think that's part of the paradigm shift of being prepared for the unknowable.

Rich Portelance

Oh, well, thank you for our wonderful panelists today. Again, happy holidays to everyone who attended. Thanks for sticking around for the full hour. We hope you got a lot out of it. We'll be visiting you again soon. Mark your calendars for March 19th. We'll be coming back with another great webinar. Have a wonderful, wonderful holiday and a good day. Bye-bye. Thanks everyone. Thank you. Thank you

Webinar Summary & Transcript - Streamlining State-Level K-12 Curriculum Adoption

bford — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 13:47:28 +0000

Webinar Summary & Transcript - Streamlining State-Level K-12 Curriculum Adoption bford Thu, 06/25/2026 - 06:47

Webinar Summary & Transcript

Curriculum Alignment

Academic Standards

Standards Alignment

EdTech Implementation

High-Quality Instructional Materials (HQIM)

Summary

This webinar explores how curriculum providers are navigating the growing complexity of state-level adoption requirements using advanced technology. Featuring perspectives from Edmentum, News-O-Matic, and EdGate, the discussion focuses on how organizations manage standards alignment, scale content across multiple states, and respond to evolving policy and instructional demands.

A key theme throughout the conversation is the increasing fragmentation of standards across states. Panelists describe how the shift away from centralized standards has created a highly decentralized environment, requiring organizations to customize content and continuously track changes across subjects, grade levels, and regions. This complexity is further amplified by the rapid growth of Career and Technical Education (CTE) standards and frequent updates across states.

Technology emerges as a critical solution to these challenges. Panelists highlight how tools like standards trackers, centralized repositories, and alignment platforms enable organizations to move from manual, reactive processes to more proactive and scalable workflows. At the same time, the discussion emphasizes that human expertise remains essential to ensure quality, accuracy, and meaningful alignment.

Ultimately, the panel concludes that success in today’s adoption landscape depends on balancing efficiency with precision. Organizations must leverage technology to scale operations while maintaining strong human oversight, prioritizing customization, and staying ahead of evolving standards and state requirements

Key Takeaways

Standards tracking across states, especially CTE, requires structured, ongoing systems rather than manual processes.
Technology enables organizations to scale alignment workflows and manage frequent standards updates efficiently.
Human expertise remains essential to validate AI outputs and ensure high-quality alignments.
The shift away from centralized standards has increased the need for flexible, customizable content.
Organizations are moving from reactive alignment processes to more proactive, data-driven strategies.
“Doing more with less” is a widespread challenge, requiring strong prioritization and process optimization.
Standards comparison tools provide critical insight into content gaps and cross-state alignment.
Real-time content updates and dynamic platforms are becoming increasingly valuable for districts.

Topics Covered

State-level curriculum adoption challenges
Standards tracking systems and workflows
CTE standards complexity and growth
AI and automation in alignment processes
Human oversight in standards alignment
Standards comparison and gap analysis
Customization of curriculum across states
Technology platforms supporting alignment and adoption

Featured Speakers

Rich Portelance

Host, EdGate Powers Webinar Series

Melissa Quinn

Education Specialist, News-O-Matic

Ashli Denton

Catalog Operations Manager, Edmentum

Heather Talbot

Director of Sales, EdGate

Themes

Managing Standards Complexity at Scale

Panelists discussed the challenges of tracking and maintaining alignment across all 50 states, particularly with the added complexity of CTE standards. Small teams must rely on structured systems, automated alerts, and dashboards to stay current with ongoing changes.

Notable Insight

“It is a daily ongoing process… a fraction of every day needs to be devoted to tracking standards.”

Key Questions Explored

How can small teams effectively track standards across all states?
What systems are most effective for managing frequent updates?
How does CTE increase complexity in standards alignment?

The Role of Technology in Alignment and Efficiency

Technology plays a central role in enabling scalability, from automated tracking systems to alignment platforms like ExACT. These tools allow organizations to manage large volumes of content and standards while improving efficiency and consistency.

Notable Insight

“That would not be possible without the use of technology… it would be a huge, monumental task.”

Key Questions Explored

How does technology reduce the burden of alignment work?
What tools are most impactful for scaling alignment processes?
How can organizations transition from manual to automated workflows?

Balancing AI, Automation, and Human Expertise

While AI is increasingly used to support alignment processes, panelists emphasized that it remains imperfect and requires human validation. The most effective approach combines automation with expert oversight to ensure accuracy and relevance.

Notable Insight

“AI… is just an imperfect tool at this point.”

Key Questions Explored

What role should AI play in standards alignment today?
Where is human intervention still necessary?
How can organizations balance speed with quality?

What This Means for Education Leaders

For education leaders, this discussion highlights the importance of selecting curriculum and technology solutions that are both scalable and adaptable. As standards continue to evolve across states, leaders must prioritize tools that provide transparency, real-time updates, and alignment accuracy.

Leaders should also recognize the importance of balancing efficiency with instructional quality. While automation can accelerate processes, human expertise remains critical in ensuring that content truly meets student and instructional needs. Investing in platforms that combine both capabilities can help districts make more informed adoption decisions.

Additionally, the increasing demand for customization and real-time content means that leaders must consider how well solutions can adapt to local needs. Platforms that support flexible implementation, multilingual content, and ongoing updates will be better positioned to meet the diverse needs of today’s classrooms.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How are organizations managing standards across all 50 states?

A: They use structured systems such as standards trackers, dashboards, and automated alerts to monitor updates and prioritize alignment work.

Q: What role does technology play in standards alignment?

A: Technology enables organizations to scale alignment processes, automate routine tasks, and maintain up-to-date correlations across changing standards.

Q: Is AI replacing human involvement in alignment work?

A: No. AI supports efficiency but still requires human validation to ensure accuracy and meaningful alignment.

Q: Why is customization important in today’s curriculum landscape?

A: Because standards vary widely by state, content must be adaptable to meet different requirements and adoption criteria.

Q: How can curriculum providers streamline state-level K–12 curriculum adoption?

A: Curriculum providers can streamline state-level K–12 curriculum adoption by using technology to track evolving standards, automate standards alignment, support state-specific customization, and combine AI with expert review to deliver accurate, scalable curriculum.

Featured Quotes

“If you can just understand that humans are going to provide a great enhancement to technology… the quality… is well worth the short wait.”

Full Webinar Transcript

The following transcript has been edited for readability. Timestamps have been removed and minor transcription errors corrected. Speaker comments and context have been preserved. Please note that Heather's job title has since changed. However, her title in this transcript reflects her position at the time of recording.

Opening Remarks

Rich Portelance

As we're getting set up and people are coming in, just a reminder, we will be doing a webinar in September as well. So, you know, check that out at the end of this. We'll have some dates. I believe it's going to be September 11th, 2025. And we'll continue this series in these discussions. Also, if you check out the EdGate YouTube channel, which is EdGate LLC, you will see the podcast interviews of all of our panelists today up there, and other panelists from the past webinars. So, please check those out. There are some wonderful conversations, some detail that really helps to give a better explanation to some of the topics that we're going to jump into today.

Another note that I will probably be repeats the end of the webinar, if you're interested in being a panelist for a future webinar, please contact us here at EdGate. The email is pr@edgate.com, and we would love to speak with you if you're interested in joining us.

Rich Portelance

Okay. Well, looks like we have a good number of people on the webinar, so we're going to get started here.

Welcome to the June 2025 edition of the EdGate Powers Education webinar series. Today's topic is K12 curriculum options using advanced technology. I'm your host, Rich Porterance, and with me today are three exceptional panelists that I'm excited to have with us. Heather Talbot, who's the business development executive here at EdGate, Ashli Denton, manager of catalog operations at Edmentum, and Melissa Quinn, education specialist at News-O-Matic. Each of our panelists will have a chance to introduce themselves in a second.

As I mentioned, today's topic is meeting curriculum adoption complexities using advanced technology. In today's hyper-competitive and increasingly desperate state-to-state market, meeting adoption requirements means understanding the nuances of each state's standards deployment and how to adjust content quickly and effectively to gain adoption. Increasingly, this means companies need to leverage technology in their process, and we are here to discover what's working, what's not, and how leading companies are solving these challenges. Without further ado, let's meet our panelists. First, let's turn to Ashli Denton.

Ashli Denton

Hi, I'm Ashli. As Rich said, I am the manager at Edmentum for catalog operations. We manage the courses and careers platform. So, we take care of all of the standards and alignments that have anything to do with our content that's released on the courses side. I've been in standards and alignments now for a little over 20 years. So, it's been a long road of looking at standards and alignments and all the ways it has evolved in the technology that we've used and added on over the years. So, I'm super excited to be here today. Thanks so much for having me, Rich.

Rich Portelance

Oh, thank you, Ashli. We're excited to have someone with your caliber of expertise and industry knowledge on the panel. Next, we're going to invite Melissa Quinn from News-O-Matic to introduce herself.

Melissa Quinn

Sure. Thanks. My name is Melissa Quinn. I am the education specialist for News-O-Matic. I wear a lot of hats with the company, but basically, I was a school teacher for about 11 years. So, I definitely have lots of experience working with different states and their standards and different grade levels. And then I kind of just naturally flowed into this career here, and have been with News-O-Matic for over three years, and I just love what we do, and we do a lot. It's been great, and so thank you for having me today.

Rich Portelance

Well, thank you, and having that educational background really helps in this field, and we're excited to have that perspective. So, thanks for joining us. And last but certainly not least is Heather Talbot from here at EdGate. Heather?

Heather Talbot

Thanks, Rich. My name is Heather. I've been with EdGate for over 20 years now. Starting in client support, where I first began working in supporting our clients with some other teacher-facing products. Over the years with EdGate, I've worked in several different positions within the company. I feel they've all contributed to significant growth in my career, which is now where I'm at in the business development side of things, helping to grow our partnerships.

Rich Portelance

Outstanding. So, that's a great perspective and a different perspective than we've had here on the webinar before, because you're interacting with lots of different clients at different levels and sizes. So we look forward to, you know, hearing more about how you see the market changing, Heather, and thanks for taking the time.

Heather Talbot

Yep. Thank you.

Discussion

Rich Portelance

So, I'm going to start off with a question for Ashli. What I want to ask is about standards tracking, including CTE standards. Can you tell the audience about the process that Edmentum deploys, and what the major challenges are for you guys?

Ashli Denton

Absolutely. So I have been involved in standards tracking for a long time at different companies, and I've seen it done in different ways. The last company I was working with several years back, they had a large group of contractors that monitored all of the different states and all of the different standards, so we are quite a small team.

Right now, I have two alignment specialists on my team, so it's just the three of us. And so, figuring out how we were going to monitor 50 states, as well as CTE, which I'll get into in a second, it's just, you probably already know, a whole other system of standards to deal with. We had to come up with some way to manage this with our small team. So, some of the great people I get to work with, my team is amazing, they came up with a standards tracker that we sort of fleshed out together.

What information do we want on this tracker so that this can be a tracker that people can come to and get the most live, important, pertinent information about standards. So we track these standards through automated alerts. We use a system called Distill that we set up on all the different state standards websites that alert us to what's going on in the world of standards. We have basically a very well-oiled machine worked out now for weekly assignments that contractors work on. Really, it's one contractor in particular that handles all of the subjects besides CTE. And those are monitored based on their importance to the company, and then also monitored so certain sets are only reviewed quarterly, and certain sets are reviewed much more often. And then CTE in the last several months, our company has deployed, you know, all of these new CTE products. And so, as we had been trying to keep up with CTE standards, we found that keeping CTE on the standards tracker for all of the different subjects wasn't really working.

So, you know, one of the challenges is just the sheer volume and variability of standards across states for CTE, especially with the frequency of updates that occur with CTE. I talked about this a little bit on the podcast with you, but sometimes something like culinary art gets updated this month, and another subject like agriculture might get updated next month, and so keeping up with all of that with just one row for CTE for a state wasn't working. So we recently deployed a CTE-only standards tracker where we have a separate contractor who is completely and solely devoted to keeping up with what is happening with CTE across the country. So, this tracker is broken down into pathways and clusters, and we keep up with what's changing when and try to keep it as alive as possible.

Both of these trackers feed into a dashboard that can be used across the company. You can click on a state, a subject, or you can click on all the different ways to look at the standards. You can click on when standards are going to be implemented, and find out what's happening in the world of standards for that state. So, it is a daily ongoing process for us to track standards. It's a part of our job. A fraction of every day needs to be devoted to tracking standards.

Rich Portelance

It's certainly a herculean task. So, thank you for that description because it was really helpful to hear how you're breaking it out. And you know, I think the number of standards that we have in our database is over six million. I think there's older standards too, but most of those are CTE. CTE standards tend to just flourish like wild flowers in the spring. So, I appreciate that you know the level of detail of the information that you provided.

Melissa, you guys have a unique company in the sense that you're a news-based organization. Can you describe to the audience what News-O-Matic is doing on a daily basis, and where some of the most critical challenges are in that process?

Melissa Quinn

Sure. So, every day, News-O-Matic publishes five news articles, specifically written for students in grades K through eight. And then each article is available at the five different reading levels and in five, which is actually soon to be six, different languages. And so, we have a team of writers and editors, translators, and educators. We work together every day to simplify these like really complex topics for students in a way that's both engaging and educational. So, really making news accessible for those younger viewers and readers.

Every article includes multimedia comprehension questions, teacher-student guides, and readalouds. Our editorial team works on sourcing their own images and videos, and all of our content is vetted by a child psychologist. So, teachers don't have to worry about students viewing unwanted content. And then we also align all our articles every day to every state-specific standards, and ELA (English Language Arts), science, social studies, and then some states have SEL (Social Emotional Learning) standards. So, we do those as well. And then we also align all of our articles to the common core, the NCSS C3 (National Council for the Social Studies College, Career, and Civic Life) framework and then the NGSS (Next Generation Science Standards) standards as well.

And so we work hard to organize, you know, our growing collection of articles. So that's what you're seeing here, is like, our units that we have to help teachers find the content they need, because we just house it all in our web app, and we have over 15,000 articles because we've been around for over 10 years now. And so, we're constantly improving features, you know, improving our search feature, our assignment feature, and custom units. But, like, ultimately, I think one of the biggest challenges is really just accomplishing everything every day in a very short amount of time with a very small team, and it's the everyday thing. Five articles a day, five days a week, 52 weeks a year. We don't take summers off or anything like that. So, because students can access our platform at home, they'll, you know, they're able to read over the summer. You know, we try to prevent that summer slide, I guess, as best as possible. So that's pretty much what we do in a nutshell.

Rich Portelance

Well, that's really helpful. So, you know, having live news articles every single day, having those aligned, and then adopted at a number of different states, and you're in 30 plus states, is that correct?

Melissa Quinn

Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah.

Rich Portelance

So, you know, that's five times 30 when you're talking about alignment. So, that's a tremendous amount of work that wouldn't be possible without using some technology in order to accomplish it, right?

Melissa Quinn

Absolutely.

Rich Portelance

And I think I was remiss in saying to the audience, we're going to send around a slide deck after the presentation. So, the slide that came up, there are some other slides that we will share with the audience. We also have some other special items that we'll send along. And I've seen a couple of questions come in. If you do have a question, please throw it in the Q&A, and we'll try to get to it as soon as we can. Either we'll answer it live or respond within the chat. And if we want to respond live, we'll probably save it till the end if we have some time. And if we can't get to it on the webinar, we will answer your questions. All questions will be answered afterwards if they are not answered live.

Okay, so over to Heather. You're bringing a unique perspective as you work with both Edmentum and News-O-Matic on a weekly basis, and then with many other clients in the industry. Can you address one or two of the consistently asked things that you were seeing bubble up, and how EdGate is addressing them?

Heather Talbot

Absolutely. Two things really surface for our clients right now. Standards comparison is probably the hottest topic. Third-party reviews come up also. But standards comparison, I'll talk a little bit more in depth because that is the one thing that we're really seeing that is being asked a lot right now. It's just being able to look at the states side-by-side and see where those standards are the same. How EdGate has been able to address this is being able to provide a report that will give that side-by-side comparison. This report uses both our standards library accompanied with our taxonomies. So, in order to pull those standards into a report where they can see where standards are teaching the same concepts across states. And so just being able to provide the ability for publishers to compare standards, it gives them some valuable insight into standards coverage, content gaps, as well as helping to inform them during the creation of new content to ensure that it meets the requirements across multiple states.

Rich Portelance

Thank you. Awesome answer and insightful of what's being asked today, you know, and that's why those standards comparisons are really important. As states get more and more unique in what their requirements are and making sure everything is met, so you can be adopted.

I want to remind everybody of the YouTube channel for EdGate, where all the podcasts are. Each of these panelists was interviewed previously, and it's @EdGateLLC on YouTube. So you can check out those podcast interviews, and they're terrific, lots of good information there.

Let's go over to Ashli. Recently, there was an article in EdWeek that Gina Faulk, here, the general manager at EdGate, talked about standards alignment and, more specifically, about AI. Can you talk about Edenum's view on the use of AI and alignments, and how you are all solving for these alignments?

Ashli Denton

Absolutely. So, AI is a hot topic right now. And how you're how your company's going to utilize this new artificial intelligence to get work done quicker, faster, and scale the amount of work you can do, and see how efficient AI really is. So, our team specifically, we actually all three read the article by Gina, and we were all just like, "Oh my goodness, this is exactly how our team feels with the use of AI". And that is that it's a powerful tool.

And our company, in particular, we are using AI right now. We've been piloting some AI-driven tools. These tools, right now that we're using, are internally created by our content engineering team. And these the tool that we're currently piloting is helping us with surfacing alignment gaps, it's helping us do mappings, and it's flagging inconsistencies. It's a beginning step. However, Edmentum has this policy that the human stays in the loop with AI-generated work. And so our approach in leveraging AI for efficiency and scale is that, one, we maintain transparency. So, all of our alignment reports in which the AI has been used, we call predictive reports; those are labeled at the top of the reports to give transparency to the customers. However, even those predictive reports have a validation effort by a human. It's a succinct review. It is not a full alignment review. It's not the level of alignments that you would achieve by a human doing the hand alignments themselves. Our direct alignments, however, your company chooses to align documents.

However, we are careful to validate these AI outputs. One of the things that Gina said in her article is exactly what we're finding too: that AI, while it's helpful, is just an imperfect tool at this point. It may grow in years to come, we need it to learn more from itself, and so right now we have data that comes out of it where alignments are missing, that a human would have said, "Oh, no, this absolutely is misaligned". And then alignments are included that are not helpful to the client. They're going to lead them down a rabbit hole. And so, those are the egregious errors that we tried to remove from any alignment reports before sending those out for customers to review.

Rich Portelance

Excellent. Thank you. And I want to address there was a question that came in. Heather, if you could answer this, does the ExACT tool provide the ability to do the standards comparison between two or more states?

Heather Talbot

Yes, the answer to that is yes, it absolutely does.

Rich Portelance

Thank you. Okay.

So, let we're going to jump over to Melissa. Continuously feeding news in real-time that is both age-appropriate and grade-level appropriate is a huge challenge. But you also need to take a look at the Lexile levels and meet the academic standards of each state that you are deployed in. Can you tell us about the technologies that News-O-Matic is leveraging to streamline your internal processes?

Melissa Quinn

Sure. Absolutely. So, differentiation is really key in education. So, it's very important to meet the needs of all your learners, and for us, those learners aren't just in the US. We have readers in Turkey and Canada, as well as other parts of Europe and Asia. And then, we recently expanded our reading levels from three to five to really meet the growing demand for these high-quality instructional materials that districts are looking for. And we're currently using MetaMetrics to help ensure that our content is at the right readability for all users.

And then another challenge, since you mentioned challenges earlier for us, is really making sure that our content is aligned to every state's specific academic standards for those four subject areas that we work with. So that would not be possible at all without the help of EdGate’s ExACT tool. So, aligning our content to each state's unique standards has been like really like the technology has been really helpful for us. And then, like, the best part is when the state standards change, which kind of Ashli had mentioned, they're constantly changing and evolving. It feels like every four years, they pick a different subject area. But EdGate keeps us in the loop on that. So, when they change the way… we can go into the next question that I had, but the way we correlate and align our articles, everything's just like a seamless transition from one standard type to the next, however many times they change. Our users would see in our dashboard that it has also changed and is automatically updated, and so I love that. That would not be possible without the use of technology like that. That would be a huge, monumental task for anybody to take on.

Rich Portelance

Thank you for that. And a question came out of your answer, and Heather, I'll throw this to you. Are the current alignments in ExACT using AI right now, or are you still using your original algorithms?

Heather Talbot

So, ExACT, we have also been working on incorporating some AI. We're still in the process of doing that because, as Ashli has mentioned, there are still some faults to it. It doesn't work perfectly, so we're currently in the process of looking into that. We're still leveraging the taxonomy, which is our proprietary taxonomies. That's like the magic sauce to our system to help our clients correlate their content. But in short, we're looking into it and trying to figure out how we can integrate it.

Rich Portelance

I appreciate that. So, there's a lot of process that's going on at News-O-Matic, making sure that those articles are being adopted using ExACT and using some of those comparison tools. And, Heather, I really appreciate you giving us some description of how ExACT is processing those.

Ashli more with less is a theme that will resonate with our audience. Everybody who is on this webinar, I'm certain, has some need to, you know, distill and do more with less. Clearly, if you could have 100 SMEs (Subject Matter Experts) at your fingertips, you could solve most every problem. But that's not a reality. As the demands from each day increase while you are simultaneously asked to do more with less, how do you and your team respond?

Ashli Denton

That's a great question. I think that's really the key question, like you said, that a lot of companies are just trying to respond to. Our team was actually double the size, you know, a couple of years ago. And with a company shift, we moved our platform, separated into courses, careers, and assessments. So our team was kind of split down the middle, and some of the alignment team went over to the other side to the assessment side, and we stayed on the courses side.

And so, balancing precision and speed is really our constant tension. especially as state standards update on different timelines. We're focused on process optimization. We have to be focused on process optimization with a smaller team. We are daily leveraging technology to try to automate our routine tasks. We work with our content engineering team, and they are very open to hearing our woes and trying to help us break those down into tasks that can be helped by technology.

Another huge, important thing is just open communication and clear priorities with our product management team. Our team has to stay focused. And so we get requests from every single area of the company. We get requests from product management, we get requests from the sales field, and so determining what we are going to do first and in what order is just a daily prioritization conversation that has to happen. So ultimately, we're very transparent with the requests that come in. We advocate for needed resources, and we do our best to celebrate the wins because you have to keep morale high when you are doing more with less. I think that our team has bonded quite closely in the fact that we've had to do more with less.

Rich Portelance

I think that's a great theme. I'm going to ask Melissa, you know, the correlations for your team is an everyday process, as we talked about, as you're getting those news articles coming in. Can you describe how your team leverages ExACT and where you find human intervention is more effective?

Melissa Quinn

Sure. So, every day we have all these articles, all five articles uploaded into ExACT's dashboard and then tagged with their concepts. Well, humans are tagging them with the concepts. But there are many different ways a correlator can accomplish this. I found the most effective method might just be even searching by a specific keyword or even just browsing by a subtopic in a subject area. You get pretty familiar pretty quick about where all the concepts are… not hiding, but where they all are. So the best part of ExACT is that we have the ability to adjust the correlations as needed. So, even though it's like… You know, we're tagging concepts and then all the technology behind the scenes that happens, and now these articles are aligned to the standards, so we can go in and adjust as needed.

So, sometimes the topics are broad. For example, Maryland state history was a concept, although I feel like we did change this, but it was just a very overarching concept; there are quite a few history standards that were associated with that one tagged concept. But, it didn't necessarily fit wasn't like the right fit for the article. So, we can go in and hide the article from specific standards, which I really like. So yes, technology is great, but then having a human component of being able to go in and oversee, finalize, change, and adjust, I think is necessary because I can't imagine how long it would take a single person to align five articles to each state's standards and all four subject areas five days a week. I just think it would be impossible. We would never be able to do that. So that's where that technology plays a really big role in our daily alignment process. What would probably take hours and hours and hours takes me, like, 30 minutes or so, just to align all five of our articles. And then we have it synced to our system. So, twice a day, the articles are automatically synced. So, teachers are able to view those correlations pretty quickly. And then even if I forget to do a correlation, maybe at night, and I have to quickly do it in the morning, I can manually sync as well with our system and EdGate’s, and it's working really well for us right now.

Rich Portelance

So, I'm going to pick on Heather next, because I think both you and Ashli were talking about some of the roles that technology is playing, and Heather, I want to back up and talk about the role that adoptions, you know, how technology is assisting those, and there's been some questions coming into the chat.

When you look at when we first developed ExACT to address two main things, right? Standards alignments and reporting on correlation data. Since then, the capabilities of ExACT have changed significantly. So, now that the audience has heard a little bit about how it's being used, can you provide a glimpse of the future, the changes that have been made, and you know what we can expect from ExACT going forward?

Heather Talbot

Well, yeah, that's an excellent question. ExACT has really expanded quite significantly over the years. It was initially created a while back as a DIY option, and more and more of our clients have made the decision that the DIY option is the best option for them. And so in many cases, we've oftentimes done an initial correlation. Our subject matter experts do the correlation for our clients, and then we've converted them over to ExACT DIY. And after some initial training, it can be overwhelming at first if you're used to doing it one specific way. And so with some initial training, they really start to realize how much easier this will make their life. And when Melissa was mentioning trying to align, you know, five articles across four subjects across 30 states every single day, that is a very tedious task if you're having to do that manually. So, we've really continued to leverage the interest and expand the tools and conveniences within ExACT. It's our clients, actually, that have really helped us to pinpoint their alignment needs specifically so that we can build upon ExACT.

Some specific examples of this expansion work recently, there are multiple approaches to aligning content to standards, including the feature that Melissa mentioned, where if there are standards that get pulled in because that concept is being taught, but there's other concepts also being taught, but you don't want to see that you can hide that standard from showing in that alignment report. So, you can really get more targeted.

The comparison of the standards side by side across the states is a new feature that we've added. It used to be that, because we had all the standards in our database, we could create those kinds of reports for our clients, but it was never accessible. The power was never in their hands. And so, now that power is in their hands. They can quickly go into ExACT, select a few states that they want to compare side by side, and generate a report within minutes. There are new ways of managing and organizing content data and metadata, there are new reporting options that have been included, as well as the ability to just download a standards file out of ExACT. It used to also be that the EdGate team would have to do that work for our clients. And so the things that they've come and asked EdGate for specifically, we've really tried to figure out how can we put this in ExACT so that they instead of having to, you know, go through the chain of command and get connect with their project manager to get these things, how can they just quickly go in and access, you know, what we have and just get whatever it is that they need?

Rich Portelance

Standards authoring and taxonomy, too, correct?

Heather Talbot

Yes. So, standards authoring is one of the features that we're still working on, but it is majority of the way done, and is now available in ExACT. You can create... some of our clients actually create their own standards, and so for our publishing clients that do that work, they can author, edit, and share across team members. It lives within ExACT, so instead of having to like pass around a Word document or a Google file, you can manage all of that within the standards authoring tool in ExACT. And then the… what was the other one that you said?

Rich Portelance

Authoring of taxonomies.

Heather Talbot

Oh, yes. Yeah. Yep. Absolutely. So, all of that is on our future roadmap, but the bulk of the work is done. It's just fine-tuning it. You know, as our clients are using these tools, of course, we want to make it work how they need it to work. And so, there's some, you know, pivoting that needs to be done. But yeah, and whatever other feedback that our clients have, we also take that into consideration when we have our meetings about what the future of ExACT looks like.

Rich Portelance

So, as you know, we kind of look at, you know, you're gathering feedback, and I'm curious about smaller ed tech companies, how they react to the changes, and keep pace, because really, you know, a big company like Edmentum, we hear Ashli talking about having a small team, but you have some contractors and you're putting together systems. Heather, what are you hearing, you know, from the smaller companies, and how are they able to keep pace? What are they doing to stay up to date with all these changes and the decentralization?

Heather Talbot

Yeah, absolutely. Smaller companies oftentimes have smaller teams, and so they need a more efficient way of being able to keep up with that endless cycle of standards changing. Oftentimes, in conversations, it's expressed that this work of keeping up is more reactive. A client expresses a need that they have a state adoption is released, and they need to pivot, and that pivot usually needs to happen relatively quickly. So using a tool like ExACT can provide a space where this work can be more proactive. All of the standards are located inside ExACT. Publishers are able to access all of the current standards in that centralized location, and then they can also create an alignment to the standards ahead of adoption cycles, as well as easily identify gaps in curriculum for any given state, so they can plan out future curricula as well.

Rich Portelance

Thank you for that. I appreciate it. I'm going to cut over to Melissa, and I want to talk about, you know, we're talking about smaller companies that are being nimble. What advice would you provide to a startup company in this space regarding streamlining the alignment process in order to gain market share?

Melissa Quinn

I mean, ultimately, I would recommend working with a company such as EdGate to assist with those alignments, especially if you are doing multiple subjects, grade levels, and states. I know when we first started the alignment in 2022, maybe something like that, we realized that we can't do this on our own or just with one person. And so we had to look into something. So, we met with EdGate, and we talked about all of our possibilities, and so we went with, like, okay, well, we can do some of it ourselves, which is why we went with the ExACT tool. So, just really leveraging, you know, your proprietary technology has really been just a huge game changer for us since we are a pretty small team, and it has allowed us to stay up-to-date with those ever-evolving state standards. So yeah, I definitely recommend finding a good partner.

Rich Portelance

Good partners are important, and that's why everybody's here today. We found that, you know, working together is the best way to do this, and I know EdGate has been doing this for 27 years, and getting the feedback from folks like yourselves is absolutely critical.

Ashli, early in your career, you were introduced to the world of curricular alignments, pre-Common Core. Some may say that history repeats itself, and here we are just 20 years later, having moved to a centralized standard system and just as quickly moved away from it. From your vantage point, how has technology played a role in helping with those transitions, and how has the tech changed as well?

Ashli Denton

Yeah, we talked about this a little bit on our podcast, and I found this super interesting, just in how early in my career, alignment work was manual. It was spreadsheet-driven, it had a lot of cross-referencing, and then of course it had a lot of human error. The ability for human error to be added in as humans were just working with spreadsheets, and emailing them back and forth with alignment in them. So, as technology has advanced, we've moved to centralized databases and standard repositories, which have made tracking and updating far more efficient than where we used to be years ago. I think the challenge of the technology taking over and becoming a big shift in our current culture of content development and standards tracking, is just the need for quality. And back in the spreadsheet days, even though there was probably human error and how things might have been pasted in the wrong cell, the alignments were highly interpreted by experts, and they were likely much better than some of the things that are coming out of technology today.

So, I think another big shift from the use of technology is that we're getting better at this at our company, but Heather just alluded to it, which is moving from being reactive and manual processes to being proactive and data-driven decision-making. So, technology hasn't just sped up things; it's made alignment more transparent and more scalable for us. It's allowing us, I say allowing, because we are currently going through the growing pains of being a more proactive team in getting out alignment reports, getting alignment information to our product management teams way ahead of the game, so that they can make decisions for what content decisions they need to make.

If you don't mind, I could take a stab at this question that was in the chat, and someone else can please jump in too. But I was reading about how national curriculum providers might need to pivot as standards have changed from this national set. This kind of flows into what we were just talking about, how things have changed. I remember when, you know, I spoke about it on the podcast, but how when Common Core first came around, you know, there were mentions of it several years before it came around, and at the time we were all doing only state standards, and we thought that will never happen, and then it happened, and we've now moved kind of away from a national set of standards.

So, I think we, as a company that serves a lot of different states with content, being a national provider in a lot of ways, decisions have to be made to make things customizable by state. So, that's what I would say for national providers, is they've got to be able to provide customization with their content so that districts, state-level decision makers can move things around as they need to to make things fit for their state, and maybe have activities that they can add in and move around and just build the course. And people who can help them do that, because a lot of people, a lot of companies, and a lot of state decision makers need that extra help just reorganizing a course so that it works for their state. But I think that's the way that you stay in the game is make things customizable, and you make customers, you know, very valuable in getting them the things that they need to provide the best experience possible for their learners.

Rich Portelance

You know, I want to point out and thank you for answering that question, and I appreciate the question coming in. If you go to the EdGate website under the standards section of the site, there is a comparison chart, and this is a free resource. It's really helpful. So, when we talk about, you know, this change over from Common Core to a decentralized standard system… Oh, thank you. There it is. So, you can compare every state individually. You can break it down, and you can kind of get a sense of, you know, if you're going to Nebraska, how close it is to the language arts common core and what tweaks you may need to make to your content. So, you'll have a sense of those comparisons of the standard. So, it's a free resource that you can look at and utilize. We encourage you to do so and provide some feedback to us if you want to see something else. We love to, you know, be the standards experts and help out people, and if you see something or think of something, please let us know.

I want to talk to Heather because I want to kind of look at that, and how we started at ExACT, and I think it's worth looking at that history, and how the ExACT tool came about. If you can talk about it, I think it relates to what Ashli just spoke about, and this decentralization.

Heather Talbot

Absolutely. I can speak to that. Thanks, Rich. The spine of our system, both behind ExACT and then, is also applicable to all of our standards, which are our taxonomies. These taxonomies are developed through the process of our subject matter experts studying the standards from each state and identifying the concepts that are rooted within the standards. And oftentimes, there can be multiple concepts being addressed in a single standard. So, through this process, we're also able to identify where there's commonality across the standards. And if we're able to connect these concepts between content to standards, and standards to standards, especially across multiple states, then the correlation process could be more efficient in time and cost. And that's part of what makes EXACT both unique and powerful.

Additionally, because of that connection of content to standards via the taxonomy, whenever the standards change, and they're updated in our database, the content correlations are updated as well, keeping them current in real time. So, anytime standards are changing, we have a team that specifically is monitoring the standards changes, and making sure that we ingest them into our system, as well as being able to provide access to future sets. So we also work with standards that are adopted, but not yet implemented, up to 2 years in advance. The only standards that we typically tend to stay away from are the ones that are not fully adopted, because they change often, even in draft form. The draft forms can change several times before they're actually fully adopted.

Rich Portelance

There we go. Thank you. So, Melissa, let's talk about the pressures and demands you see that states are placing on publishers, and what are some of the ways you and your team meet those pressures by leveraging technology?

Melissa Quinn

Sure. I've already noticed some states have implemented stricter guidelines or have increased the rigor for adopting their digital curricula. I've also noticed states seem to want, I think this was mentioned before, more personalized content platforms, really customized to fit the needs of their students, and that varies widely across the country. Our products are actually quite perfect for all those districts because we do offer that engaging content, which is produced daily, and it's available in our safe and secure database. So, with our, you know, within our digital platform, students have the ability to read in different languages, because we get that a lot. We find that teachers are always looking for just really high-quality materials in different languages. We have a Spanish immersion as well. With just a little click of a button, you can have the entire site turn into your Spanish version.

And then our whole platform helps support every school's unique curricula in all those subject areas. Unlike other curricula, we are very dynamic. So, we are constantly changing brand new content every day, like something that you maybe a basal reader couldn't do because that's published, you know, and here once you once you publish it, that's it. So, I like that we use the technology that we are able to constantly change and evolve.

And then we also started leveraging other things, like our active learning slides is new. So teachers can display content on smartboards or Promethean boards. So, they don't have to have a one-to-one, especially in those younger grades. So now with these downloadable and customizable PowerPoints and Google Slides, it just gives more options for teachers to leverage our content.

And then we also have, well, basically keeping up with the demand of these districts can be challenging. But then we offer custom units, so educators can pick and choose different articles they want in one unit, and then push that out to just their own district. I did an entire custom unit for New York City that went along with their actual curriculum, which they were using, and so just to fill in the gaps. So, we have that ability to customize, and then we also have we have the data tracking as well. We were asked to do that. So, we've been constantly improving our data tracking. I know someone mentioned earlier, like we used to have to do it ourselves and print the data and send it off to our customers, but now they can go online and do that themselves. So, that's kind of just a few ways where we're helping to keep up with the demand and hopefully exceed expectations.

Rich Portelance

I really appreciate that. And I just want to remind everybody that on September 11th, we'll have the next webinar in our series. So, please keep an eye out for that. We will send around slides that support some of the things that we talked about today. So, that will come. I think there's an infographic that we're going to send out as well. And if you have any more questions, please put them in the chat.

I'm going to ask one more question for everybody, and then I think we're going to wrap it up. One of my favorite questions, I was talking to Ashli on our podcast about it, so I'm gonna repeat that. You said to me that if transparency matters, understanding alignments, and the gaps that exist in content from state-to-state adoptions. If you could wave a magic wand, what would you wish for in order to improve existing processes?

Ashli Denton

That's a great question. I might answer it a little bit differently than I did on the podcast, but I think that… you would think I might say that I wish that AI would come to the place where when we ran a set of standards against content, it would come out perfectly. I think that's a grandiose wish to get to that place where AI is able to do that.

But I think what my current wish would be just in the current moment, you know, we're doing day-by-day. So my current wish, you know, if I could wave a magic wand today in the situation that we're in, would be for there to be a better understanding that alignment expertise is valuable and it produces really quality alignments. You might have to wait a little bit longer than what could be produced by technology. I think technology and humans can work together beautifully to produce great alignment reports. But, this desire to go faster, faster, faster, faster, and faster in today's time would be something I would like to speak up and say, “Hey, if you can just understand that humans are going to provide a great enhancement to technology, and that the quality of what's going to come out of the reports you receive are well worth the short wait beyond just a computer spitting something out”.

Rich Portelance

Thank you. I appreciate the answer.

I'm going to put Melissa on the spot a little bit. Do you have a magic wand? If you had some piece of technology or something you could see or have that would improve the efficiency of your team, what would it be?

Melissa Quinn

My goodness. I mean, our team's we have to be pretty efficient at this point because we do a lot, and we have a very, very small team. I know from our editorial team's standpoint, I think just in general, making things a little bit easier in our back office, I would say.

We have an older system, and you know, as technology evolves, we have to implement some of the new technology into our older technology, and it's challenging at times. Our developers are fabulous. They're great at what they do, and I just know what's on their plate, and I always apologize. I'm like, “I know this is going to be more than what you can handle right now, but I would really love it if you could do this for me”. So, I think that just improving some of those back-office things would be great for us.

Rich Portelance

I think that's an amazing point that you made, because I think for everybody, if you're involved in technology and you're involved in processes, being able to wave a magic wand and say, “Oh, this fix is done”, or, you know, “This update that I need to the system so I can get to the next thing is done”. As great as developers are, they have priority lists, they try to go through, and they're trying to knock it off, and boy, if I could jump to the front of the line today to get this done to my customer, it'd be great, right?,

So, Heather, I want to ask you about the idea of AutoAlign, and where you see it helping companies the most, and what do you see as best practices today, because that's an important function, right?

Heather Talbot

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. AutoAlign is a tool that's in ExACT that can be used to import content metadata, and the tool will actually suggest concepts from our taxonomy that are relevant to the content. So, the client would import the lesson metadata. When I say metadata, I mean the title, grade, subject, topics, keywords, descriptions, and anything that is about that lesson. And the more specific the better, of course. And then the AutoAlign feature suggests concepts using that metadata as its guide. The client then has the ultimate say, though, because the client reviews the suggested concepts and adds only the ones that they feel are applicable and relevant to their content. And then in turn, the content aligns to any of the standards in ExACT that share those concepts. The benefit, of course, is that this process quickly gets a list of relevant concepts without first and foremost having extensive knowledge of our taxonomies. And then second of all, without having to search the taxonomy for the best concepts.

Interestingly enough, we actually have a client right now who is not experienced with standards and alignments. And so they're actually using the AutoAlign tool to help train themselves on how to do those standards alignments in general.

Rich Portelance

Well, that's a great use of technology right there, to understand how to do this and get better at it.

Closing Thoughts

Rich Portelance

Well, I want to thank our panelists today. Everybody's email will be linked in the PowerPoint presentation that we'll send out to the audience. If you have a question for one of the panelists, I'm sure they would be happy to answer. So, thank you very much, Ashli Denton, Melissa Quinn, and Heather Talbot. I appreciate your time today, and I hope everybody has a great day