2022 EdWeek Market Brief Summit: Event Recap

Each year, Education Week brings together education companies, journalists, researchers, and district-level leaders to discuss best practices in sales and marketing in the K-12 space during the EdWeek Market Brief Summit. The last two years have been hosted virtually, so our Ed2Market team was excited to get back on the road and travel to Dallas for this year’s event.

We were so grateful to see some of our current clients and partners on site, and we were able to catch up with new and old friends alike. The agenda was jam-packed with research sessions, district leader panels, and networking events during the two days, giving us tons of insight into the biggest trends and needs in K-12 classrooms today.

Here are our two biggest lessons learned from the event:

School Districts Need Vendors to Deliver

When it comes to educational products and services, there is no shortage of options for school and district leaders, so leaders look for the vendors that can be true partners throughout and after the sale. During the summit, multiple district leaders discussed the vendor role being a critical part of implementation success.

In addition, district-level decision makers were putting ownership on vendors to deliver when it comes to efficacy, stakeholder communication, engagement, and customization.

For example, district leaders want to see use cases, testimonials, referrals, and success stories for new products or services, but sometimes this isn’t even enough. Many leaders value pilot opportunities so they can see how your solution fits their specific needs and works within their existing systems before they can make purchasing decisions. They want vendors to tailor products to their district’s goals and to be transparent when customization is not doable. During one panel, Dawn Walker, Chief of Human Capital Management in Dallas ISD said that while hearing about how a product has worked elsewhere is great, she wants classroom pilots to prove that “it works in Dallas” before investing dollars into any new initiative.

When it comes to any content that can be deemed controversial like Critical Race Theory, Social-Emotional Learning, Sex Education, etc., leaders want support from vendors on language they can use with parents and community members to discuss the content. They need vendors’ help to get ahead of these political situations that are issues they deal with on a regular basis.

Lastly, engagement is a key priority for leaders. They want products that not only work, but are engaging for students and teachers, increasing the likelihood of use in classrooms.

Leaders Have Big Problems that Don’t Always Include Finding New Products or Services

While many of us grapple with how to increase product knowledge and how to book sales demos with leaders, the reality is that district and school leaders struggle with other pressing priorities that they’d like vendors to be aware of.

For example, teacher shortages remain a huge concern for education leaders, specifically recruiting and retaining high-quality educators. The lack of teachers makes time a huge issue for leaders and many leaders find themselves filling in for classroom teachers, lunch duty, and more. We heard a lot of backlash on the trend of education companies recruiting current teachers–a trend that leaders don’t appreciate.

Cybersecurity and data privacy for students are key concerns for leaders, and if your product is digital, you must be able to discuss security and safety. Trust is critical when it comes to student data and privacy measures, and schools don’t take this lightly.

Time is a real issue and leaders can’t put “one more thing” on the plates of their teachers. They’re looking for professional development solutions that are short snippets of usable content that can be easily shared. In fact, Education Week released survey data that showed the trend of content moving online and PD was at the top of the list.

Lastly, leaders want vendors to focus on meeting students where they are now. We know learning loss is a key topic, but leaders don’t have time to play catch up and they want you to focus on keeping kids on grade level by focusing on learning acceleration, not remediation. Leaders want to know how your products enhance on-grade level learning with additional supports in place to address learning gaps.

The event was a great mix of content and we hope some of these key takeaways will help you as you think of your 2023 marketing plans.