So I went to a session on ed-tech this morning and it was a panel discussion. It was really interesting hearing from speakers from Knewton, Microsfot, Quizlet, and Google talk about how ed-tech is evolving rapidly. I couldn’t believe how many people work in this industry creating software for students. It seems like one of the most interesting challenges is that no matter how hard developers try to anticipate the needs of the users teachers are just inherently creative. When Google created a virtual field trip in Expedition for students to tour the Great Wall of China in VR, a teacher turned it into a math problem to calculate the number of bricks in the Great Wall. What a terrific problem to have as a developer!!!! Clever users. Apparently kids make great test users because they have no preconceived ideas about how something is supposed to work and they are also un-censored in their feedback. I thought this was an amazing session not only about ed-tech but about how users drive content and about dedicated educators shaping the future.
I followed that up with a session on Trans Issues in the Workforce and that was pretty awful. Great content just brought me to tears because its so so sad how much I feel my own experience here. I’m gender non-conforming meaning I am a woman and I wear men’s clothes. Have since I was a young. I have really short hair. That causes me endless amounts of problems because people don’t know what to do with me and I got to hang out with a room of people that share my pain and my skills. In the midwest there are not alot of us. This was like soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo good. I am not an emotional person, but this actually welled me up. They know the pain of what its like to have people avoid eye contact with you, have people use pronouns interchangably on e-mails and documents they send you. Avoid using the bathroom with you or even outright get security if they think you are in the wrong one. (Really happened.) Much less try to go on job interviews etc… Really happy I attended this one.
Followed that up by chatting with the Women at ABI Local who hold ABI events throughout the country. Closest one to St. Louis is Chicago where they host mini-one day Grace Hopper Cons. The Local Chapters sound like an excellent way to continue pushing the movement forward. Maybe we can have one in the Lou someday.