Recent Posts
At their annual Worldwide Developers Conference on June 7th this year, Apple announced a new policy on email privacy. According to Apple, their Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) “hides your IP address, so senders can’t link it to your other online activity or determine your location. And it prevents senders from seeing if and when Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Dr. Shawn Smith, Chief Innovation Officer, McGraw Hill I’ve written previously in this publication on the role of EdTech providers in a post-pandemic landscape – on embracing flexible learning models, leveraging adaptive technology, and driving with student data. Today, I want to explore the role of social and emotional learning (SEL) in that same complex landscape of K-12 education. Even in Read More »
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Every November, Merriam-Webster picks the “word of the year.” For 2020, it was “pandemic.” (Go figure!) While it is still a bit early for the 2021 word to be announced, it might well be “disruption.” And among the things that have been most disrupted over the past year or more is the way that we Read More »
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MDR Insights There are 95,478 public schools in America, serving over 49 million public school students. Let’s look at the different school district sizes and what types of businesses match their needs. At MDR, we consider a district large if it enrolls over 10,000 students. A medium district enrolls 2,500 to 9,999 students, and a Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Dylan Arena, VP, Learning Science, McGraw Hill School Group I’ve been fascinated by both learning and playing for my whole life, but it wasn’t until graduate school that I fully appreciated how related they are. Now I love to remind people that play is the most powerful adaptation for learning in the Read More »
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We’re all familiar with Teacher Appreciation Week. Considering everything teachers are dealing with right now–return to in-person instruction, keeping kids safe, helping students catch up, and controversies about curriculum—we’d like to make a suggestion… Let’s make every day Teacher Appreciation Day. Here’s why: whatever expectations you may have in a typical year for teacher time? Read More »
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The U.S. Department of Education recently approved 21 state plans for use of their American Rescue Plan Elementary and Secondary Emergency Relief (ARP ESSER) funds. These states join 11 others and Washington, D.C. whose plans were approved earlier this year. The plans detail how each state is using and plans to use ARP ESSER funds Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Lisa Wolfe While back-to-school 2021 may have been more uncertain than we had previously hoped, one thing that hasn’t been uncertain this year is growth, acquisition, and investment in the education market. We previously provided you with updates on top news from the first and second quarters of 2021. At the end Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Dr. Shawn Smith, Chief Innovation Officer, McGraw Hill School Group We’re in a transitional moment in K-12 education. As an institution, education has always had an incremental relationship with change. But within that relatively static institution, individuals – teachers, students, principals – have been making their own changes at the scale of their classrooms, schools, and learning communities. Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Erin Werra, Skyward Behind just about every public school district is an elected school board. Here are a few considerations to cultivate harmony. It takes a village to run a public school district. Harmony is the goal, but in turbulent times like these, tension arises quickly. As communities navigate changes and challenges, defining Read More »
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Educators couldn’t miss the headlines about the additional $122 billion allocated for ESSER in the American Rescue Plan (ARP), signed into law in March. But there was another boon for education in the ARP that you may not have heard about: the Emergency Connectivity Fund (ECF). Administered through the Universal Service Administrative Company of the FCC, Read More »
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States and school districts around the country are seeing the influx of American Rescue Plan Elementary and Secondary Emergency Relief (ARP ESSER) funds. The U.S. Department of Education recently approved plans from 11 states and Washington, D.C. for using the funds to safely reopen and sustain the operation of schools, and address the needs of Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Lisa Wolfe Parents have always been involved in school and their children’s education. They’ve gone to PTA/PTO meetings, participated in parent-teacher conferences, volunteered in the classroom and, of course, helped with homework. But 2020 and the closure of schools due to the COVID-19 pandemic took that involvement to a whole new level. Read More »
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As teachers exhale and hopefully get some well-deserved R&R, we thought it was time to reflect on some of the changes coming out of the COVID-19 experience. Sometimes out of chaos comes positive change, here are five ways we think schools will have changed for the better: Remote learning may be here to stay. Not Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Lisa Wolfe While there wasn’t quite as much activity as in the first quarter of 2021, the education space remained a hot bed of acquisition and investment activity in the second quarter with some significant initial public offerings (IPO) and leadership appointments. Here are highlights: McGraw Hill acquired Kidaptive, Inc., an adaptive Read More »
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As of April 2021, the CDC reported nearly 80 percent of teachers, school staff, and childcare workers have received at least one shot of COVID-19 vaccine*, recently the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine for children as young as 12 and experts are predicting even younger children will be eligible to be vaccinated by the end Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Lisa Wolfe There’s been a lot of talk over the past year about the “learning loss” K-12 students may have suffered as a result of the switch to remote learning, but it is also important to shine a spotlight on the toll it may have taken on their social and emotional development Read More »
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One of the major challenges in selling to education is getting your product in the right hands, using the right channels, and then securing the sale. The trick is to reach out and develop a connection so you can confidently inform decision makers, “This product will meet your needs or address your problem!” Establish Relationships Read More »
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You’ve likely heard some rumblings in the marketing world about the death of the third-party cookie. Dramatic language aside, some big changes are coming in how browsers handle user site visit information. Those changes will have an impact on how MDR’s digital display advertising works. So, we want to give you a heads up about Read More »
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We’ve had a lot of heroes to celebrate over the past year, among them, and most notably for our community, the over 4 million U.S. K-12 teachers! While thanking teachers should not be a once-a-year event, we have an opportunity with Teacher Appreciation Week 2021, May 3-7, to share our gratitude. This year, more than Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Lisa Wolfe Summer learning is a big topic this year among educators and plans are taking shape for many school districts now. While many school districts traditionally offer students some type of summer learning program, this year is seeing a surge in these offerings as educators and parents strive to ensure that Read More »
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Experts say that the average American employee receives more than 120 emails a day. Looking at your own inbox, you might think even that is a vast under-estimate. Every day, you need to sort through the important work emails that need to be handled immediately, the e-newsletters that contain information that help you do your Read More »
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The last year in education has been an ‘all hands on deck’ situation. Educators, parents, districts, providers, nonprofits…everyone pitched in to keep student progress moving forward under challenging, and constantly changing, circumstances. Like a stress test, this current school year demonstrated how important it is to have an efficient and flexible marketing operation that can Read More »
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On March 11, 2021, President Biden signed the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, with another round of COVID-19 relief funding for education. The new law includes: $129 billion for K-12 state education agencies, including $800 million for children experiencing homelessness $40 billion for colleges and universities $2.75 billion to governors for use by private schools Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Lisa Wolfe Lisa Wolfe joins us again to provide an update on education news. From an education perspective, reopening schools and the status of spring assessments dominated the education headlines during the first quarter of 2021. Plus, the news of investment, growth, and acquisition in the education community during Q1 is Read More »
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Each year, we review the marketing strategies that we believe will guide our customers to success in the spring selling season and beyond. When we look at the trends for 2021, it quickly becomes clear: In today’s environment, a focus on data, digital, and customer engagement will pave the path to marketing growth and sales Read More »
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If the view from your window looks anything like mine, spring may be the furthest thing from your thoughts. But, thankfully, it really is right around the corner and now—before the crocuses pop their heads through the snow—is the time to start planning for the spring 2021 selling season! Although this year’s selling cycle has Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Caroline Gilchrist, Skyward, Inc. In a world of connectivity, pockets of darkness remain. Twelve million children in the U.S. lack the internet access or devices they need to participate in remote learning. This disparity has only become more apparent—and devastating—amid the pandemic. Are you looking to light up the dark? Here are Read More »
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By Guest Contributor Lisa Wolfe Now that the second half of the school year is underway, let’s take a look at the hot topics in education for 2021. Although COVID-19 has put added pressure on the education system, many of this year’s topics are the same ones that the community has dealt with for ages. Read More »
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Reaching educators and engaging them are both an art and a science and, generally, we lean into what worked in the past. 2020 required us all to pivot plans and rethink strategies for communicating with educators. As teachers and the greater education community figured out how to teach and learn in new ways, there were Read More »
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