Melbourne EdTech Summit 2021

Opening Remarks

Listening to the Student Voice

Michelle Demirel, Deputy Principal-Instructional Leader & Accredited Lead Teacher at Leichhardt Public School
Kerry Weston, Principal of Guildford West Public School
Nikki Bonus, Founder & CEO of Life Skills Go

Learner agency is important to ensuring engagement. The first step to empowering students is to listen. How do we ensure the voice of the student is central to learning and what role does technology and design have in supporting this pedagogy.

Connecting with industry to build skills of the future

Marteen Burger, Co-Founder & Director of Jaunt Motors + Bendigo Tech School Teacher and 2 Students
Graeme Wiggins, Director of Bendigo Tech School

Industry partnerships are creating innovative opportunities of student engagement. The cutting edge industry technologies of today are engaging learners for the future. In this session hear from the students at Bendigo Tech School working alongside Jaunt Motors to build an Electric Car.

Live Pitch Heat

An exciting pitch competition among some of the most innovative EdTech startups today. 

Safety and Security for Technology in Schools

David Rosengrave, Education Industry Solutions Lead, APAC at Amazon Web Services
Peter Carpenter, APAC Director of Wonde
Dan Ingvarson, Founder and CEO of Aprina

By creating standards for data integration and safety we can ensure all that the software and technology used in schools maintains privacy, data sovereignty and academic integrity is preserved. Making it easier for teachers and schools to select and implement technology to support the classroom.

Keynote | Hear from the founder of Moodle, an Australian EdTech success story

Martin Dougiamas, CEO of Moodle
Jack Goodman, Founder & Executive Chair of Studiosity

Moodle is the most popular open source LMS in the world and has 110+ million users globally. Hear from Martin Dougiamas, the founder who built Moodle into the renowned EdTech solution it is today. We’ll find out about the future of Moodle in this new phase of EdTech opportunity.

Lunch-time guest performance

EduGrowth wants to celebrate the Australian entertainment industry with a virtual performance from a guest entertainer.

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Opening Remarks

Tools for EdTech

Trevor Furness, CRO at Octopus BI
Leon Young, CEO + R&D Lead at Cogniss
Camil Torabully, Program Manager – Asia Pacific + Japan at AWS EdStart

All EdTech founders set out to solve a problem for educators and their students. But the technical challenges and time to building a solution often takes you away from the founding vision. Through collaboration with other vendors you will be able to focus on the core of your product while maintaining quality outcomes for your users. Meet two companies that can support your EdTech journey with tools to enhance analytics and the student experience.

Entrepreneurship Interview

Scott Tonges, Founder of TeachStarter
Ange Alcock, Founder of Flohh

Hear from an EdTech entrepreneur that has made a dream into a reality. This session will bring together entrepreneurs to discuss the high’s and lows of making a start-up successful.

Live Pitch Heat

An exciting pitch competition among some of the most innovative EdTech startups today. 

SESSION CLOSE

Opening Remarks

Global Victorian EdTech Innovation Program

Beverley Oliver, Emeritus Professor and Principal Consultant of EduBrief
Caroline Hartnett, Deputy Director of International Education at Global Victoria

Education innovation on a global scale. Connecting EdTech entrepreneurs, educators and researchers to provide a competitive advantage locally and internationally. EdTech Innovation Alliances to drive the quality of EdTech innovation from Victoria.

Keynote | Students demanding innovation: EdTech enabling new business models

Liz Johnson, Deputy Vice Chancellor Education at Deakin University
Deanna Raineri, Senior Advisor to the President, Vice President and Senior Vice Chancellor for Digital Strategy at Northeastern University
Tim Dodd, Higher Education Editor at The Australian

Education must be responsive to student needs. This simple statement has inspired leaders in education and technology to reimagine models for the delivery of education. This session will examine the evolution of education from the degree to the promise of MOOC’s and what comes next.

Hear from our members

Hear from EdTech companies at the cutting edge of education innovation.

Real Demand, Real Time: Technology enabling student outcomes

Chris Fitzpatrick, General Manager at Studiosity
Sherman Young, Deputy Vice-Chancellor Education (interim) at RMIT University
Cherie Diaz, Managing Director Australia of Open Learning

Student retention is a function of the everyday experience for learners, encompassing the social aspects of education, support available and how content is delivered. In an increasingly on-demand world, how do we meet the expectations of students when and where they are?

Panicogy to Pedagogy: The Complete Reinvention of an Education Sector

Jake Foster, Chief Commercial Officer at AECC Global
Brett Blacker, CEO of English Australia
Kadi Taylor, Head Strategic Engagement & Government Relations at Navitas

The ELICOS sector stopped completely in March 2020. So if no one is in your course, your classroom or your school, do you still exist? The English language sector is an integral component of the Australian education story. The sector has gone through 10 years transformation in 12 months. Let’s look at the many positives that have come from having to move online in at incredible speed. What are we keeping, what are we discarding?

Lunch-time guest performance

EduGrowth wants to celebrate the Australian entertainment industry with a virtual performance from a guest entertainer.

BREAK

Opening Remarks

Amplify Learner Impact: Partnerships between institutions and industry

Dino Willox, Director, Student Employability at University of Queensland
Ryan O’Hare, CEO, Australia & Asia Pacific at KeyPath
Vivian Fan, Director of Global Education, Australia

The modern student has an increasing demand to learn on their own terms. Universities can take advantage of this opportunity through partnership with industry. We will discuss the support infrastructure required for success and the market leadership opportunity for taking education online into new global markets.

Enterprise innovation through the start up

Josh Nestor, Managing Director (Education) at SEEK
Georgia McDonald, Chief Operating Officer of LaunchVIC
Tim Praill, Non-Executive Director of Global Study Partners

The innovation ecosystem needs many actors. Potential partners and stakeholders can be found across the entire spectrum including capital, enterprise customers, governments and the founders with bold visions. We’ll deep dive into the role that enterprise and government can play in building the education innovation of tomorrow.

Innovation in the institution

Chris Campbell, Senior Lecturer Learning Innovation at Griffith University & President of ASCILITE
Rob Thomason, Executive Director of VETASSES
Herk Kailis, CEO of Cadmus

Many of the greatest innovations in Australia come out of our higher education sector. But our TAFEs and Universities are also an incubator for technology to support teaching and learning informed by their deep understanding of the needs of students. This session will examine new ways that innovation can be leveraged beyond the walls of the institution.

SESSION CLOSE

Opening Remarks

Regulation: Innovation Friend or Foe?

Andrea Cornwell, Executive Director, Strategic Policy and Government Relations at Digital Skills Organisation
Sally Kift, President of Australian Learning and Teaching Fellows
Lindy Richardson, Partner at Maddocks

Education is heavily regulated at every level. Does this regulation accelerate or stymie innovation? There are huge opportunities in the regulatory process for innovation. New regulations means new solutions need to be imagined, built and implemented.

Keynote | The War for Talent: EdTech enabling industry growth

Belinda Tynan, Provost of Australian Catholic University
Sally Curtain, CEO at Bendigo Kangan Institute
Claire Field, Principal at Claire Field & Associates

Job ready graduates is the goal. But what jobs are we preparing these graduates for? The jobs that exist today, the jobs we think might be there tomorrow, the jobs that we hope will be there. What is the intersection between education and industry in a rapidly evolving labour market.

Hear from our members

Hear from EdTech companies at the cutting edge of education innovation.

Hybrid Learning: A Rio Tinto case of what exceptional looks like

Alan Cook, Principal Advisor Reconciliation at CoE OBK
Lynn Olssen, Chief Advisor OBK Technical Assurance at Rio Tinto
Barbara Harvey, Head of Learning & Culture at Cahoot Learning

There has been significant criticism of the shortcomings of online education over the last 18 months. The assumption that face to face is the gold standard of learning denies the reality that the online environment has so much to offer students. We will discuss the value that online learning contributes to student outcomes with the aid of data, new modes of delivery and where it improves face to face education.

The Stackable World: Life-long skills curated through technology

Andrew Barnes, CEO & Co-Founder of Go1
Brad Birt, Director of Learning Partnerships at Curtin University
Cherie Diaz, Managing Director Australia of OpenLearning

Learning does stop at the end of school or university. Successful engaged employment needs life long learning. As the employee of the future traverses the many jobs and careers they will need to acquire new skills and refresh existing ones to be be connected to work into the future.

Lunch-time guest performance

EduGrowth wants to celebrate the Australian entertainment industry with a virtual performance from a guest entertainer.

BREAK

Opening Remarks

Fuelling life-long learning: Technology supporting rapid reskilling and upskilling to ensure career relevance

Sally-Anne Browner, CEO of Goanna Solutions
Jonathon Tanner, CEO & Co-Founder of Social Media College
Alexander Tran, CEO of Lumaway

Employment has changed and the employee of the future needs to constantly be learning. Neither the employee nor the employer can wait for 2-4 year accredited courses. Rapid, regular and relevant learning is needed to ensure individuals and their employers are most relevant.

The New Scale: Capital Amplifying Education Impact

Gill Cashion, Director of PWC Australia
Marc Washbourne, CEO of ReadyTech
Maria Spies, Co-CEO of HolonIQ

EdTech investment is not new, but the global focus on the sector as a pandemic free space is. With billions of learners forced online because of COVID EdTech investment is enjoying a focus not seen before. What are the factors we need to consider in raising capital for EdTech companies? How do we find the right investors and what does that even mean? Should we be thinking about capital from different sources?

Shark Tank Final (Live)

Judges | Jonathan Warrand, Senior Investment Partner at Greenwich Capital Ventures; Tom Matthews, Partner at Pemba Capital; Rachael Neumann, Founding Partner at Flying Fox Ventures
Moderator | David Linke, Managing Director of EduGrowth

The top 4 pitch presenters will return for a final pitch and Q&A from our shark tank of judges. From there, judges will decide which finalist deserves to win the grand prize. 

SESSION CLOSE