00:00.92

Dan Gizzi

Hi everyone. This is Tech In EdTech, and in this podcast we discuss technology that powers education and improves learning for all. Welcome to today's episode where we'll be talking about improving collaborative learning through technology. I'm your host, Dan Gizzi, from Magic EdTech and our guest today is Michael Lombardo, Founder and CEO of Book Nook. Michael, thanks for joining in, and welcome to today's show. 

00:24.62

Michael Lombardo

Thanks, Dan, it's great to be here.

00:26.00

Great, won't you just give a little bit intro about yourself? You know how you got into edtech? We'd love to learn a little bit about your background and a little bit about BookNook as well.

00:35.96

Michael Lombardo

Yeah, absolutely um I've had a passion for equity and education for my entire career. I started out as an administrator at UC Berkeley, then spent 10 years building 1 of the largest literacy nonprofits in America and founded BookNook out of the belief that that technology, uniquely, is capable of addressing large educational issues at scale. Um, and I'm really passionate about the idea of sorts of using technology to connect humans to have authentic social learning experiences that have powerful academic results for students.

01:11.44

Dan Gizzi

That's great and I notice one of the areas you focus on with BookNook is the small group learning for children I'd love to just maybe hear a little bit of elaboration around, you know, the passion that drove that, you know, the reasoning behind small groups, you know, some of the learning that may go into that.

01:26.72

Michael Lombardo

For sure. Yeah, um, you know most of the answers of why does BookNook do things are easily um, easily tied back to what the research says works um, and, um, I think part of the reason why things like high-dosage tutoring are are generating so much interest among educators right now is because there's such a well-established body of literature that that leads us to believe that when students are looking to accelerate learning you know small group or one on one instruction is, hands down, the most effective thing we can do um and that's been validated by dozens of studies over 30 years um so so we don't come to it from a sort of you know, ah philosophical viewpoint, although, we really value the social elements of learning and that special relationship that forms between students in that more intimate instructional setting, Um, it really comes from the research and what we know works for students and then our job at BookNook is to use technology to help make that scalable. Um, and when you talk with educators and you say small group learning, um everyone universally will say yes, that we wish we could do more of that we know that's really beneficial for students, both academically and socio-emotionally and the problem is just we don't have enough people. Um, it's it's too logistically complicated to pull off. Um and you know that's ah, a great spot where we can step in and help, Um, both by working with districts to upskill more parts of their workforce to be able to provide that kind of rigorous instruction and also to supplement that with our virtual teaching core which can further extend the people districts have access to in the buildings.

03:05.57

Dan Gizzi

That's great. The mission is amazing and I actually saw an article yesterday where they're seeing the impact is finally starting to be felt in the classroom of the challenges we've obviously faced as as a world with how the educational market had to shift so quickly and Reading has taken an ah unbelievable hit across the board beyond just even the assessments and scores of of being down but just that ability to actually you know educate the students and learners now in a way that makes sense of the world where we live in today.

03:35.49

Michael Lombardo

Absolutely um, yeah I think that's completely true. Um, and you know the pandemic has challenged a lot of parts of the education system and I like to believe that all of us in the world of education take a learner posture first um, much like we ask our students to and so. I think we're all still learning both. What were the effects of the pandemic on student learning both academically and socio-emotionally um and then also ah you know, kind of what are the things that work to address that and as districts are thinking about different learning acceleration strategies, you know as I was just talking about sort of what can we pull from the research and and what does our past experience teach us and then how does that need to adapt to this unique moment that we are in and how can we make sure that we are sort of building on that base of knowledge and and allowing ourselves to be learners and to try new things and to continue to kind of push that frontier of understanding further and further as we think about creative new ways to support students during these extraordinary times.

04:37.20

Dan Gizzi

You know that's that's great to hear I think you know from a virtual perspective. You know what were some of the ways that you were able to help support, you know, were there areas that you were able to expand and quickly, or had you already had that in place and were able to just kind of shift and pivot?

04:53.57

Michael Lombardo

Um, yeah, it's a little bit of both sometimes you know I'm I'm fond of saying it's sometimes better to be lucky than be good. Um, and so so we you know really started to BookNook with this thesis about a workforce problem. Um, and as I was just saying like reading and the science of reading this is not new. Um, and um, there's a pretty well-established set of ideas about what really works for students and the problem is how do districts make that happen right? Um, and you know even before the pandemic we were dealing with teacher shortages and challenges with highered and classified staff and paraprofessionals and so. So we were already kind of working in this idea at BookNook of sort of how could technology help with that problem. Um, and and our first thought was like I said kind of upskilling and sort of taking more people and as we like say expanding the WHO of teaching so so kind of being more inclusive and thinking more broadly about the caring adults that are in children's lives and how we could turn them into great reading teachers. Um, and then even before the pandemic we were starting to experiment with virtual teaching and which you know we saw as a way to sort of double down on that thesis and to acknowledge that even if we you know sort of upskilled every single person in that school building and made every single person capable of delivering great small group instruction, unfortunately, even before the pandemic oftentimes there simply weren't enough adults in the building to do that and so virtual teaching was a way to sort of extend that and to make sure that if there was a will from a school leader. Or a teacher to be able to provide students with small group learning that these sort of you know, kind of who is available to grab wasn't the limiting factor and that we could use virtual teaching to support that. So so that was an idea we were playing with before the pandemic and then obviously when we went into distance learning in the spring of 2020 that um became much more relevant. Um and districts all of a sudden were sort of um, scrambling both to figure out. You know this kind of upscaling and instructional problem and then also the hardest part for every educator during distance learning was the synchronous components. How do we in that moment in the Zoom room do a great job for our students? Um, and the fact that we had been experimenting with technologies that could you know help with that was definitely beneficial. So so for us it was less of a pivot and more kind of an evolution of a hypothesis we had even before the pandemic. And and sort of I think we just didn't know how right we were that it was going to be really really important that schools had these kinds of tools to navigate these problems.

07:19.30

Dan Gizzi

Yeah, that who is very important as the parent of what was a second grader at the time when all of this started and how soon to be coming up to the end of his third grade. It's ah amazing how the parents got dropped into this equation of being more of the beyond homework educator and and this as well. So it's ah it's great to hear that the services were being thought of that that that group setting and everyone's an educator.

07:44.21

Michael Lombardo

Yeah, absolutely um I think there were actually you know like most startup founders I'm an optimist. Um, and so you know I do think there are some really positive things that came out of the pandemic acknowledging obviously that ah teachers and students experienced all kinds of disruption and trauma but there are positives.

08:03.10

Michael Lombardo

Some of them have to do with really putting the digital divide at the forefront and and moving to this understanding that those of us I think working in school buildings already understood but was not broadly understood which is there are vast differences in the technology and device environment at different schools and that students have in in different homes. Um, and that creating equity of access and making sure that every student has a device. Every student has internet access whether they're at home or at school. Um, you know the the way that moved to the forefront and the amount of energy that administrators and policymakers put into addressing that issue is really positive and moves things forward. Um, we're not there yet and I think there is a misconception that the digital divide like we figure that out that's behind us now. Um, there are still major major equity of access issues. But we made a lot of progress and I think everyone agrees with that. Um, another positive is what you describe your experience with your second grader. I had a first-grader at the same time and I think It gave an opportunity for families and caregivers to see firsthand what's happening and to kind of understand. Um you know, sort of what oftentimes is sort of behind the veil of the yellow bus of like what what is the you know like what is the experience of a child learning reading or learning foundational math. What does that actually look like? Um and you know we found ourselves dragooned into service in some cases we found ourselves maybe just sort of ah a fly on the wall just kind of listening and hearing what that was like but but I think it did give families a unique insight into kind of the challenges that educators grapple with every day and I hope that that shared understanding creates opportunities as well and that you know parents walk away feeling better informed and maybe having more empathy for the challenges that teachers face and and vice versa and that teachers came to understand all the shared challenges that families deal with at home. Um, and and so so I'm a believer that you know sort of greater understanding you know leads to greater empathy and and to ultimately um, better connections and I think that you know the pandemic provided that for better for worse like it or not we we all got to see each other's business. Um, and I think that there are some positives to that for sure.

10:07.97

Dan Gizzi

Yeah I can respect that positivity and to touch upon the equity of access, it was amazing how you know it's always been discussed and talked about it's built into budgets. It's talked about any district level RFP but it still always ends up being something that the districts with the money are still the districts with the money in in the prepademic world and that shift was very drastic I think where we saw that it had to happen but from an industry perspective as well where we had to open up that access where it may have been hidden in the past and you know even from a social and emotional learning I think that's you know we were in everybody's living rooms for so long over zoom or over you know whatever you know the the video was that we got to see into people's lives in a way that we wouldn't have in an educational system and you know it's been great to see that continue forward now as you know we've gone back to the brick and mortar classrooms or some version of hybrid.

11:03.78

Michael Lombardo

Yeah, absolutely I think that like I said I think the you know pandemic I often describe it as you know, sort of a time machine right? like so there were these trends already districts are moving to more 1 to 1 device access. Um, you know we were sort of grappling with issues of personalization and the use of technology and teaching. Um, and the pandemic kind of shot us forward like 5 years all at once and trends that were already in place that were positive um like like I said teachers embracing more technology as part of learning greater personalization and differentiation like those things all progressed. But then also the problems progress too. And um, as I said earlier teacher shortages and workforce shortages were a problem before the pandemic that is not a new thing. Um, however, the pandemic made it drastically worse. Um, and and so now we're dealing with you know, kind of problems that we're starting to emerge you know in in late twenty teens as you know reaching crisis stage. Um, and um, I'm hopeful that we'll see from school leaders and policymakers the same kind of resourcefulness and creativity and urgency that we saw during the pandemic to sort of figure those solutions out because. Um, is every bit as big of a challenge for students and for educators to deal with the fact that it's very very hard to hire right now. Um, and most districts have some kind of a shortage and are doing you know all kinds of contortions just to make sure there are enough adults in the building to keep it open. Um, so. So I hope that we'll see the same kind of innovation the same kind of embrace of technology. Um and the same kind of like I said urgency that we saw early in the pandemic to to figure out a solution and to make sure that students have access to great teaching. Make sure that educators feel well supported and excited about being in the k12 workforce and wanting to stay um and that you know we're sort of of building kind of ah, a stronger more diverse. Um, ah k 12 workforce over time because I think that will will serve both students and schools better.

13:05.21

Dan Gizzi

And it puts you on the spot a little bit as a leader in the education space. So you know seeing that there is this big gap in challenges. You know what would be your advice to that next person on the sidelines that's thinking of the next big idea. What would be your advice to them? To get out in front of that to be able to assist?You know Obviously whether it's with Book Nook or or even in that you know what's the next greatest big thing that we could do to help close that reading gap.

13:32.98

Michael Lombardo

Yeah I mean I think the hardest thing for us to grapple with is this idea that the pre- pandemic k 12 system is the good old days. Um, you know it was the bad old days. There were a lot of really big problems in equity of access to high-quality teaching for students.

13:50.23

Michael Lombardo

Of providing like I said before sort of a great experience for teachers and and embracing and respecting them and making sure that we were building a strong and diverse workforce of teachers and so so you know my general advice is let's not look backwards. Um, and much as there are things to be proud of of what we've done in k 12 education over the last few decades it was not serving all students well. um, and and I think the more we can release that and think about the future, the better. I think the more people who have creative ideas are willing to speak up and raise their hand and participate the better. Um, and I do think we found districts um learned they had an innovation muscle that they maybe didn't realize because they were forced during the pandemic to move quickly. Um, as Facebook famously says right to move quickly and break things and I think they they had to do that they didn't have any choice. Um, and.

14:43.20

Michael Lombardo

I'm hopeful that that that legacy of of you know, sort of urgency um, and adaptability is something that that is a long-term outcome of the pandemic. Um, but you know I talk to people who think about starting startups all the time in the Edtech space. Um. And my answer is you know if you have a real solution and that solution is based on a need that you see and understand from a student or a teacher or a parent or caregiver standpoint come on it. You know the water's fine. There's there's a lot of opportunity. Um, and. And it's probably never been a better time to think about coming into this space with a new idea. Um, but I also ah caution people. Um you know I believe that ed tech is at its worst when it's a solution in search of a problem and somebody has like is really fired up about machine learning or web 3 or whatever it is and and sort of extrinsically comes up with this notion that like wouldn't it be cool if this technology was used in education. Um, and you know I think that that those those solutions tend. Um, both not to lead to successful businesses. But also um, you know are are maybe contributing less to the overall development of the field which which I believe should begin with you know, empathy and humility and just understanding of like what it is like for a classroom teacher or what it is like for a student who is struggling academically and and starting from a place of saying how can I solve those problems? How can I help that person? Um, and you know, kind of founding your ideas when it comes to you know, kind of the the next big idea in the sort of Edtech product space on that understanding. Um and not so much on like I've read this article in wired and I think you know I think bitcoin is somehow going to be the way that kids buy school lunches in the future and I want to work on that. Um I think that's. That's generally speaking going to be you know, less of a rewarding experience for everyone involved.

16:34.76

Dan Gizzi

And I think I couldn't agree more with that I think it's amazing how we can look at that equity access piece and and be drivers and leaders with just a simple change in just mindset and it doesn't always have to be a huge heavy lift from a technology standpoint either.

16:53.58

Michael Lombardo

Yep, um I appreciate that too I think it's you know? Yeah I think all of us I mean everyone comes into education with good intentions. That's that's you know for better or for worse That's a nice thing about the world of of education I think we all believe in the power of learning. We all want to support students and teachers. But.

17:09.35

Michael Lombardo

You know, like ah it requires a certain humility and particularly for people that are are more in that technologist end of the spectrum. Um, to say you know I probably don't know a lot about what it's like to be a teacher. Um, if I haven't been one or if I haven't spent a whole lot of time around them. Um, and. Before I, you know sort of go make my pitch deck and start making the rounds with VCs like I first am going to kind of you know, put myself in their shoes and try to understand the day-to-day of their lives and and make sure that what I'm working on solves a problem for them. Um, and is you know sort of. Ah, fundamentally trying to come from a place of of empathy and understanding and translating that into a product vision.

17:47.13

Dan Gizzi

Yeah, it's made every data point has a little human attached to it at the end of the day. Um I'm gonna ask you to put your parent hat on for a second. So so you've got a young one. What would be some of the advice you would say in the areas that you seen have have been lacking now? So at from a parental standpoint. You know if you if you could sit yourself down as a Ceo and say I need you to fix this as a parent. Oh god good.

18:08.58

Michael Lombardo

Um, yeah I mean. Yeah I actually have four kids so well high schooler a middle schooler and 2 elementary Schoolers. So I get to see the full spectrum and you know, um I'm gonna own I am a very privileged person I'm a college-educated white male and so my kids go to pretty good public schools. Um, and they are you know sort of the winners of that you know, kind of zip code lottery um and and so so I spend more of my time thinking less about you know, sort of the experiences my kids are having because they're at the very privileged end of the spectrum and more about the students who don't have that privilege. But but you know I think.

18:50.30

Michael Lombardo

Your parenting does give you an insight and it helps you understand you know, kind of as you said the little humans that are attached to those data. Um, and I think you know if nothing else some of the things that that my kids have taught me are you know as I said before humility and patience and you know all the words to the songs from enconto those things I've I've got. Um, um, and but I think you know as a parent and this is something that we deal with the BookNook I do think there's a lot of room for improvement in the way that school systems work with their families and treat them. You know as central to the learning experience of their children. And and I would say that's even more important when we're working with families who are not traditionally very connected to school so who who maybe don't speak english or and certainly who don't have a college degree. Um, and so um I think schools mean well um, and do a lot of efforts designed to involve parents in learning process. Um, but at the end of the day. Um, you know I think if you you talk to those families you find they generally feel pretty disconnected from from education. Um, and that may be because they're dealing with other challenges in their lives and are just trying to sort of keep food on the table and and attend to the very basic human needs. But. But I think um, you know I think there's ah, a lot of space for us to do better in terms of how family voice um is a part of decision making for schools is a part of you know, kind of crafting learning experiences for students. Um, and you know it's it's not sort of. You know as as I think is too often the case you know parents are sort of notified of what's happening kind of after the fact and they're more a part of the learning design process. Um, we worked with ah a great nonprofit. Um in the San Francisco Bay Area called Innovate Public Schools that I thought did a ah really great job kind of bringing families together with education leaders and and sort of saying rather than us tell you what we think you need um and you know, kind of here's the program, do you want to sign up or not?m, like doing a kind of grassrootsdriven community boyriven process to sort of hear from them what they felt they needed um and to try to you know, craft solutions that meet that need. So it's hard and I have such um you know sympathy for school districts that are dealing with so many challenges and as I said are are stretched so thin from workforce standpoint. But I do believe that that you know pays off over time. Um, and. You know, particularly if we're designing learning solutions that you know involve the parent in some way the the parent or guardian has to you know, register their child for services. Whatever it is and you know the more we make them feel a part of that process I think the the better they will feel about it. The stronger the program will be.

21:25.00

Michael Lombardo

Um, and hopefully also the more success we'll have in reaching students. So I think that's a definite area that I could see is room for improvement.

21:31.54

Dan Gizzi

I think that's a great way to wrap us up. You know I think you know being able to close the loop on that and I appreciate you know Michael you joining me today on this episode of tech in edtech at Magic Ed Tech and we look forward to tuning into this in future broadcasts as well.

21:47.70

Michael Lombardo

Yeah, likewise thank you for having me and appreciate the thoughtful questions and hope you and your now third grader are doing well.

21:53.23

Dan Gizzi

Yeah, thank you.