In this session, we will map out the complex media environments created by digital platforms and consider how that complexity manifests in our classrooms and schools. To what extent does media literacy education prepare us to grapple with the complex relationships that are introduced within a platform society? And how might our media literacy education frameworks better equip us for this moment?

T. Philip Nichols is an assistant professor of literacy education in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at Baylor University. He studies how science and technology condition the ways we practice, teach, and talk about literacy and the implications of this conditioning for equitable public education. He is the author of Building the Innovation School: Infrastructures for Equity in Today’s Classrooms (Teachers College Press, 2022), and he recently co-convened (with Antero Garcia) a Harvard Educational Review symposium on “Platform Studies in Education,” which explored the impacts of platform technologies on global education policy and practice. Phil is also editor of Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education (English) and a 2021 National Academy of Education / Spencer Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow. He holds a PhD in Literacy, Culture, and International Education from the University of Pennsylvania, where he also earned an M.A. in History and Sociology of Science. He lives in Austin, TX.

The edtech market is dominated by products developed by Big Tech companies (i.e. Google and Microsoft) or operate along the same logics of surveillance capitalism business models. What would it take to build edtech outside of the data extraction business model, that are publicly or otherwise funded? What alternative edtech tools already exist, that are open source or otherwise locally maintained? What would our schools gain and what would they give up if we looked beyond the obvious, big players in the field for teaching and learning technologies?

The use of particular educational technologies in our learning communities can be mandated or encouraged by our institutions. What happens when we notice that particular edtech creates unintended or unwanted changes in our pedagogy, in our relationship to our students and colleagues, or in the habits of our students? Can we refuse to use mandated or encouraged edtech? And can this individual refusal become part of a larger structural and institutional strategy? In this session, we will hear from educators who have engaged in refusal, and discuss the possibilities and perils inherent to refusal as a strategy.

Schools are under so much pressure to address a wide range of issues—from student academic achievement gaps to cyberbullying to threats to school safety. Amidst these pressures, it is no wonder that particular kinds of edtech appear to be silver-bullet solutions. But no piece of technology can solve any complex and socially-situated problem. How can we—as educators and/or community members— support schools and districts in courageously rejecting the adoption and implementation of particularly harmful edtech? How can we help others in our communities learn about and grapple with the unintended harms that come along with certain proposed edtech solutions? In this moment of widescale attack on public education, it is more important than ever to support schools in making these difficult choices. In this session, we will hear from community members that are working to build solidarity in their communities to help shift the conversation away from harmful technology implementations.