Baltimore is a center of the for-profit education sector as headquarters to Laureate Education and Sylvan Learning, and the city is a base of major operations for other companies such as K12 and Connections Education, but startups based in the city's Emerging Technology Centers (ETCs) are also looking to make their mark in the multi-billion dollar education products and services industry.
A handful of small education innovation companies are working on web-based tools at the ETC in Canton. They want a piece of the market being stimulated by President Obama's Race to the Top and i3 (Investing in Innovation) initiatives, which are working their way from the U.S. Department of Education into state and local school boards and districts.
Khalid Smith is one of those ETC entrepreneurs. He says i3 and Race to the Top are in some ways connected to George W. Bush's No Child Left Behind, which itself was a modification of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. However, Obama's investment initiatives are rooted in the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act--the federal stimulus of 2009.
"They are related in that they build off of the same idea that -- although the federal government is not constitutionally empowered to dictate educational policy -- it does provide huge sums of money to the states to assist with large education problems, and it theoretically can attach whatever requirements it likes to say what a state needs to do to qualify for these 'additional' funds," Smith says.
Through i3, the Department of Education and the administration aim to spur collaborations between non-profit organizations and school districts, with enterprises watching carefully to see what market segments they can serve. Locally, Maryland schools are ranked highest in the nation by The College Board and Education Week magazine, and on April 15 the Maryland State Board of Education announced that it would hire a search firm to find its next superintendent after Nancy Grasmick ends her 30-year tenure at the post. Maryland's record of high achievement sits alongside a history of challenges in Baltimore City schools, which now include 34 charter schools. Khalid Smith adds that it is still difficult for for-profit education innovation companies to work their products into school systems, but the overall promotion of educational innovation in Baltimore and nationwide is encouraging for emerging companies in his sector.
Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Khalid Smith, Emerging Technology Center - Canton