The proliferation of technologies being sold for educational purposes is often heralded as a means to empower learners, expand access to knowledge, and address inequality. Indeed, technology opens new possibilities for access to education for students with disabilities, personalize learning with AI tools, and expand opportunities for intercultural education through virtual exchange, to name a few, However, with this expansion comes a range of dilemmas, including the increasing entanglement of public education with private interests, issues of user privacy and surveillance, the pedagogical challenges of educating for critical media literacy, the mental health implications of social media, and the reproduction of inequalities through the ‘digital divide’. In this course we will take a sociological perspective to explore these and other issues in the rapidly evolving world of ‘EdTech’.
We will engage with leading scholarship in the field, representations in the media, and our own educational experiences to explore both instructor-and student-directed topics. Students will develop skills in academic reading, writing, presentation, and discussion.