Looking Ahead at the Top Priorities and Shifts in PK-12 Education

As educators, students, and families prepare to head back to school—the first full in-person school year since 2018-2019 for most—we’re reflecting on the dramatic shifts that have taken place in just a few years, as well as what is ahead for the education industry. 

PowerSchool is also celebrating two major milestones this year: one year since PowerSchool entered the public market, and 25 years as a company!  

We are proud of the innovation and technology solutions we’ve brought to market so far. And we know our mission to power the education ecosystem with integrated technology that helps educators and students realize their full potential, in their way, is more important than ever. 

Our industry has experienced massive change in the last 25 years, yet we are still very early in the digital transformation of education. We are motivated by the trust our more than 15,000 customers place in us and our solutions. We understand the tremendous opportunities—and challenges—educators and administrators are facing—it fuels our innovation. 

In fact, in just the past year we’ve completed five core platform expansion updates, including: 

• The launch of PowerSchool MTSS, which will securely import data from a school’s or district’s Student Information System, behavior management, social emotional learning (SEL), and assessment solutions and will connect them for deep analytics and insights. 
• The release of PowerSchool Curriculum and Instruction, which supports teachers and improves student outcomes with connected curriculum and instruction, improved instructional alignment, and comprehensive analytics. 
• The expansion of PowerSchool Naviance to improve college, career, military, and life readiness for students of all ages, building on the momentum of the last year where Naviance saw strong growth in both usage and engagement by students, educators, and families. 
• The enablement of stronger communications and notifications between school and home to increase engagement and help reduce absenteeism. 
• The expansion of whole child supports and helping educators simplify social and emotional learning and behavior management via PowerSchool Behavior Support.

Introducing Connected Intelligence by PowerSchool

One critical challenge for educators at this stage in the industry’s digital evolution is the need for a unified, global, fully managed and secure platform for their data. This is the impetus behind our latest solution, Powerschool Connected Intelligence, which unifies all data under one comprehensive platform, segregated by school district, with built-in, stringent data security and governance controls. 

Built on the Snowflake data cloud platform, Connected Intelligence gives school districts sole ownership and storage of the data so they can collaborate with internal stakeholders and external partners efficiently and securely. 

This innovative, all-inclusive data ecosystem will help education leaders make the most effective and efficient use of data with greater agility to focus on what matters most—improving student outcomes and preparing all learners for success. 

Insights from the 2022 Education Focus Report

All the new solutions we’ve delivered in the last year represent industry-leading innovation made possible by our relationships and open dialogue with educators and district leaders. 

To better understand how educators and district administrators plan to navigate the seismic shifts and trends shaping this school year, we examined 25 mid-sized to large districts’ strategic plans from across the country and identified seven common strategic priorities and two grounding concepts. We then invited education leaders to reflect on these priority areas through a dozen 1:1 interviews, roundtables engaging 65+ administrators, and an online survey of more than 3,500 district leaders and educators, and compiled key insights into the 2022 Education Focus Report.

Our goal is to recenter PK-12 conversations starting with what’s important to school districts—their priorities to better support students. 

Overall, the nationwide, tapering enrollment trends and doubled rates of chronic absenteeism compared to just three years ago underscore the urgency of attracting and retaining top educators, strengthening communication between educators, students, and their families, and implementing strong whole child supports. 

Here are a few of the top insights from the report:

• • Fewer Than Half of Survey Respondents Say Technology Is Used Effectively to Support Talent Needs. This finding presents an opportunity. Modern technology solutions can help enhance professional learning and PD offerings, simplify administrative processes, and even speed up hiring and onboarding with automated workflows.  

• Nine in 10 Educators Say Parent and Family Engagement Can Help Reverse Recent Enrollment Declines. In addition to increased teacher turnover, the pandemic impacted student engagement, increasing absenteeism and tapering enrollment, which stoked concern about root causes and funding implications. This finding demonstrates how much educators value family involvement and partnership in reversing recent declines in student engagement. 
• Whole-Child Supports are Widely Perceived as Fundamental to Student Learning. Along with effective parent, family, and community engagement, whole child supports, also known as social and emotional support, was identified as “fundamental” to student learning and development by over half (58%) of the educators we surveyed.

Our Vision for the Future Starts with Listening to Educators Today 

Striving to support the priority areas districts have outlined for the next school year, we are committed to helping districts keep students and families engaged, retain and support effective educators, optimize processes with secure data management, and leverage advanced analytics to gain deeper data insights with integrated edtech.  

Just a few weeks ago we convened education leaders at the Council on Education Innovation Summit to discuss all these important topics and to receive feedback. I encourage you to learn more about these discussions – our key sessions from the Summit can be viewed for free today.  

And, I invite educators to share your thoughts with us throughout the year by joining the PowerSchool Champions program or one of our many other forums for discussion and feedback.  

At PowerSchool, we remain focused on helping every school better serve each student. We will continue to improve, develop, and deliver edtech that helps districts achieve their vital goals and support their community into a new year of possibilities.