Nevertheless

In this episode we discuss how STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) role models from all walks of life are essential for young people, and what needs to be done to ensure that those who want to be it, can see it.

Season 2 of Nevertheless starts Thursday 16th August. In Season 2 we’ll be asking the difficult questions around our relationship with technology in education. We will be highlighting the achievements of the brilliant women using technology to make a better future for learners. And give a voice to the young people whose lives are being immediately affected by modern day events and technology.

Good intent is nice, and goes a long way sometimes — but if the result of good intentions is a bad outcome, then whatever the intent, it’s kind of irrelevant. Unfortunately there are plenty of examples of good intentions paired with bad outcomes. In this episode we look at a failed product that excited everyone — except the people who had to use it. We chat to women who are working closely with users and communities and analysing data to ensure their tech solutions solve real problems. And we discuss the difference between forcing change, and encouraging it; between assuming you know what people need and asking them in advance.

In this episode we look at how to most effectively bring education — a key human right — to the displaced and those in conflict zones around the world. We speak to women who are trying to answer that question in innovative ways — from the software companies battling it out for Silicon Valley’s $15 million Global Learning XPRIZE, to the low-tech approach to teacher training in Lebanon by a nonprofit backed by Syrian expats. We speak to Brookings’ Rebecca Winthrop — a senior fellow and director of the Center for Universal Education — about her latest report Can Education Innovation Help us Leapfrog Progress? We then chat to Emily Musil Church from the X-Prize about their Global Learning Prize. Fathima Dada tells us about some of the frugal innovation initiative Pearson Education are running at the moment. And finally we meet Suha Tutunji director of the Jusoor Refugee Education program in Lebanon who talks about her low tech approach to teacher training.

In this episode we look at the changing workplace and how you build a tech company for the future that enables career progression for all genders. We look at the story of Sarah Bagley, activist and the first female telegraph operator in the United States. We also speak to Dan Godsall of Womba about returning to work after maternity leave, Sigma's Elizabeth Buie about designing for our future selves, transgender rights attorney Jillian Weiss about the changing workplace and Rose Luckin, Professor of Learner Centred Design at UCL Knowledge Lab about how employers need to take more of a holistic approach to understanding the needs of its employees.

We hear from an edtech innovator bringing children into the design process to shape future classroom tools, whilst at the same time instilling in them an innovators mindset. We meet the team that won MIT’s Women and Tech Solve Challenge. We're introduced to an educator who is using hackdays to help children develop emotional intelligence. And we find out what the Dirty Old Ladies of Software are all about.

From racist hand dryers to sexist search suggestions, there's plenty of examples of how software products have gender and racial bias built in. Why is that tech companies who may have diversity initiatives in place still struggle to produce ethical software products?

Nevertheless takes a close look at the innovation that happens in ed-tech focusing on the women that drive innovation whilst telling the stories of other female tech innovators.