Most EdTech companies pitch schools before they understand how decisions get made inside them. School budgets are tight, sales cycles are long, and trust is hard to earn and easy to lose. In a market this crowded, the vendors who succeed are rarely the loudest ones. They are the ones who understand what a school leader is weighing before they ever pick up the phone.

Smita Kolhatkar has sat on both sides of that equation. She spent 15 years in high tech before becoming an educator, and today she is Assistant Head for Innovation, Responsible AI and EdTech at Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School in Palo Alto. She evaluates new products constantly, built her school's AI Tinkery program to teach AI literacy from kindergarten up, and has a clear, specific list of what earns her trust and what ends a conversation before it starts.

In this conversation, Smita walks through her actual buying process: the no-gos that end a pitch immediately, why conference expo halls still outperform months of email outreach, and why a single "no" from her can quietly close the door at several other schools too. It's a clear look at what that decision-making looks like from the other side of the table, for anyone marketing or selling into K-12.

What You'll Learn

• The specific deal-breakers that end a vendor conversation immediately, including SSO integration and cross-platform compatibility
• The buying signals that earn her attention, and the outreach habits that shut a conversation down fast
• Why a single school leader's "no" often reaches ten other schools through her professional network
• Why conference expo halls remain one of her most valuable discovery channels, even in a digital-first market
• Why AI literacy needs to start at age five, and how her school's AI Tinkery program puts that into practice
• Her take on the no-screens debate, and why treating EdTech as all-or-nothing misses the real question schools are asking

Why It Matters

EdTech companies are working in one of the toughest sales environments in years: tighter budgets, longer sales cycles, and a market flooded with AI tools faster than schools can evaluate them. What Smita describes is not just one school's experience, it is a window into how school leaders across the country are making these calls right now. She is not only a buyer, she is a connector: when something works, it moves through her professional network, and when something falls flat, that travels just as fast. For EdTech marketers and sales teams, the lesson is that a sale is never just to one person. The trust built or lost in a single conversation compounds across an entire network of schools.

Resources Mentioned in this Episode:

• Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School
• The K-8 school where Smita serves as Educational Technology and Innovation Director.
• AI Tinkery at Hausner
• The maker-style AI lab Smita built for students to experiment hands-on with AI tools and concepts.
• AI Tinkery at Stanford GSE
• The Stanford Graduate School of Education program that inspired Smita's AI Tinkery model, credited to Dr. Karin Forssell.
• Stanford Accelerator for Learning
• An overview of the Stanford initiative behind the AI Tinkery framework.
• AI Quests and Day of AI
• A resource Smita references for structured AI literacy activities.
• Hour of AI
• A companion resource to Hour of Code, focused specifically on AI literacy.
• "The Learning Frontier"
• Hausner's AI in Education confererence for educators.
• Smita Kolhatkar on LinkedIn

Elana: Welcome to All Things Marketing and Education. I'm your host, Elana Leone, and I have had the honor of working alongside education and ed tech brands for almost two decades. As a marketer, I've built lasting connections with educators, innovators, and leaders who are all shaping the future of learning. And I don't say that lightly. On this podcast, I bring those voices forward so you can learn from their experiences, shift your perspective, and put those things into action.

Hello, friends, and welcome back to another episode of All Things Marketing and Education. Today I am talking with someone super special. Her name is Smita Kolhatkar. She is the assistant head for innovation, responsible AI, and ed tech. Whoa, that is a mouthful. But we will get into that. We will get into why we're seeing different titles incorporate AI in K-12 education. She works at Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School in Palo Alto, California.

And here is the thing, and here's what has been kind of rubbing me a little bit: so many ed tech companies are pitching to schools and districts without truly understanding how the system works, how decisions get made, what they're dealing with on a day-to-day basis, and what they're looking for to help them align with the challenges they need to solve.

And if you don't know that, it's time for you to pause, especially as we think about this season of back to school, heading into a new buying cycle. Get your foundation right first. When it comes to my guest, Smita, she has spent 15 years in high tech, which is awesome. We don't always get people who've been in ed tech and also in the classroom, and vice versa, but she spent 15 years in high tech before moving into education.

She understands both worlds. She has a deep background in computer science and technology. She is one of those rare voices who can tell you exactly what it feels like to be on the receiving end of your outreach. And believe me, I ask her: hey, what actually works? What do you look for? And her answers are awesome. I love this conversation because she tells it like it is without being harsh.

She tells you what earns her trust as a buyer, what immediately turns her off, and why sometimes a single conversation at an expo hall or a conference can matter more than six months of email campaigns. As marketers, we're always trying to figure out where to spend our time and how to make sure our time is well spent and captures the attention of the audience in the most effective way. That's always swirling in my head. And believe me, I am asking her those questions. And of course, given her title and her role in AI, I asked her all things AI. And it is good.

So if you are trying to reach school leaders in a market that is louder and more crowded than ever, this is a really good episode for you. I do hope you enjoy it. And don't miss the lightning round at the end, especially when she shares her biggest vendor red flags. All right, enjoy.

Welcome to the show, Smita. I am so excited to have you on. We don't know each other super well, but we have so many friends in common. And after I looked at your background, I thought, my gosh, I need to hear from this woman. So I am so glad that you are on this show and we get to talk about all things marketing and education. We'll get into AI, all of the things. But welcome to the show.

Smita: Thank you, Elana, and thanks for having me here. I'm really honored.

Elana: Yes. And we were talking right before this — sometimes you, in particular, may not get the opportunity to talk to the ed tech community directly.

Smita: Correct.

Elana: So I'm very excited about that. Let's jump right into it, because there's a lot of moving and shaking in the world, and that is not sparing ed tech and education in any way, shape, or form. Let's start at a high level. Your title is the assistant head for innovation, responsible AI, and ed tech. Whoa, that's a lot. These AI titles and AI roles in schools and districts — we're not all just making it up. We are collaborating and learning from each other, but they're all brand new and we're all trying to figure it out as we go. These roles did not exist two years ago, let alone a year ago. So why don't you start by telling people about your role, and how you evolved into it, and AI and all of the things? Let's get into that at a high level.

Smita: Thank you for that. I actually started at this position as director of technology and innovation. I've been in the ed tech space for several years. I do have a tech background — I worked in high tech for 15 years, before which I decided I wanted to teach young children. So I earned my multiple subject credential and my admin credential.

Getting into tech itself was not something new, though it was from a different perspective educationally. The thing about this year is, when my head of school and I were talking about what kinds of functions I should have this year, we knew we wanted a focus on responsibly integrating AI, starting with our youngest learners. I feel very strongly that AI literacy must start from the age of five, because those children are talking to Alexa, Siri, Google Home, their cars — everybody. So to emphasize that our school is really placing an emphasis on responsibly integrating AI along with the tech pieces, that's why my title is now a mouthful.

I am really lucky to have the support of my head of school for this, so that we can integrate as needed. That's basically where we're at, and I'm very happy with everything we've done this year in terms of AI and the students, and their knowledge and thought processes around it.

Elana: As you're looking at that vantage point of responsible AI and ed tech, can you talk a little bit about how that's shifted this year — as you start using ed tech in your school, but also as you evaluate for the future and implement products? Maybe talk about your role, especially with that new vantage point of, gosh, this is the wild, wild west when it comes to AI. We've got some guidelines, but you have that really grounded perspective — someone needs to teach ethical, responsible AI from that foundational age. Can you talk a little bit about how you weave that into selecting new tech and then implementing it?

Smita: With any system, whether it's an AI system or even curriculum, it has to fit into our ecosystem. Is it meeting our objectives? This past school year especially, there have been so many products in the market, and many of them push one-on-one tutoring. In a school system, how would that really fit in — unless you're a school like Alpha School, whose goal is one-on-one with students on a computer? That's not the model that most of our schools have. It doesn't mean we don't change what we're doing — at the same time, there is a huge benefit to social interaction when it comes to learning, and we don't want to lose that, because that would mean losing a lot of skills.

To make sure students are benefiting from new technology while maintaining that, I think it's important to evaluate: does this fit with the way we want our students to be learning? Does it fit with the way we want our students to be aware of their environment, and to know the advantage of when to use it and when not to? What's the usability, and how easy or complex is the implementation? Like any system, that makes a big difference. We're a smaller school compared to most independent schools — we're about 360 students, TK through eight. For that model, the cost-benefit is what we need to weigh. I'll reach out to my professional networks when approached by companies — "hey, what do you think about this, have you heard about it?" This past year, having put "responsible AI" as part of my bio on LinkedIn, the number of requests that come in is phenomenal, and you really have to vet them. "This looks interesting, but I really want nothing to do with scalability at this point for my school" — but I'm happy to reach out to my networks and say, "hey, so-and-so approached me, are you interested in implementing this product?"

Elana: To be clear, when you say you're getting requests, a lot of people on the other side are thinking, "ooh, how are they getting her attention?" Is it LinkedIn? Is it email? You have this AI title, you also have it on your website — how are people reaching out saying, "hey, I've got this great AI tool, do you want to use it?"

Smita: It's mainly through LinkedIn.

Elana: Got it. Okay, so for those of you listening who are saying LinkedIn is dead — I got some really positive feedback last time on LinkedIn social selling in my last podcast, I'll put that in the show notes — LinkedIn is not dead, and it is super, super powerful. I just want to tease that out.

Smita: A blog post I wrote on LinkedIn actually motivated a book publisher to reach out and say, "hey, I really liked your post, would you be interested?" After three non-responses from me, it was a "no" — but it wasn't because it's dead, it was just because I wasn't interested at that point.

Elana: When you said that, I was doing some research on your background, and I was actually very surprised you didn't have a book, given the depth of your experience. So take that as a grain of salt down the road.

Smita: I'll note that to self.

Elana: There you go. So let's get back to your role within responsible AI and ed tech. People are coming to you, you're vetting through your network, and they're giving you feedback too. You said "fit" — you look for fit. Really, you're probably talking about whether it advances learning outcomes in the way that your school organizes it. How do you begin to piece together that fit? You mentioned cost as well, and that's a reality, but—

Smita: The fit is — we already have so many systems in school. Is this going to be one more thing for teachers to use? Is it going to add benefit to what we're doing? I'll give an example without naming a particular product. This year we're starting implementation of the Toddle app. About a year ago, I started a conversation with that company because of feedback I saw on my professional networks — everybody was full of praise for it. What the company did is they didn't push me to buy the product right away. I got invited to sessions where some attendees were their users and some weren't, and I got to converse with everyone in an informal setting. Then I got my admin team to come see the product — we went to a local school that was already using it and asked for a demo. Then we went on to signing the deal with the company, and they have what's called a Toddle buddy — one person working with you to implement it successfully.

All of those factors, I feel, are success factors — making sure you aren't pushing your way in, yet showing the school what the benefit could be if they implemented it. We're replacing three or four different systems with that one product. So when I say fit, we're not just adding another product — we're replacing these for better efficiency and usability for our teachers and students.

Elana: Part of me thinks, okay, it's cost efficiency, probably aligned with all your internal goals — but from a tech side, you still have to consolidate all that and do the migrations. So it is extra work for that long-term gain. You're probably weighing, do I have the time this year to do that consolidation? Thank you for walking through that, because when you talked about that journey — one, it's long, and everyone in ed tech knows the sales cycle is long. But two, it was, "maybe I talk to my network, and then I actually see it in person." Not everyone gets to do that. That's cool — you got to see it live in person. And you said you didn't feel pressured — it was more about exploring.

Smita: Correct. And I also want to add that having a pilot period makes a huge difference. When products come to us and say, "we'll give you a trial for this amount of time," the timing of that pilot is also important. If someone comes to us in April or May, that's almost impossible — everyone's scrambling for the end of the school year, and we can't have teachers taking on one more thing. But if the conversations start in the fall, that's easier. And in terms of migration, I want to give a shout-out to Toddle — their tech team helped us migrate a bunch of stuff.

Elana: Okay. Well, we're going to ask you more buying questions later, but I want to get into something cool you've written about recently — I've never heard the term before, and I don't know if you made it up, but "AI tinkery." I love the concept. It's AI tinkery for elementary and middle school students. Why don't you start by telling us about it? I think that approach will really help my audience understand how schools are approaching their needs around AI, and how products should reflect that.

Smita: I don't take credit for the name — the credit goes where it belongs, which is the Stanford Graduate School of Education.

Elana: Yes, I think I did read that. Very, very cool.

Smita: My friend Karen Forsell heads up a couple of different things over there. One of her responsibilities is the AI Tinkery, which she started about two years ago. She was telling me about it, and I asked if I could come see it. I found it so cool, and I thought — this is a graduate school of education, how can I adapt it for elementary and middle school students?

What I really like about it is the low-tech, low-key, hands-on approach to AI literacy and ethics in a very safe manner. We want students, from a young age, to be educated as well as to speak about AI thoughtfully. It really has a bunch of images that students learn to gauge — is this made by AI, or taken by a human? There are questions students think about — what did I last do with AI? Because middle schoolers are all using it in different ways for different things — some fourth and fifth graders are using it for projects. So, how does it work? It just helps introduce AI to students in a very down-to-earth manner.

It's not "no, you shouldn't be using it, you shouldn't be talking about it, this is bad for you." There are also ethical questions — how much is it impacting our environment? What's going on with the data servers? What are some debates in the world today? Students need to be exposed to all of that in a meaningful manner. That's what the AI Tinkery helps with. We do have a screen where students get to work with AI, which the Hour of Code folks — Hadi and his team — put together. It's wonderful. And the AI Quests, developed by Stanford Research, the Stanford Accelerator, and Google Research — those quests are real-world problems that students learn to solve through a whole data process.

Elana: Amazing. For those of you listening, I'm going to gather all of those resources and put them in the show notes, including the blog post about AI Tinkery — I think there's a really good Stanford blog too that I'll include. For those of you wanting to bring that into your own school — what I love about this approach is that it's approachable, but it sparks curiosity in a really safe way, rather than students in ed tech just having to use it without the foundation of why and what it is and isn't.

Smita: Absolutely, it makes a big difference. And for everyone listening, we have an open-door policy — just let me know if you want to come visit. I've had people come and check it out to see how they might implement it. If you have a product to prototype, we're happy to prototype it there too, to see what our students think.

Elana: You didn't actually tell the audience your school — why don't you go ahead and share that?

Smita: I'm at Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School in Palo Alto. We're a private TK through eight school, about 360 students, as I mentioned.

Elana: I have so many more questions, but let's round out this AI Tinkery topic. I'm also curious how you introduce AI at other grade levels. As you think about your tech stack and integration and how it aligns with your standards and learning outcomes — how are you considering weaving in AI appropriately throughout the grade levels? I know it's a hard question, and it's probably evolving every day.

Smita: It changes so much — every month since August. Again, I don't take credit for doing it myself — it's my teachers. They've been very open, welcoming, and appreciative. They've been using AI for over a year to improve their own workflows — getting rubrics, reading texts appropriate for their age group. There's a whole team of teachers actively using it and helping others. Going back to our head of school, who's been very supportive, we've had professional development sessions for our teachers starting a year and a half back when we began training them. So teachers themselves are using it — I don't have to personally use it with the students. It's more about training the teachers. There are grade levels where I personally do AI literacy lessons — that's more third, fourth, and fifth grade. Kindergarten, first, and second grade has been more sporadic this past year, but will be every other week starting next school year, because there's so much more information and knowledge we've gained.

Elana: Yeah, that makes sense. I want to ask you more on the AI side, but let's jump into a couple of other questions and see if we have time. I really want to talk about this "no screens, no ed tech" movement. I was on LinkedIn this morning and saw my friend Holly doing a special session just to address it. It's been on people's minds — I know we live in a bubble where of course you use ed tech, but it's not just using ed tech for ed tech's sake. It's thinking critically about why and how. But it's so polarizing, and we've got pressure from parents, communities, and now legislation. Where do you land, and do you think this is a threat or an opportunity?

Smita: I wrote a whole blog post about this on LinkedIn, because honestly, I've always found it very amusing. I grew up in India, and coming to America, one of the biggest things that struck me is — why is this country so zero degrees or one hundred eighty degrees? Why can't there be a ninety-degree middle ground? It's either use a lot of tech, or don't use any tech.

It's an opportunity. Tech for the sake of tech, tech just because it's cool — "hey, look, this phone has these new features" — well, just because it has new features doesn't mean we have to integrate it into the classroom. What is it that makes sense to students? Because the one thing we should never forget is that our end goal is the students and their learning. What is it that's helping our students learn? We're not doing them any service by saying "ban everything, get everything away from them" — that's like giving someone the keys at sixteen and saying "go drive your car on the freeway." No — we have to train them to get to that point. Showing them the appropriate uses, along with how learning can benefit, is our job — whether we're educators, ed tech companies developing products, or anybody else. It shouldn't be all or nothing.

Elana: How would you like vendors to approach this? Some have come out and spoken about it — more now, since I've started asking the question — why aren't vendors jumping into this conversation more, as a thought partner? I've seen more come out, but how would you like them to approach it, especially since as you adopt tech in your school, parents might say, "whoa, stop the tech." What are the resources or messaging, or how can they navigate this more eloquently or in alignment?

Smita: For many years I've used the SAMR model — are you familiar with it? Substitution, augmentation, modification, and redefinition. We always want tech usage to be at the redefinition level. If not, then modification, maybe augmentation — but definitely not substitution, because a worksheet is a worksheet whether it's on paper or on a device, and that doesn't make sense. Just watching a video by itself is meaningless if you aren't following up with thoughtful questions, inspiring students to ask questions and do things with it. So, keeping the SAMR model in mind, and asking — am I really contributing to students' critical thinking with this product, or am I just having it for the sake of having it? Otherwise, students just want to be on the device because they want to get to the next level. That's not helping them. It's like watching TV for hours — we know what happens when kids do that and then get off the screen.

Elana: When people talk about it, and when I get excited about ed tech, I say — you don't understand that when you use tech appropriately, it can fundamentally change the learning experience in a way that wasn't possible before, that redefinition. That's inspiring, it accelerates learning in ways we never thought possible. But not all tech has done that, and especially during COVID, there was a boom of "let's let everything in." We're still weeding out all the free tech that got into our tech stack. We also had an AI boom where everyone was excited, trying everything, with free trials and a lot of wrapper tools coming in. Now we're thinking critically. So when you say it's an opportunity, I do too, but I'm also concerned about why it's so polarized. Like you said, there's no ninety degrees — why is this an all-or-nothing debate? That seems absolutely crazy.

Smita: Speaking of using it effectively — some of the other benefits are things like giving students access to a global search. If they're interested in a specific topic, the world has never been at their fingertips like this before. I remember, long ago, with my fifth-grade class, something similar to what we've heard Google implement — the Genius Hour — where students could pick a topic of choice and research it. That was around the time Khan Academy switched from being just a math-based tutorial to expanding into things like, "you want to learn about the universe? How did the universe start? What is physics?" Fifth graders who were really interested but didn't know what to do could get on there, learn about it, and teach other students. There's so much opportunity in things like that.

Elana: This debate is to be continued, and I'll put a link to your blog in the show notes too, so people can get a taste of a deeper perspective on ed tech or no ed tech. As I've said, and many people have said, it's surfacing questions that make us think critically about what tech we use and how we use it — and that's amazing. But I'm still concerned about why this is even a question of "no tech in the classroom."

Smita: And we keep wanting to bridge the digital divide — now the AI divide. We want to make sure we're not increasing that by saying "no tech."

Elana: Agreed. Let me get into the marketer-type questions, because I know people are dying to hear this. You got into it right at the start — how do you evaluate purchases, what catches your attention? I call this part of our interview the "focus group." I'd love to know — how do people get your attention, and what makes you tune out immediately as a buyer?

Smita: First, I think references make a big difference — if they know someone who's recommended a product, that makes a huge difference. Second, if someone is really pushing — calling every few days — that can be off-putting. At the same time, I understand people need to follow up; the frequency makes a big difference. A lot of times, people don't take no for an answer. I've had calls where I say, "this is good, but we're really not interested at this point," and some are very gracious — "okay, I'll just contact you in three months and see." But if people keep pushing, it's a no — they're really trying to push this product.

Elana: Trying to push the sale rather than thinking about the school. It opens it up to, "whoa, you weren't actually thinking of me and my school anyway — you were just there for the sale."

Smita: And if we face a specific implementation problem or a learning problem in school, it makes sense to look out for a new product. Otherwise, we're not necessarily actively looking on our professional networks. If someone praises a product, we'll look at it and see if it would work for us. But on a daily basis, unless we face a problem with a process or workflow, we aren't actively looking for something new to replace what we have — because it's so much work to replace products.

Elana: Can you tell me about an example where you had a challenge and were actively searching for a vendor with an RFP-type status — or maybe that hasn't happened in a long time because you haven't had a big challenge like that?

Smita: It hasn't happened in a long time. That's why it was strange that we decided to go the Toddle route — we were at status quo, doing what we were doing. Then I talked to our neighboring school, and when I heard what she said, I thought, that makes so much more sense. Literally, one of our admin team members who went there said to me, "now when I look at Product X, when I go back, that looks so archaic." So it served a need without us realizing it.

Elana: I had my friend Nancy on a podcast, and we talked about how the biggest competitor sometimes isn't your direct competitors — it's the status quo. You don't know how good it could be, or how bad it currently is, because you're just used to it.

Smita: I agree, and status quo — I don't think it's good to just stay complacent. It's kind of like in teaching, when we say "we're doing this just because it was done like this in the past" — but you don't have to do it that way just because it was done that way before. Can it be done better? I think constantly asking ourselves, can something be done better — but then again, back to cost-benefit — is it worth it?

Elana: So you told me what makes you tune out — overly aggressive follow-up, not thinking about your school, and it just being all about the sale. What gets your attention? It sounds like it's more about your network talking about something, and you thinking, "I can't ignore that, that sounds really cool." Are there other ways? I know you go to conferences — I originally met you at ASU GSV, a conference in San Diego.

Smita: Some of my biggest discoveries have been at conference expo halls, because you can really talk one-on-one with each exhibitor and see the product. Sometimes it's, "this is good, I don't need it, but this may be useful for someone else because that's how their school operates." So I think the exhibition halls at conferences make a big difference.

Elana: When you were talking, I had a lightbulb moment — sometimes when people talk to one school or district leader, they think, "great, I'm potentially going to sell to that one school or district," but they don't understand that we all have a PLN and a PLC around us. You were figuring out, "this is a good product, it's not good for us, but I know three other people who might need it" — and you're not doing it for commission. You're doing it because that's how the community works. I think sometimes people coming into education don't understand that we're all just sharing and collaborating and trying to figure out what works. It's never a one-to-one sale. I want other people to know — not only is it long-tail, and you might not be right for that product now, but maybe three years later — you're also always thinking about connections as much as possible.

Smita: Absolutely. One of my favorite lines is from a poem by an Indian Nobel poet laureate, Rabindranath Tagore. The poem is about freedom, and in it he talks about knowledge being free — that knowledge shouldn't be confined to just an elitist group of people. It should be free to disperse. Knowledge is available, it's there, and it's about how you give people access to it.

Elana: And it's how we all rise together, and not keep it a secret because we want to be better — better for what, for who? We're in this to raise an entire generation, not to raise our stock on the stock market. All right, really quick — you talked about what gets your attention and what makes people tune out. Are there things that, if a vendor doesn't have them, it's an automatic no-go? Stop the conversation right there. I know you have a background in computer science and cybersecurity — are there things you've seen recently that are dealbreakers?

Smita: I wouldn't say there have been showstoppers, exactly. I do like SSO integration — practically speaking, whether it's Google Apps, Microsoft, or whatever — having that integration is huge. The number of passwords students would otherwise have to remember is insane, and we can't expect them to. That's big. Going back to implementation cost and time, that makes a big difference too. Having the mobility to work across any platform is important. We're a Mac school, but not everybody is, and not everybody has iPads. If things work, you want to make sure anything created is accessible on any platform.

Elana: All right, I have more questions, but let's let people know where they can find you. Before we do, let's do our fun lightning round at the end — our way to throw some questions at you that we didn't have time for. Gut reaction, no right or wrong answer. Let's start with this one — a little hard, but: what's the one thing every education administrator wishes ed tech companies understood about their day?

Smita: Just how complex it is — how many decisions are made in every minute of the day.

Elana: So respecting that, not pushing too hard.

Smita: Yeah. Shadowing would be a great idea — if people came in and shadowed a teacher for a day.

Elana: What's the biggest red flag when you're evaluating a vendor?

Smita: "We can do this, we can do this, we can do that, we can do everything."

Elana: What's one thing ed tech marketers always get wrong about schools? Maybe "always" is a hard word, but what assumptions do they typically have about schools that aren't quite right, or where the nuance is missing?

Smita: Just how schools are run in general. I don't know — that's a hard one.

Elana: Sometimes the way you evaluate vendors, it sounds like it's not from a big ed tech marketer channel — you're not signed up for all the emails as much as I am, so I understand the nuance and tone can be off at times. That one was a hard one. What are you most excited about right now in education?

Smita: I think we're at a crossroads, and I'm really excited to see where the AI revolution takes us. Things are changing very rapidly, and I'd love to see what schools will be like ten years from now.

Elana: Ten years from now is like thirty years now, given the acceleration we have going on — it's absolutely crazy. What's the best way to get a school leader's attention?

Smita: Having a champion teacher or administrator who can genuinely sing the praises of a product — "hey, I just saw this, it's really good, I think we should take a look" — versus hearing it from a marketer, which can be off-putting because there are too many people reaching out every day. And student focus — always student focus, student focus, student focus. That's really key.

Elana: For me, it's — how do we bring this to light more, in a scalable fashion? Testimonials, case studies, success stories, video interviews, site visits and references as it makes sense — but not being afraid. So many people on their websites silo one area for success stories and one area for clients — why not put that everywhere? Put it on your homepage too, it doesn't need to be siloed. That's the most important thing, because people are probably looking at schools like you, not like, say, LAUSD — that's very different, and they'll think "that's not like me at all." Side note. Okay, let's end with these last two questions. What skills will students need most in ten years?

Smita: Knowing when to use and not use AI, I think, because it's going to be such an integral part of life, so easy to access — like a search engine right now. Besides that, all the basic skills — communication, collaboration, critical thinking, problem-solving — those remain in place no matter what. And so does delayed gratification.

Elana: You've got to earn it. I wonder — you and I grew up before the internet, before a lot, obviously before AI. Because I have those critical thinking skills and that knowledge underneath me, I can poke holes in AI. I know how to converse with it, create prompts and system prompts to be as effective as possible. But what if you didn't have that baseline knowledge, and didn't even know the literacy part — that it's not always right, it makes assumptions, it's a machine? Then we see a lot of AI slop coming out. So when you're raised in the AI generation, how do you get those fundamentals and that knowledge?

Smita: Basic reading, writing, and mathematical skills are needed.

Elana: More so than ever.

Smita: No matter what, yeah.

Elana: All right, my last funny question, since I know you have a background as a computer scientist — you chair a lot of associations around computer science, and you're actively in AI. If you were on a deserted island, would you rather have a computer scientist or an AI engineer to help you get off the island?

Smita: A computer scientist.

Elana: Okay.

Smita: Because the computer scientist is building the AI engine.

Elana: Yes, that's true. We got so excited about AI engineers and all of that. Well, thank you so much, Smita, for coming on the show. I've learned so much from you, and thank you for letting me poke at those questions. I know my audience really appreciates it too. For those who want to learn more about you, follow you, connect with you — how can they do that?

Smita: LinkedIn is probably the best way. I do have a Twitter account — well, I should say X, but I'm not as active there. Through LinkedIn — and this was great, thank you for having me.

Elana: Can you pronounce your last name for our audience?

Smita: Kolhatkar.

Elana: Okay, and I'll put that in the show notes too, along with a link to her LinkedIn. Thank you again for being open, for sharing, and really demonstrating that PLN spirit of — let's share together so we can all be better together. Thank you all for listening to the show. I always urge you to think about one or two things you heard. It doesn't have to be big — I want it to be a mindshift, one thing you might do differently as you approach sales conversations, marketing, or evolving your product and company. Thank you all for listening. We'll see you next time on All Things Marketing and Education. Take care, everyone. Bye.

Smita: Bye.

Elana: Thanks again for listening to All Things Marketing and Education. If you like what you heard and want to dive deeper, you can find more episodes at LeoneConsultingGroup.com/podcast. You can also continue the conversation with us on Twitter at LeoneGroup, or on LinkedIn. And don't forget — if you enjoyed today's show, make sure to subscribe to our podcast and leave a review. We're so appreciative of every single subscriber and review we get, and it helps us reach even more people who need help. So we'll see you next time on All Things Marketing and Education. Take care.