Erin Mote is the CEO and Founder of InnovateEDU. In this role, Erin leads the organization and its major projects, including its policy and strategy portfolio. She leads the organization’s work on creating uncommon alliances to create systems change – in special education, talent development, artificial intelligence, and data modernization. An enterprise architect, she created, alongside her team, two of InnovateEDU’s signature technology products – Cortex, a next-generation personalized learning platform, and Landing Zone – a cutting-edge infrastructure as a service data product.
Erin is also the co-founder of Brooklyn Laboratory Charter School with her husband Dr. Eric Tucker. She is a recognized global leader in technology, mobile, and broadband and has focused much of her career on expanding access to technology in the US and abroad. A recognized leader in alliance building, Erin serves in an advisory capacity for several leading international organizations, including SXSW EDU Launch, XPRIZE Foundation, Digital Promise, and The Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy. She is an Aspen Institute Socrates scholar and a proud alumnus of the University of Michigan.
Recently, in an exclusive interview with K12 Digest, Erin shared her professional trajectory, the inspiration behind establishing InnovateEDU and what makes it unique, significant career milestones, her biggest stress relievers, future plans, pearls of wisdom, and much more. The following excerpts are taken from the interview.
Hi Erin. What inspired you to dedicate your career to transforming education, and what motivates you to continue driving systemic change in this field?
The throughline of my career is impact. I had an experience in 2010/11 when I joined some folks in the Obama Administration to visit local schools in my community in Washington, DC. I will be honest: I was horrified that we accepted the lack of connectivity and access in some schools in the US. I was leading programs to wire schools in the Masai Mara in Kenya with more computers and bandwidth than were present in a school in Anacostia. It stuck with me. I had thought to have the impact, I had to travel thousands of miles away. Instead, I realized I could do things in my community. Fast forward two years and that experience gnawed at my brain, and I kept thinking about forgotten schools and students. I had been to places where failure to invest in rural communities and schools had led to conflict. And the disparity I saw in Washington, DC, that day was like that. So, I left a career in international development, did some tech consulting, and then founded a school. And ten years later, I (still) believe the state of the education system in the United States is our most significant national security crisis. I only now have a much deeper appreciation and understanding of how we have systemically underinvested in education, research, and development, and the human capital critical to our young people. Now, more than ten years later, I am still radically dissatisfied with the fact that your access to a good education and opportunity in this country is often a function of your zip code.
My relentless pursuit of change in education stems from a deep-seated belief that every child deserves an empowering learning experience and one in which every child feels safe, known, and loved. Witnessing the disparities and limitations within the current system fuels a fire within me to challenge the status quo and advocate for innovative solutions. I am driven by a vision of education that fosters critical thinking, creativity, and a genuine love for learning, preparing students not just for standardized tests (which are very broken) but for a rapidly evolving world. This passion and a sense of responsibility towards future generations keep me persistently focused on driving positive change, no matter the obstacles.
Tell us about InnovateEDU and what sets it apart from other non-profit organizations.
InnovateEDU is a non-profit organization that works to transform education by bridging gaps in data, policy, practice, and research. We aim to create a radically different future for all learners. We do this with a focus on systemic change. We don’t just offer quick fixes. We tackle deep-rooted educational challenges through collaborative initiatives and partnerships with schools, districts, and organizations across the US. Because we center our work on the field, we prioritize the needs of students, educators, and communities by empowering those closest to the challenges to be part of the solution. We want practice to drive policy and close the gap between the field and those making policy decisions about education. We do this all through our special sauce of building uncommon alliances. Our uncommon alliances bridge political, geographic, and social or role-based silos – with a focus on bringing together diverse stakeholders, including educators, technologists, policymakers, and researchers, to foster innovation and create lasting change.
We also have a ‘Get Stuff Done’ culture. When we say we are taking something on – we do it. We make change and drive transformation. And that culture is only possible because we have a team of relentless innovators and doers who are radically dissatisfied with the status quo.
What role do you believe technology and innovation can play in transforming education, and how is InnovateEDU leveraging these tools to drive change?
Well, first, I think I say this line at least 10 times a year, and I mean it so much more now in the age of AI. No technology is ever going to replace a great teacher. Education is fundamentally a human enterprise. However, we must deeply leverage technology and innovation to transform our system into a more accessible, purposeful, personalized experience for all students.
We know guidance and advising is one of the keys to helping high school students access new opportunities like dual enrollment, internships, and even financial aid is often at the hands of the guidance counselor. The American School Counselor Association (ASCA) shows that for the 2022-2023 school year, the national average student-to-school-counselor ratio in the US was 385:1. It’s impossible to make the advising experience personal, accessible, and inclusive when you have more students assigned to you than days of the year. Here comes technology and innovation to help strengthen that human relationship. For me, one of the greatest potentials for AI, for example, is to make the invisible visible. Imagine AI can intake the college course catalogs for community colleges, universities, and colleges within a certain radius of a school. Then a counselor (or even a student) could ask that generative AI about what classes are available for dual enrollment, what type of credits the course offers, if the course is available for distance learning (a whole different kind of technology and innovation especially needed in our rural communities), and maybe even build a hybrid schedule for classes on campus at high school and classes at your local college or university. Now the aperture is wider for the student, the information is more accessible, and because it is easier to access – it can be more personalized and inclusive of that individual student’s needs. For me, technology and innovation can strengthen human relationships.
At InnovateEDU, we use integrated data to make decisions; we use AI to support the design of our marketing and communication materials so we can speak to multiple audiences and do it with a nimble and small team; we use technology tools to strengthen human connections and also ensure communication. Most importantly, we use these tools to amplify the incredible work of a team of people.
What are some of your greatest achievements in your career till date? What makes them special?
It’s hard to name any achievements as “mine” because everyone I think of – has involved the incredible work of a team of people who had vision, commitment, and a relentless focus on impact. So, I’ll name some of the outcomes I am most proud of instead. At InnovateEDU, we just reached our tenth year – and there are so many outcomes there that make me smile with pride for our team. From having the First Lady say the words data interoperability last August from a stage in the East Room to highlight the work of Project Unicorn (our longest-running Alliance), or the goosebumps I get when we announce the EDSAFE AI Fellows each January or the over 600 partners who we work with annually throughout all of our alliances – these are the things that keep me in the fight and the arena. I am delighted when I have the opportunity to run into or connect with the first and second classes at Brooklyn Lab as they graduate college, take their first professional steps, and jump headfirst into life. I know we built a school that created life trajectory-changing opportunities for kids – it is quite another thing to get their graduation announcements and messages with photos from their families of them walking across the stage at their college graduation. Earlier in my career, I had the privilege of connecting communities in my work overseas – it’s a remarkable thing to bring a means for communities to gain an education, employment, or health care in some of the remotest parts of the world. It was especially poignant for me in communities that had suffered unimaginable tragedy, from Darfur to Haiti post-earthquake, to the Dadaab refugee camp in the middle of a famine.
What have you learned as a woman in leadership?
It’s hard (really hard). A woman in leadership is held to a standard that is almost always impossible to meet, and I always wonder if my male colleagues get some of the same questions I do—who is home with the kids when I travel? Where did you get those shoes? How am I balancing it all? I literally have a sticker on my laptop that says, “Would you say that to a man?”
It’s also an enormous privilege – I get to mentor other young women (and learn a ton from them), host ladyboss events and host compelling conversations about what it means to lead and how we support each other. The worst thing a woman leader can do is kick while she climbs up the ladder – instead, she should lift others up alongside her. I take that seriously – not just as a woman leader but a woman leader in tech. Over the last five years, women in tech have departed the sector at a rate 3x that of their male counterparts, including in the education sector. That’s an enormous amount of talent we are losing because, as a sector, we aren’t creating a space for those women to grow and lead. I’m committed to doing my part to fix that, and the good news is – I have a ton of allies in that effort (Shoutout to the wolfpack, the ladybosses, and the sorority of sisters leading in ED as chiefs and supes).
Who is the one person you look up to and why?
This is tough because I have had so many fantastic mentors in my life. One person who I deeply admire is Penny Schwinn – and I certainly have to look up to her. I got to know Penny in her role in Tennessee – from her groundbreaking work on tutoring to her pioneering work on teacher apprenticeships and through collaboration afterward. Penny has always been such a stalwart advocate for students and educators – ensuring that she created opportunities for innovation in schools and districts while keeping student outcomes and accountability front and center. After her stint in Tennessee, she turned her attention to how to support other state leaders and districts with a focus on research and development anchored in practice. I admire leaders who create opportunities for discourse and dialogue, ground policy in practice, and try to create social license to innovate for the field. Penny has done all of that.
What is your favorite non-academic book and why?
Ok—big confession here. I love a good historical romance, so I am addicted to the Discovery of Witches series. (It also means you’ll find me binging Bridgerton the night it comes out.) Should I have given a more business answer there? Well, in that case, Radical Candor—I loved it so much that I made it an InnovateEDU core value.
What is your biggest stress reliever?
I love having new adventures with my family. We love to travel, and we try to dedicate time every three months to taking a family trip to a new place (or a place my kids have never been). I love discovering places through their eyes—even though we might go to more playgrounds than I would choose—but the joy of their curiosity brings me so much joy.
Where do you see yourself in the next 5 years?
The work is more urgent right now than when I founded InnovateEDU a decade ago. I hope to lead radical disruption in education, build uncommon alliances, and drive policy change anchored in practice. Right now, I can’t imagine being in any other role than getting to collaborate with our amazing team at InnovateEDU and our over 600 partners. I will also be the mother of teenagers (which seems super scary).
What advice would you give to entrepreneurs and change-makers who are looking to drive transformation in education, and what skills or qualities do you believe are essential for success in this field?
Tenacity, trust, and the ability to think differently (systems thinking as the default). Our education system is not serving all kids the way we need to. Disruptors are needed in our system – as well as systemic changes like moving from a schooling system to a learning system. That’s where the ability to think differently and tenacity will be essential. And you’ll need trust as a disruptor. Change is scary, and often, our first reaction is fear. One of the ways you can overcome fear of change is by having trust. Let me put it this way – when I built, founded, and helped lead a school with new models of learning, human capital, and even furniture (people could not get over 10 years ago that we had rolling desks!), we had to think about how to be innovative without turning over all of our faculty and families every year with untenable change. But even as one of the country’s most innovative schools, we had an 80% rule. We had to keep the work (pedagogy, practices, systems) 80% stable year over year to build trust and allow us to innovate on 20% of the work. Humans rarely tolerate massive change without trust and onramps to support success for what comes next.