Influencer Class of 2015: Monica Burns With Class Tech Tips
Monica Burns was first recognized in 2015 for work on her Class Tech Tips blog.
EDTECH: How have you continued to support your followers who seek help with ed tech?
BURNS: I’m still leading the Class Tech Tips blog. I’m also an educational technology and curriculum consultant, author and blogger, and I now host the Easy EdTech podcast.
EDTECH: What is your most recent and proudest professional achievement?
BURNS: I partnered with ASCD for several publications, but I’m very proud of the new edition of my book, EdTech Essentials: 12 Strategies for Every Classroom in the Age of AI.
DISCOVER: How to find your fellow K–12 ed tech enthusiasts.
EDTECH: What are your thoughts on AI in K–12 education today?
BURNS: I am excited about the potential of AI in education, but I also have a healthy hesitation about what this technology can do. AI tools complement my mission of helping to make ed tech easier, particularly by saving time on small tasks and scaling their impact with larger initiatives.
EDTECH: How can schools prepare students for a tech-focused future?
BURNS: Schools should intentionally model best practices for navigating and interacting within digital spaces.
RELATED: See who made our 2024 EdTech K–12 IT Influencer list.
Influencer Class of 2017: Eric Curts With Control Alt Achieve
Eric Curts first made our list in 2017 for work on his Control Alt Achieve blog.
EDTECH: How have you continued to support your followers who seek help with ed tech?
CURTS: I’m still at Control Alt Achieve. I’m still a technology coach at Stark/Portage Area Computer Consortium, and I run a training, speaking and consulting business that last year provided more than 300 professional development sessions in 20 states.
EDTECH: What is your most recent and proudest professional achievement?
CURTS: I am proud to have been able to consistently share ed tech resources, templates, projects and training videos through my blog for the past decade, with over 750 posts and more than 22 million lifetime views.
EDTECH: What are your thoughts on AI in K–12 education today?
CURTS: AI has the potential to provide personalized instruction and support for all students, meeting them where they are, and helping them grow and achieve. Of course, AI is still just a tool, which means it can be used positively or negatively. It is critical for schools to have clear guidelines on AI use to make sure we get the most benefit from this resource.
EDTECH: How can schools prepare students for a tech-focused future?
CURTS: Schools need to incorporate AI into students’ learning now. Our classrooms can serve as the perfect place for students to learn how to use AI effectively and ethically so they will be better prepared for the jobs of the future.
READ MORE: See what tech EdTech’s K–12 IT Influencers are grateful for.
Influencer Class of 2015: Vicki Davis With Cool Cat Teacher
We first recognized Vicki Davis in 2015 for work on her Cool Cat Teacher blog.
EDTECH: How have you continued to support your followers who seek help with ed tech?
DAVIS: I’m now a part-time teacher and IT coach. I’m still running the Cool Cat Teacher blog and Cool Cat Teacher Talk podcast and now the 10 Minute Teacher podcast.
EDTECH: What is your most recent and proudest professional achievement?
DAVIS: I received the Student Teacher Achievement Recognition again in 2025 from the Professional Association of Georgia Educators, and in 2021 and 2022, ISC Research named me one of its top international influencers.
EDTECH: What are your thoughts on AI in K–12 education today?
DAVIS: While there are many amazing uses of AI for all of us, there are also many challenges. Most great teachers I know are rewriting their courses, and that takes even more time out of an already taxed schedule.
EDTECH: How can schools prepare students for a tech-focused future?
DAVIS: AI is a tool that will be a part of our lives from now on. To leave out morals and ethics from the AI conversation is to endanger the students we teach because of the ELIZA effect — the tendency for people to give human characteristics to technology as it interacts with them. Also, the privacy concerns are tremendous, and it is more important than ever for us to supervise the use of AI. I want students to master what AI cannot do: be creative and work in a team.
Influencer Class of 2015: Doug Levin With K12 SIX
Doug Levin first made the list in 2016, around the time he founded Ed Tech Strategies and began blogging there.
EDTECH: How have you continued to support your followers who seek help with ed tech?
LEVIN: In 2016, I had recently left my role as executive director of SETDA. As I re-evaluated the larger trends driving ed tech, I identified one that others seemed to be missing: the cybersecurity vulnerabilities of the K–12 sector. I then became founder and director of the K12 Security Information eXchange, or K12 SIX, a national nonprofit that works to uplift the cybersecurity defenses of the K–12 sector.
EDTECH: What is your most recent and proudest professional achievement?
LEVIN: I’m proudest of the inroads we’ve made at the federal level to garner support for cybersecurity challenges facing school systems. I had the honor of representing the K–12 sector on the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s Cybersecurity Advisory Board, and I also serve — alongside several K12 SIX members — on a newly formed cybersecurity advisory committee at the U.S. Department of Education.
EDTECH: What are your thoughts on how AI impacts K–12 education today?
LEVIN: From a cybersecurity perspective, we’ve already seen threat actors using AI to disrupt school systems and target school personnel. We are hopeful that AI can also be used to shore up school IT defenses.
EDTECH: How have you seen technology change education in the past few years?
LEVIN: Technology operations now underpin virtually every aspect of school administration, from facilities management to the classroom, and schools now collect and manage very sensitive information about students, staff and families — past and present. Should those operations be compromised or disrupted for whatever reason, we’ve seen schools need to close and send students home, and millions of dollars in emergency funds spent on remediation and large-scale identity fraud.
Influencer Class of 2017: Matt Miller With Ditch That Textbook
EDTECH: How have you continued to support your followers seeking help with ed tech?
MILLER: I am still leading Ditch That Textbook and providing professional development full time to K–12 schools. Last spring, I returned to the classroom for a semester. I taught a full load of high school Spanish classes and was able to incorporate some of the instructional strategies and technologies I've been writing about.
EDTECH: What is your most recent and proudest professional achievement?
MILLER: The publication of my book, AI for Educators. I published it a few months after OpenAI released ChatGPT to the world. I worried how it would be received and how helpful it would be, as writers often do about their work, but I've been very pleased at the response and all of the comments about the positive impact it’s had on teachers and schools.
EDTECH: How do you see AI impacting K–12 education today?
MILLER: The generative AI genie is out of the bottle, so to speak, and it's going to impact pretty much every work field and our personal lives in the future. There's so much talk about teaching students AI literacy, and I believe that AI literacy is important. But we can't spend too much time teaching students about today's technology.
AI technology is going to evolve and change so quickly in such a short period of time. I'd rather focus on preparing students with critical thinking skills, problem-solving skills, adaptability and flexibility, which are timeless skills that we've taught students for generations. They're just as relevant today. Thankfully, teachers are positioned beautifully to prepare students for the future.
EDTECH: How have you seen technology change education in the past few years?
MILLER: Generative AI, personal tech devices and social media are all impacting schools in a big way right now. Unfortunately, lots of schools are trying to combat these “innovative disruptions” instead of preparing students for them. We're seeing AI and cellphone bans all over the United States. In the same communities, we have countless adults who don't understand AI or its implications, or the positive impact it could have on their lives. Those same adults act poorly on social media and are addicted to their technology. Instead of preparing our students with solid strategies to navigate a world where these are a reality, we're trying to stop teachers from talking about or using them. Our communities need to prioritize preparing students for these realities instead of acting like they don't exist or banning them.
