PORTFOLIO

The digital transformation in education remains a topic of high importance for the Swiss, as well as the global, society. To enhance visibility and support the digital transformation in education, the Swiss EdTech Collider, Switzerland’s leading hub and center for EdTech startups and innovations based at EPFL Lausanne and with a location also in Berne at BeLEARN, has established so-called «test-bed/test-lab» collaboration framework with a few schools (mostly private and/or professional education schools) in the past. In those testbeds schools could address their needs and based on those selected EdTech startups were able to test their solutions and innovations with the appropriate targeted group (teachers, students, administrators) in those schools. This has proven to be an effective and impactful added value, not only for the schools/test lab partners for having the opportunity to ‘field test’ EdTech innovations, but also for the EdTech startups themselves for being able to receive real world feedback for their innovations – a win/win scheme for both sides that also aims to push generally digital transformation in schools and educational institutions.
However, an overall Swiss wide EdTech Testbed Platform – especially addressing public schools – had been missing in the past. The Swiss EdTech Collider has closed this gap by establishing and launching the “Swiss National EdTech Testbed Program” end of 2022, which offers an environment and platform for Swiss Public Schools to test and experiment EdTech solutions in a real-world setting with the support of pedagogical specialists from the Swiss EdTech Collider Team. The aim of this «Test and Learn» model and framework in Switzerland is to allows fast testing and feedback loops of EdTech tools by offering public schools to test new educational tools. In those environments, educators and schools will be matched and brought together with EdTech startups based on their needs to rapidly test innovations and solutions in a real-world school setting accompanied by members of the Swiss EdTech Collider team. This helps schools to address the challenges they face as well as see, test, and learn about new innovative EdTech tools. Findings of Testbeds are summarized in ‘Good Practice Papers’, which are available to anyone via the official website. Also, the feedback generated from educators, schools is transmitted back to the startups, which provides them with crucial information for product design improvements. Finally, the Swiss EdTech Collider can identify possible/potential gaps in the EdTech market.

The Swiss National EdTech Testbed Program was successfully initiated end of 2022 with the help of two new Swiss EdTech Collider team members (Program Manager and Implementation Manager). The conceptual design, development, and set-up of the overall framework structure has been finalized and the testbed program was launched during several events in November 2022: VSLCH Fachtagung (15.11.2022), 5 Year Anniversary Event Swiss EdTech Collider (16.11.2022) and PH St. Gallen Netzwerktreffen «Blended Learning» (17.11.2022). The official rollout of the program started beginning of 2023. Ever since, the EdTech Testbed Program has been a major success: up until 31.12.2023, more than 350 «EdTech Testbeds» in 130 schools with 250 teachers and over 4’000 students have been conducted in the first 12 months of the program. At present (01.2024), over 15 different EdTech tools are available for tests and schools can conveniently address their needs and sign up via the Swiss EdTech Collider’s official Testbed Website (see below). Also, the Swiss National EdTech Testbed Program has been communicated in a variety of public and educational events. Finally, collaborations with educational organizations such as Educa, ProEdu, BeLEARN, a variety of PH’s as well as Cantons (Solothurn) have further supported the awareness of the program.