Edtech Insiders

Empowering 28 Million Students and Teachers with Clever CEO Trish Sparks

• Ben Kornell • Season 9

Send us a text

Trish Sparks leads Clever as CEO. Previously she was VP of Customer Success and Sales. Trish came to Clever with a wealth of executive leadership experience at companies such as LinkedIn, where she scaled a global customer success organization, and at DemandBase, where she was Chief Customer Officer. As a North Carolina Teaching Fellows Scholar, she started her career as a middle school teacher in Wake County Public Schools. Trish holds BS degrees in Business and Education as well as an MBA from Meredith College. After living in the Bay Area for 20 years, Trish now resides in Chapel Hill, NC.

💡 5 Things You’ll Learn in This Episode:

  1. How Clever has grown to serve 28 million students and teachers across the U.S.
  2. The role of digital identity platforms in securing and simplifying education technology.
  3. Insights from Clever’s “Classroom of the Future” report on AI adoption in education.
  4. How AI and automation are reducing teacher workloads and improving teaching conditions.
  5. Clever’s innovative cybersecurity solutions tailored for K-12 schools.

✨ Episode Highlights:

[00:02:47]
Trish’s journey from teaching to leading Clever and her passion for EdTech.
[00:04:54] The critical role of identity platforms in protecting student data and facilitating digital learning.
[00:08:04] Key findings from Clever’s “Classroom of the Future” report
[00:09:41] The rapid adoption of AI in EdTech and its evolving role in education
[00:11:12] Cybersecurity challenges in K-12 schools and Clever’s solutions to mitigate risks.
[00:14:44] Exciting EdTech trends, from addressing teacher shortages to advancing student data protection.

😎 Stay updated with Edtech Insiders! 

🎉 Presenting Sponsor:

This season of Edtech Insiders is once again brought to you by Tuck Advisors, the M&A firm for EdTech companies. Run by serial entrepreneurs with over 25 years of experience founding, investing in, and selling companies, Tuck believes you deserve M&A advisors who work as hard as you do.

[00:00:00] Trish Sparks: One of the things I was so happy to see. Is that today, 80 percent of educators now believe that technology has actually made their jobs easier. We have come a long way. This was definitely not the case just a few years ago. And based on the data that we're seeing, I believe the growing role of AI and automation in the classroom will follow a similar path.

You know, when we can reduce teacher workloads with AI, It can have a significant impact on the future of education.

[00:00:38] Alex Sarlin: Welcome to EdTech Insiders, the top podcast covering the education technology industry. From funding rounds, to impact, to AI developments across early childhood, K 12, higher ed, and work. You'll find it all here at EdTech 

[00:00:53] Ben Kornell: Insiders. Remember to subscribe to the pod, check out our newsletter, and also our event calendar.

And to go deeper, check out EdTech Insiders Plus, where you can get premium content. Access to our WhatsApp channel, early access to events and back channel insights from Alex and Ben. Hope you enjoyed today's pod.

Today on EdTech Insiders Podcast, we are joined by Trish Sparks, CEO of Clever. Trish leads the company as CEO, but previously she was Clever's VP of customer success and sales. Trish came to Clever with a wealth of executive leadership experience at companies such as LinkedIn, where she scaled a global customer success organization, and at Demandbase, where she was chief customer officer.

As a North Carolina Teaching Fellow Scholar, she started her career as a middle school teacher in Wake County Public Schools. Trish holds BS degrees in business and education, as well as an MBA from Meredith college. After living in the Bay area for 20 years, Trish now resides in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

Enjoy the show. Hello, EdTech Insider listeners. I am so honored today to have one of the leaders of your beloved EdTech company, Clever, CEO Trish Sparks. Welcome to EdTech Insiders. 

[00:02:14] Trish Sparks: Thanks. I'm happy to be here. 

[00:02:16] Ben Kornell: So many of us on the pod are familiar with Clever's history, and we were super excited when you stepped in as the leader.

And so today we're just excited to dive in to the present and the future of Clever. So first, let's just talk a little bit about your career. You've had a remarkable run in customer success and leadership roles at companies like LinkedIn and Demandbase. Before coming to the education sector, what drew you to the world of EdTech and specifically to the CEO role at Clever?

[00:02:47] Trish Sparks: Yeah, so I started my career as a teacher in a public school classroom in North Carolina many, many years ago. And so I've always had a passion for education. And after teaching for a few years, I transitioned into enterprise software. And I've spent the last couple of decades developing my leadership skills and a lot of different roles, such as tech support, sales, success operations.

I did a little bit of everything, but when I was presented with the opportunity to join Clever in 2019, as the VP of customer success and combine all of the things that I'm most passionate about, like, Education and technology innovation and serving customers and people leadership. I just could not pass that up.

And what's funny is that I had never really considered taking on a CEO role at any company, but I'm so grateful that I did. And ed tech is such an exciting space right now. And I have an amazing team. Believe it or not, some days I do miss being in the classroom. And in fact, I may go back to teaching in some form one day.

But right now, I wake up every day. Knowing that I have the opportunity along with my team to help make learning better for 28 million students and teachers. So what could possibly be better than that? 

[00:04:22] Ben Kornell: Wow. 28 million. It's just such an impressive number and growth. And, you know, early days, I remember sitting with Dan Carroll in my living room in Denver, when he had the idea and was talking about this kind of pain point of rostering and.

Learner identity, but now identity platforms are becoming really crucial in education. Can you explain a little bit to our audience how these platforms work and why they're so essential for protecting student data in today's digital age? 

[00:04:54] Trish Sparks: Yes, for sure. So first I think it's really important to remember that the term digital identities.

which sounds really technical, actually represents real people in the school community. It includes, of course, students, but also the people that are there to support them, like their teachers, their counselors, their librarian, even their parents. And so that means that identity platforms in education are key to not only securing students, staff, and parent data, but also making access to digital learning resources as easy as possible.

And so at Clever, when we talk about our identity platform that's designed specifically for education, We're talking about one place for schools and applications to do a few things. First, just one place to secure all identities with layers of protection. We provide identity and access management for the entire school community.

But it's also important to have one central place for learning applications to connect all the data and accounts that are needed for digital learning. And third, and most importantly, An identity platform needs to power meaningful classroom learning experiences, and ideally it's with one secure place for teachers and students to access the digital education resources They need for a great learning experience and at Clever, we make sure everyone has one single secure digital identity that gives them easy access to all of the resources they need.

So our ultimate goal is just to have a smooth uninterrupted learning for all ages. With no glitches, no cyber threats and just safe and seamless access every time. That's the goal. 

[00:06:54] Ben Kornell: Yeah, I mean, I remember when I was in the classroom and you were just managing so many logons, so many usernames. Also, like, rostering was so challenging when You have a new student come to your classroom.

You had to go to all the different platforms and input their data or have them sign up. And I think it's something we really take for granted. This one stop shop, seamless integration. And now that I'm on the school board, it's actually pretty profound. The security that this provides to know that there aren't people kind of coming in through other identities into your ecosystem.

It also has really put clever. At this unique intersection between what's going on in the classroom and all the ed tech providers. And so most recently you produced a classroom of the future report. Folks can check that out on our ed tech insiders, LinkedIn. And then also we did a podcast episode where we dove into that, but it had so many interesting insights.

You know, I'm curious, given that you're the CEO and you're seeing all this stuff happen, what were a few of the findings from the report that you think have the biggest impact on the future of education? 

[00:08:04] Trish Sparks: Yeah, so that report was so great for so many reasons, but one of the things I was so happy to see is that today, 80 percent of educators now believe That technology has actually made their jobs easier.

We have come a long way. This was definitely not the case just a few years ago. And based on the data that we're seeing, I believe the growing role of AI and automation in the classroom will follow a similar path, you know, when we can reduce teacher workloads with AI. It can have a significant impact on the future of education.

And we also know that teacher burnout is a real issue, leading to attrition and vacancies in the classroom. And while AI won't solve this issue completely, it is already providing some teachers that are early adopters with the ability to automate and streamline administrative tasks, like grading and lesson planning, and create more time for them to actually focus on teaching.

Thank you. And supporting students and assisting with individualized learning. And so I'm confident that the future of education is bright with some of these new opportunities. 

[00:09:19] Ben Kornell: Totally AI is what everyone's talking about in the kind of ed tech future. And what was interesting about the report is it gives you a little bit of snapshot of where we are today and how far we've come.

But also, you know, it alluded to how A. I. could shape the future of teaching and learning. What role does Clever play in the A. I. adoption or future transformation? 

[00:09:41] Trish Sparks: Yeah, so we know that teachers are adopting A. I. technology at a rapid rate, like even faster than they adopted EdTech a few years ago. And a lot of Clever's application partners are already integrating A.

I. into their offerings. And based on the data, in fact, in 2023, 48 percent of teachers surveyed said that they believed AI would make their jobs harder. And in just one year, as the power of AI has started to become better understood, that number has dropped to only 18 percent of teachers believe AI will make their jobs harder.

So that is. Great progress. And, you know, I'm personally excited about the ways that we're exploring how AI can reduce burdens for folks in our school community through Clever's identity platform. And I'm not sure if you know this, but Clever is now used in about 78 percent of U. S. K 12 schools. So that can drive real scale and time savings.

[00:10:49] Ben Kornell: So the other big trend that people are talking about in. EdTech, EdTech Circles is cyber security, and there's a number of published reports about schools being incredibly vulnerable to attack, and it's a growing concern, not just for CTOs, but now for superintendents too. What are some of the most common risks that they face and how does Clever help them mitigate these challenges?

[00:11:12] Trish Sparks: Oh, wow. You're right. Our K 12 schools are facing more cyber security challenges than ever before. And because their challenges are so unique, they really do require tailored solutions. And, you know, one of the best parts of my job is visiting schools and getting to talk with the IT and curriculum folks at the school district level.

Working to support them and one thing I've learned over and over again when I talked to these folks is that cyber security challenges often stem from a severe lack of resources in school districts and that school districts of all sizes. And in our cybersecure report from earlier this year, the number one challenge facing school districts is a lack of dedicated staffing to cybersecurity, followed closely behind budget constraints, of course.

But, you know, clever IDM, for example, is one of those solutions that can reduce manual tasks by automating activities like account creation and role changes. It really can save time for those understaffed. It teams and, you know, just a few weeks ago, I was talking to a CIO at one of the largest school districts in the country, which will remain unnamed.

But we were discussing the fact that while having. More devices in schools can be a great thing and game changing for learning. On the flip side, having more technology and devices in schools than ever before also creates more cybersecurity risks. He is constantly dealing with phishing attempts and ransomware attacks.

And that's specifically why we developed Clevers Classroom MFA offering. It's to provide that second layer of protection for the applications that are used by the students. I mean, we all know that multi factor authentication has been around in the business world for a really long time. But those solutions just don't work in the classroom.

Kindergarteners don't generally have cell phones to receive their pin code for MFA access. And so, in a lot of schools too, you know, teachers aren't even Allowed to use their personal phones during the school day, so we had to figure out a way how to provide that same type of protection, but for use in the classroom and our classroom M.

F. A. Solution provides that enterprise level protection by preventing unauthorized access to accounts. And the best part is it was specifically designed with the needs of the classroom in mind. So now our student accounts and their data can be just as secure as the grownups around them. 

[00:14:11] Ben Kornell: Amazing. You know, I'm curious, um, in terms of trends that you see, you've got to be focused on All of these security things.

And sometimes it's not the most exciting or inspiring. And sometimes it's thinking about, you know, the worst of humanity, but you also get to see really interesting things going on in the landscape and. Across your platform and across these 28 million students. So what, what is the most exciting trend that you see in the ed tech landscape right now that our listeners should keep an eye on?

[00:14:44] Trish Sparks: Yeah. So there are a couple of things I'm personally excited about. I mean, as a former teacher, I'm really paying attention to creative ways to address the teacher shortages. Over the last couple of years, my kids have had multiple instances of Of having long term substitute teachers that are not certified or have the experience in the classroom to effectively teach the content because of teacher vacancies.

And so improving teacher working conditions is one way to do that. Removing friction for teachers and increasing instructional time could actually let them do more of the job that they signed up for. And like I mentioned before, some of our application partners on the Clever platform are doing some really cool things.

I mentioned this one earlier, but an example is just to make lesson planning easier by leveraging AI. Companies like Canva and Kahoot, they are at the leading edge of delivering some of these really innovative solutions. And another trend, as a parent of two teenagers in high school preparing to enter the world, I care a lot about our schools adopting more effective approaches to protecting student data.

I mean, luckily, Clever has been a key player in this effort for over a decade, you know, protecting student identities. And now, even more so, with multi factor authentication for students of all ages. Cybersecurity insurance companies are starting to require it, not just for staff, but MFA for students. And so, it's really exciting that Clever serves this purpose of providing that solution for education.

And so, I just, I can't wait to continue innovating in this area and, Serving even more schools by providing secure and seamless access to their digital learning resources in 2025 and beyond. 

[00:16:51] Ben Kornell: This is so awesome. I will just say before we let you go, Clever has been such a great partner for EdTech Insiders.

You all sponsored our happy hour at ASU GSV and also at South by Southwest. We've also just been such a great convener for the EdTech space. Thanks. I know in many ways, you're the front door to edtech for so many of us in the space. And we're just really grateful that you all have kind of kept that initial spirit and purpose of connecting the ecosystem.

So thank you for, you know, grabbing the baton and, you know, carrying that torch forward for us. 

[00:17:29] Trish Sparks: Yes. Well, thank you so much. This has been a lot of fun. It's the first time we've done something like this, so we should do it again. 

[00:17:36] Ben Kornell: And if people want to find out more about Clever, where should they go? 

[00:17:40] Trish Sparks: Clever.

com. 

[00:17:41] Ben Kornell: That's easy. All right. Well, thanks so much, Trish Sparks. CEO of Clever. So great to have you on the EdTech Insiders pod. 

[00:17:49] Trish Sparks: Thank you so much. 

[00:17:51] Alex Sarlin: Thanks for listening to this episode of EdTech Insiders. If you liked the podcast, remember to rate it and share it with others in the EdTech community. For those who want even more EdTech Insider, subscribe to the free EdTech Insiders newsletter on Substack.

People on this episode