Newark, NJ, January 17, 2018 – Over 300 educational technology (“EdTech”) professionals from 13 states gathered in Whippany, NJ, last week at the ninth annual EdgeCon2018 to discuss the latest in digital leadership and enterprise transformation.
The two-day conference hosted by Edge focused on innovations and efforts to integrate emerging technologies with education. Over 50 breakout sessions were presented across six tracks covering Big Data & Analytics, Education & Technology, Networking & Data Security, Customer Support & Service Excellence, Aligning Business & Technology Strategies, and Transformation Products & Services.
Notable sessions included:
- New Jersey Big Data Alliance: Providing leadership and driving transformation in advanced computation – Presenters shared the future outlook for Big Data in the New Jersey landscape and strategies for engagement of higher education institutions and businesses.
- Transforming Teaching and Learning at PCCC with Open Educational Resources (OER) – Members of Passaic County Community College explained how they developed nearly 50 OER courses that helped students save nearly $100,000 in textbook costs in Fall 2017.
- Dinner and Keynote Address – Internationally-recognized digital economy leader Amber Mac stole the night with her insights on best practices for digital leadership from some of the top organizations in the world, guiding the audience through an engaging keynote.
- Understanding Cybersecurity Risk for School Administrators: Concerns about Information Security – Robert Costanza, Principal Architect at DynTek Services, addressed security issues that specifically concern schools as he walked the audience through a practical program to simplify the cyber risk management process for K-20 executives.
- EdgeSecure and EdgeCloud: How we can help you secure the enterprise and the cloud – Audience members learned advanced cybersecurity measures for identifying the security controls that are critical to organizations. Key takeaways included standards, frameworks, controls and information around Edge’s latest solution, EdgeSecure.
- Panel on IT Leadership Present and Future: Identifying Core Competencies – One of the most pressing issues in education today is colleges’ and universities’ pressure to retain and graduate students on time. The panel uncovered the current education leadership challenges and provided a future outlook as CIOs transform their organizations and redefine their role.
“We’re thrilled with this year’s event, and have heard from many participants that this is the best conference Edge has hosted”, said Dr. Samuel Conn, President and CEO at Edge. “We thank all those who attended this year, and look forward to hosting an even better conference next year.”
EdgeCon 2019 is set for January 9-11, 2019, at the Ocean Place Resort & Spa in Long Branch, New Jersey.
About EdgeCon2018
Now in its ninth year, EdgeCon is the premier, annual education technology conference sponsored by Edge. The event brings together a wide variety of professionals from academic, healthcare, IT and government backgrounds to discuss cutting-edge technology and surrounding issues, as well as the opportunity to learn how to apply real-life solutions to their own institutions.
About Edge
Founded in 2000, Edge is a New Jersey-based 501.3(C) nonprofit which provides high performance optical networking, Internet, digital asset management solutions and IT products and services. Edge provides these solutions to colleges and universities, K-12 school districts, government entities, hospital networks, and businesses as part of a 60-member consortium spread throughout the continental US. The group is governed by New Jersey’s Presidents’ Council and housed at the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) on its Newark, NJ, campus.