Most EdTech companies pitch schools before they understand how decisions get made inside them. School budgets are tight, sales cycles are long, and trust is hard to earn and easy to lose. In a market this crowded, the vendors who succeed are rarely the loudest ones. They are the ones who understand what a school leader is weighing before they ever pick up the phone.
Smita Kolhatkar has sat on both sides of that equation. She spent 15 years in high tech before becoming an educator, and today she is Assistant Head for Innovation, Responsible AI and EdTech at Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School in Palo Alto. She evaluates new products constantly, built her school's AI Tinkery program to teach AI literacy from kindergarten up, and has a clear, specific list of what earns her trust and what ends a conversation before it starts.
In this conversation, Smita walks through her actual buying process: the no-gos that end a pitch immediately, why conference expo halls still outperform months of email outreach, and why a single "no" from her can quietly close the door at several other schools too. It's a clear look at what that decision-making looks like from the other side of the table, for anyone marketing or selling into K-12.
What You'll Learn
The specific deal-breakers that end a vendor conversation immediately, including SSO integration and cross-platform compatibility
The buying signals that earn her attention, and the outreach habits that shut a conversation down fast
Why a single school leader's "no" often reaches ten other schools through her professional network
Why conference expo halls remain one of her most valuable discovery channels, even in a digital-first market
Why AI literacy needs to start at age five, and how her school's AI Tinkery program puts that into practice
Her take on the no-screens debate, and why treating EdTech as all-or-nothing misses the real question schools are asking
Why It Matters
EdTech companies are working in one of the toughest sales environments in years: tighter budgets, longer sales cycles, and a market flooded with AI tools faster than schools can evaluate them. What Smita describes is not just one school's experience, it is a window into how school leaders across the country are making these calls right now. She is not only a buyer, she is a connector: when something works, it moves through her professional network, and when something falls flat, that travels just as fast. For EdTech marketers and sales teams, the lesson is that a sale is never just to one person. The trust built or lost in a single conversation compounds across an entire network of schools.
Resources Mentioned in this Episode:
Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School
The K-8 school where Smita serves as Educational Technology and Innovation Director.AI Tinkery at Hausner
The maker-style AI lab Smita built for students to experiment hands-on with AI tools and concepts.AI Tinkery at Stanford GSE
The Stanford Graduate School of Education program that inspired Smita's AI Tinkery model, credited to Dr. Karin Forssell.Stanford Accelerator for Learning
An overview of the Stanford initiative behind the AI Tinkery framework.AI Quests
A resource Smita references for structured AI literacy activities.Hour of AI
A companion resource to Hour of Code, focused specifically on AI literacy."The Learning Frontier"
Smita's blog post for Hausner on where AI fits in K-12 classrooms.
Elana Leoni, Host
Elana Leoni has dedicated the majority of her career to improving K-12 education. Prior to founding LCG, she spent eight years leading the marketing and community strategy for the George Lucas Educational Foundation where she grew Edutopia’s social media presence exponentially to reach over 20 million education change-makers every month.
Smita Kolhatkar, Guest
Smita Kolhatkar is currently Assistant Head for Innovation, Responsible AI & Ed Tech at Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School, President of the Silicon Valley chapter of the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA), adjunct faculty at Notre Dame de Namur Univiersity (NDNU), and curriculum advisor at Project Scientist.
Born in India, she completed her undergraduate degree in Engineering before spending fifteen years in high tech. She later moved into education, earning her Multiple Subject Credential, Administrative Credential, and Masters in Educational Leadership, and has since worked as a classroom teacher, a Teacher on Special Assignment, and an administrator in educational technology roles.
Smita is passionate about every student, from kindergarten on, learning computer science, becoming AI literate, and having access to Makerspaces to build and create. She is a writing team member for the PK-12 Computer Science Standards and for Cyber.org's K-12 cybersecurity standards, and she most recently pioneered an AI Tinkery for elementary and middle school students. She serves on several educational boards and speaks regularly at conferences across the country.
Outside of work, she enjoys running, hiking, reading, puzzles, board games, and traveling.
About All Things Marketing and Education
What if marketing was judged solely by the level of value it brings to its audience? Welcome to All Things Marketing and Education, a podcast that lives at the intersection of marketing and you guessed it, education. Each week, Elana Leoni, CEO of Leoni Consulting Group, highlights innovative social media marketing, community-building, and content marketing strategies that can significantly increase reach, relationships, and revenue.
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