Vote Now For Robin Hood’s SXSW and SXSW EDU 2025 Sessions

Robin Hood’s program officers and community partners have crafted an exciting lineup of proposals for this year’s SXSW and SXSW EDU, focusing on innovative solutions to enhance educational equity, leverage AI technology, and strengthen community engagement in New York City. We need YOUR help to bring these ideas to life and make a lasting impact!

Voting is simple! Follow these steps to cast your vote for our proposals:

1. Sign Up: Click here to sign up for an account with SXSW. Create your account, verify your email, and sign in. If you already have an account, click here to sign in.
2. Vote for Proposals: Return to this post and click on the panel title links to visit each proposal’s page. Once there, click the “Vote Up” button in the top right corner to support our sessions and help bring them to the SXSW and SXSW EDU stage!

Your vote is essential in making our sessions a reality! Join us in supporting Robin Hood’s mission to empower communities through education and innovation. Your vote matters, and together, we can make sure every New Yorker gets a fair shot! Spread the word, share this post, and let’s get as many votes as possible for @RobinHoodNYC at #SXSW and #SXSWEDU 2025!

Remember, the community voting period runs from August 6-18, 2024.

SXSW EDU

• Accelerating Literacy: NYC’s High-Impact Tutoring Model
• AI Tools to Support Literacy & Computational Thinking
• Building the Foundation: Early Childhood Professionals Unite
• Disarming Stigmas for Early Ed Equity in BIPOC Communities
• It Takes a Village: Preparing Teachers for the Age of AI
• Live AI-Powered Problem-Solving Solutions Workshop
• Power, Trust, & Community in NYC Schools
• Redefining Early Learning for Our Youngest Learners
• Reimagining Everyday Places as Early Learning Hubs
• Scaling Digital Native Nonprofits-Challenges & Opportunities
• Strengthening Family-School Connections with EdTech

SXSW

• AI x Poverty: Innovating for Opportunity
• Community Driven Narrative Change: Undo Poverty in Flushing
• From Poverty to Prosperity: Redefining Brownsville
• Innovation in Impact Investing
• Social Impact Founders Meet Up

SXSW EDU – March 3-6, 2025

✔ Accelerating Literacy: NYC’s High-Impact Tutoring Model

Panel | Teaching & Learning | K-12 Education

Delve into New York City’s groundbreaking public-private partnership designed to deliver high-impact tutoring to over 50,000 students, enhancing individualized education and accelerating learning. This panel discussion will showcase how education leaders, community partners, teachers, and philanthropic organizations collaborate to support, elevate, measure, and sustain effective tutoring citywide. Attendees will gain insights into the essential elements of high-impact tutoring, the role of blended philanthropy, and practical strategies to replicate this successful model in their communities.

✔ AI Tools to Support Literacy & Computational Thinking

Panel | Future of Tech | K-12 Education

Generative AI has the potential to personalize learning, curate content, and promote collaboration, while questions remain about how to integrate AI in elementary schools in safe, equitable, and ethical ways. With support from Robin Hood, the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop and The GIANT Room are co-designing an AI-storytelling platform with students and educators from a low-income NYC public school district. Our panel will discuss lessons learned and effective strategies for integrating hands-on STEM, AI literacy, and creative writing in elementary school classrooms.

✔ Building the Foundation: Early Childhood Professionals Unite

Meet Up | Community Initiatives | Early Learning

Join us for a dynamic meet-up tailored for early childhood education professionals. This session offers a platform to connect, share, and discuss the unique challenges faced by those working with children aged 0-8. From brain development to professional development to AI innovation and more, we’ll explore key issues and collaborative solutions, local and national. Co-hosted by Michelle Kang, CEO of NAEYC, and Kelly Escobar, Managing Director of Early Childhood at Robin Hood, this session promises insightful conversations and networking opportunities.

✔ Disarming Stigmas for Early Ed Equity in BIPOC Communities

Workshop | Equity & Justice | Early Learning

Discover insights from a successful initiative in Brownsville, New York City, that increases uptake of necessary early childhood special education interventions through confronting hesitancy and stigmas in Black and Brown communities. This case study leverages community engagement and mindset shifts around child development, highlighting how addressing stigma among marginalized groups significantly improves early learning. Leave with a replicable blueprint for clarifying challenges, disarming stigmas, and supporting communities and families to achieve equity across early childhood education.

✔ It Takes a Village: Preparing Teachers for the Age of AI

Panel | Teaching & Learning | Higher Education

For K-12 students to thrive in the age of AI, their teachers must be prepared to teach computing and digital literacy. The City University of New York (CUNY) prepares about 1500 of the new teachers hired at New York City Public Schools annually. Discover how CUNY’s multi-tiered, multi-sector approach is transforming teacher training to integrate computing and digital literacies. During an interactive panel with faculty, teacher candidates, and nonprofit partners, participants will hear examples and learn strategies to support professional learning and effective classroom implementation.

✔ Live AI-Powered Problem-Solving Solutions Workshop

Workshop | Future of Tech | Convergence

Join us for an engaging workshop with experts from Decoded Futures and the Robin Hood Learning + Technology Fund. This workshop focuses on the importance of leveraging AI in education nonprofits. Experts in AI, philanthropy, and nonprofits will discuss why nonprofits need to adopt AI-driven solutions and share practical examples of solutions developed through AI. Participants will be invited to bring their AI challenges for live problem-solving. The session will include sharing landscape analysis and tools for participants to explore AI applications with guidance.

✔ Power, Trust, & Community in NYC Schools

Conversation | Equity & Justice | K-12 Education

NYC’s Community Schools are pioneering a transformative approach to education by blurring the lines between district leadership and the community, sharing leadership to strengthen education. This session explores the critical roles of race, class, and power, emphasizing trust and collaboration to strengthen schools and why it’s important, especially in times of crisis, to deepen relationships rather than retreating to silos. Attendees will delve into NYC’s “inside-outside” strategy for building community, improving quality, and ensuring sustainability.

✔ Redefining Early Learning for Our Youngest Learners

Panel | Health & Wellbeing | Early Learning

Children are learning from the moment they’re born, yet discussions on their education often start with pre-K. This session redefines early learning by highlighting the crucial years before school. By pre-K, children have already spent years learning from the people and places around them. This session features leaders of programs that support social-emotional learning, bonding, and relationships in early childhood. These areas build a strong foundation for success in school and life. Join us in reimagining early education with a holistic approach that truly supports our youngest learners.

✔ Reimagining Everyday Places as Early Learning Hubs

Panel | Community Initiatives | Early Learning

Young children spend 80% of their time outside of school, but too many lack access to joyful experiences that encourage learning through hands-on activities and play. Though these opportunities exist in our highest-income neighborhoods, they are often inaccessible to families in under-resourced communities. Join us as we explore innovative programs that tackle this divide by transforming overlooked spaces—sidewalks, shelters and even jails—into nurturing learning environments accessible to all kids, and discover why community involvement is crucial for fostering children’s early development.

✔ Scaling Digital Native Nonprofits-Challenges & Opportunities

Panel | Future of Tech | K-12 Education

Discover the journey of digital native nonprofits as they navigate challenges and harness unique opportunities. How do digital non-profits scale? What role does AI play in transforming tech-empowered nonprofits? Join expert leaders from the field to explore innovative solutions and actionable strategies for sustainable growth in the nonprofit sector.

✔ Strengthening Family-School Connections with EdTech

Panel | Community Initiatives | K-12 Education

Technology is changing the education landscape and creating an opportunity to engage families in their children’s learning. From this panel, learn from district leaders, community organizations, and systems change experts how they are using the proliferation of AI and other ed tech to strengthen school-family partnerships and support student learning. Panelists will highlight NYC’s effort to engage families in improving literacy instruction. Participants will learn to use and customize new tools and resources for assessing and updating their approach to tech-powered school-family partnerships.

SXSW – March 7-15, 2025

✔ AI x Poverty: Innovating for Opportunity

Panel | Artificial Intelligence

Join Rich Buery, CEO of Robin Hood, as he announces and unveils the winners of the Robin Hood AI Poverty Challenge, each receiving a $1,000,000 prize. Sponsored by GitLab Foundation and Bezos Family Foundation, this panel will feature interviews with the three innovators who are leveraging AI to fight poverty. They will discuss their groundbreaking technologies in education, workforce, and financial empowerment, and their impact on creating upward mobility for low-income communities. Discover how AI can address society’s pressing challenges. (Winners not yet selected. Panel has four speakers.)

✔ Community Driven Narrative Change: Undo Poverty in Flushing

Panel | Culture

Explore the transformative power of narrative change in addressing poverty and fostering equity. Featuring the Undo Poverty: Flushing Collaborative, funded by Mobility LABs and powered by Robin Hood, which executed a narrative change campaign including a feature-length documentary, The Cost of Living, to highlight the realities of Flushing residents. Learn how community-driven storytelling can combat the model minority myth, reshape perceptions of poverty, and increase resource access and civic engagement among community residents.

✔ From Poverty to Prosperity: Redefining Brownsville

Panel | Government & Civic Engagement

Explore how Brownsville, BK is transforming its future by challenging the “culture of poverty” narrative. With 40% of residents living in poverty and 25% of adults without high school diplomas, Brownsville has faced decades of intentional disinvestment. However, the Brownsville Hub Cooperative, supported by the Robin Hood’s Mobility LABs initiative, is leveraging local talent and collective power to drive change. This session highlights how BHC is shifting mindsets, addressing the root causes of poverty, and building a narrative of economic prosperity and empowerment in Brownsville.

✔ Innovation in Impact Investing

Panel | Startups

Join leaders from Camelback Ventures, Unleash.org, Blue Ridge Labs, and Symphonic Capital as they discuss innovative models to support social impact founders. Moderated by Sergio Marrero, this panel will explore strategies that have successfully nurtured early-stage startups aimed at creating positive social change. Learn how these organizations provide tailored support, use innovative investing models, and leverage collaboration to support underrepresented and diverse founders. Gain insights into their missions, approaches, and the impact they’ve made on creating sustainable change.

✔ Social Impact Founders Meet Up

Meetup | Startups

Join us for an interactive networking event hosted by Blue Ridge Labs and New Media Ventures, designed to connect social impact startup founders and investors. Focused on innovators addressing the UN SDGs, healthcare, education, affordable housing, and financial inclusion, this meetup will feature engaging activities to foster meaningful connections. Network by impact area, share insights, and discover related events at SXSW, creating opportunities for collaboration and investment. We hosted a meet-up at SXSW in 2024 and would love to do it again!