People + Technology: Keeping Our Work Mizzen-Driven

I sat down with my 18-year-old daughter late last year to walk through her work history. Part of the exploration included her asking to see my resume. The first thing she noticed was my personal mission statement or “ways of working,” describing how I approach any role. I further explained that the intention behind that statement was to let would-be employers know what guides my pursuits and aspirations. Part of this also involved looking at the differences in terminology, comparing skills, character traits, and values. What we landed on was the value of understanding ourselves, the connection that comes from knowing one another’s north star, and the success that comes from self-awareness and empathy for others. I share this story because it describes our journey here at Mizzen Education: continuously revisiting and strengthening our organizational identity to grow our empathy for the now 26,000 educators who have come to rely on our people, products, and solutions.

We are grateful for the opportunity to share another year of our work and mission with you all as we look back to 2025! We have learned much since launching as an independent organization in October 2023, namely that our growth as an education technology (EdTech) organization has been about balancing our energies and talents to find harmony in our passion for both our technologies and the amazing people we call the Mizzen community.

There’s one reality about the relationship between people and technology that you won’t always hear from companies and organizations in the business of developing digital solutions. Establishing true harmony between people and technology requires asking the right questions, practicing active and empathetic listening, innovating by first mastering the basics, having personal humility, and caring about the people you're serving more than the products you create. And one can’t forget about having data that informs and inspires. The type of data that tells a well-rounded story involving people, settings, and scenarios. An example of simple yet powerful data is a Mizzen inquiry in which we asked educators to describe how having access (or lack thereof) to supplies and materials impacts learning experiences for young people.

In full transparency, 2025 wasn’t about achieving the biggest numerical growth. Our growth came from better knowing who makes up the Mizzen community. Our success has come from having more intimate knowledge of the conditions in which many of our end-users work in and through. Our ah-ha’s were born from having real-talk with people who have dug into our platform and from those who’ve delivered VERY constructive feedback. So yes, we slowed down a bit in our reach and went deeper in our connections and insights.

It’s because of this people-first approach that we reached our most significant moment as an organization: launching our totally new and re-imagined platform and solutions in August 2025. The entire Mizzen team pulled on all levers of engineering, learning experiences, content development knowledge, design and communication, strategic partnerships, and the like to release a resource worthy of our educator community. By listening to our community and connecting with their reality, it was clear that Mizzen needed to go beyond providing access to resources to offering tools and services useful to a wider array of adults and youth-serving professionals across varied settings and situations, including learning during the school day and at home.

This was also a year in which we went further for our educator community, designing new professional development experiences and launching our first-ever multi-year professional development engagement with the Flint Center for Educational Excellence. And there’s more on the horizon: anticipated new solutions to increase language accessibility, internal tools that allow us to design and distribute content to the field with greater efficiency, and future AI-based products that will power up the Mizzen experience. 

One of our aspirations here at Mizzen is to know our educator community better than anyone else. We want to hear about their struggles, successes, adventures, and normal everyday interactions with young people. We often say that learning changes when staff are present and genuinely connect with young people. The same can be said for our relationship with educators. We believe “how” learning happens dramatically changes when organizations like ours truly know and connect with the hearts, minds, and smarts of adults leading and facilitating learning journeys. There are many stories within the Mizzen community that underscore the importance of the relationship we have with them beyond the platform.

In a recent education technology story, the author captured the perfect quote for describing how we envision interacting with individual educators and youth-serving organizations:

“Technology should serve education–not the other way around.”

In closing, we believe that Mizzen’s best innovations will come from our in-depth knowledge and empathy for educators (the people), combined with our drive to reduce friction and increase ease through great products and tools (our technology).

We invite you to join us in our mission of connecting people with technology! Donate today to power joyful learning for thousands of youth and completely free technology for the educators who make it all happen.