Educational data advocates: emerging forms of teacher agency in postdigital classrooms

Commercial platforms are being increasingly used in classrooms as teaching and learning tools. Beyond shifts in practice to accommodate this, the teacher becomes a tool of the platform – generating and collecting data for commercial entities. It is time to move from commercial platforms working through teachers to influence education, towards working with teachers in the ethical use of educational data. The purpose of this paper is twofold. Firstly, we draw on semi-structured interviews to present an exploratory typology of teacher influencer behaviour. Secondly, we argue that there is potential for teacher influencers to act as advocates. We introduce the conceptual notion of an ‘educational data advocate’. We call for Teacher Influencers to be recognised as a source of expertise to understand the implications of the use of data-driven educational technologies. By doing so, a new pedagogical economy that promotes ethics and rights alongside educational and commercial outcomes may be generated.