Company Updates

Student Voice Excited to Launch New Youth Innovation Advisors with Dell

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Today, in partnership with Student Voice, Dell announced the Youth Innovation Advisors (YIA), a network of 12 young leaders under 22 years of age, who will provide input and feedback to contribute to the development of the our technology and solutions strategy in education. Below is a guest post from Student Voice’s founder Zak Malamed, with his view on the impact of such a group. Zak is in Austin attending SXSWedu, a convergence of energetic and innovative leaders from all backgrounds of the learning landscape including teachers, administrators, university professors, business and policy leaders. You can follow what is happening at the event on Twitter by watching #SXSWedu and #DellVenue.

Photos of all the Youth Innovation Advisors

Today’s announcement of the formation of the Youth Innovation Advisors group marks an exciting development in the role that student voice plays in the education technology and student entrepreneurial fields respectively. Student Voice is excited to partner with Dell on this groundbreaking initiative that will help to facilitate the most authentic and influential student representation in the entire education technology field. 

This is a sign of the developing trend in the field of education technology where student voices are increasingly being put at the front and center of the designing and implementation of new products, ideas, and initiatives. We know that this will increase both the bottom line and student performance.

I am excited to mentor and guide this group to capitalize on the opportunity of having special access to a corporation as renowned as Dell with as wide a reach as the 400,000 schools that Dell is a part of.

Having these students on the ground, experiencing the evolving education system and advocating with and for their peers in both advising Dell’s work and at the various events that they will be attending over the next year has immense value. This newly created platform will facilitate the authentic, diverse, and influential student voices interacting within Dell’s infrastructure and beyond.

Student Voice is also excited to share that the second annual Student Voice Live! will take place on September 20, 2014 in NYC and will feature student voices from across the world, including the Youth Innovation Advisors. We are grateful to have Dell on board as a co-sponsor this year and look forward to making the 2014-2015 the Year of Student Voice in education.

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 Zak Malamed speaks at the DellVenue at SXSWeduZak Malamed is a 20-year-old advocate for the student voice in education policy. He is the founder and organizer of StuVoice.org and the #StuVoice Twitter chats. These efforts focus on uniting and centralizing the student voice. Student Voice also maintains a growing support network of students worldwide that works with students and for students to enhance and empower the student voice. 

About the Author: Laura Pevehouse

Laura Pevehouse was profiled as one of five “social media mavens” in the March 2009 issue of Austin Woman Magazine and named an AdWeek’s TweetFreak Five to Follow. She has been part of the Dell organization for more than 15 years in various corporate communications, employee communications, public relations, community affairs, marketing, branding, social media and online communication roles. From 2014-2018, Laura was Chief Blogger/Editor-in-Chief for Direct2DellEMC and Direct2Dell, Dell’s official corporate blog that she help launch in 2007. She is now a member of the Dell Technologies Chairman Communications team. Earlier in her Dell career she focused on Global Commercial Channels and US Small and Medium Business public relations as part of the Global Communications team. Prior to that, she was responsible for global strategy in social media and community management, as well as marcom landing pages, as a member of Dell’s Global SMB Marketing, Brand and Creative team. When she was part of Dell’s Global Online group, Laura provided internal consulting that integrated online and social media opportunities with a focus on Corporate Communications and Investor Relations. She managed the home page of Dell.com, one of the top 500 global web sites in Alexa traffic rank, and first brought web feeds and podcasts to the ecommerce site. In her spare time she led Dell into the metaverse with the creation of Dell Island in the virtual world Second Life. Laura has earned the designation of Accredited Business Communicator from the International Association of Business Communicators, and received her Bachelor of Arts in Journalism from Louisiana State University. Before joining Dell Financial Services in 2000, she worked at the Texas Workforce Commission and PepsiCo Food Systems Worldwide.