Sir Ken Robinson, a leading creativity advocate whom many of you know from his bestselling book “The Element,” and his acclaimed TedTalk video, has joined Adobe in the past by having a voice in our blog. “The Element” inspired readers all over the world to discover what really makes them tick and get the most out of their lives and work. Today, the long-awaited companion and complimentary book, “Finding Your Element: How to Discover Your Talents and Passions and Transform Your Life,” is being released.

To accompany the book’s debut, a new one-hour TV program on American Public Television, “Finding Your Element with Sir Ken Robinson,” will air on public television stations nationwide beginning June 1 (check local listings). The program offers practical advice as well as techniques and resources that we believe will help educators put creative ideas into practice in the classroom. Per Sir Ken, the “element” is the point where natural talents meet personal passions; once you find your element, your life takes on a new character and purpose.

Here at Adobe, we focus on helping educators and students discover their passions by advocating for creativity and creative thinking in the classroom. Finding your “element” plays a key role in unleashing creativity – so we encourage you to watch Sir Ken’s PBS program, think about where your talents and passions meet, how they define your personal brand, and how you can articulate your brand in ways that will inspire your students. That way you can make creativity an everyday element in your classroom.

Join us @adobeedu by tweeting with the #CreateNowEdu hashtag to let us know how you are unlocking creativity in your classroom! You can also participate in the conversation about Sir Ken by following the #SirKenElement hashtag.

Disclosure: Adobe Education Marketing team is a proud sponsor of Sir Ken’s public program on American Public Television.

As you may have already heard, today at Adobe MAX, the Creativity Conference, Adobe announced a significant update to Adobe Creative Cloud, the company’s flagship offering for creatives. Available in June and packed with new features, Creative Cloud reimagines the creative process through a stunning set of Creative Cloud desktop applications (“CC” apps) and sophisticated cross-device collaboration and publishing capabilities. Creative files can be stored, synced and shared, via Creative Cloud; and Behance, the world’s leading online creative community, is now integrated with Creative Cloud, so customers can showcase work, get feedback on projects and gain global exposure. For education, this means keeping a competitive edge and providing students and educators with access to the latest tools for college and career success.

This update to Creative Cloud includes the next generation of Adobe desktop applications—including Adobe Photoshop® CC, InDesign® CC, Illustrator® CC, Dreamweaver® CC and Premiere® Pro CC. Adobe’s desktop tools, previously known as Creative Suite (CS), are now branded CC to reflect that they are an integral part of Creative Cloud and have been reinvented to support a more intuitive, connected way of creating. Adobe Creative Cloud includes more than 30 tools and services that enable professional grade content creation and delivery across print, web, mobile apps, video and photography.

New Licensing Program for Education

Also today, Adobe announced a new licensing option for primary, secondary, and higher education institutions. The Education Enterprise Agreement (EEA) program is an easy-to-manage, term-based licensing program that gives educational institutions access to the new CC apps. With this program, institutional customers can have the creative tools they need to be more productive, foster creativity in teaching and learning, and help their students develop essential digital communication skills.

Additional ways students, educators and institutions can purchase Creative Cloud:

• Creative Cloud for individual—includes a membership offer for individual use by students and teachers available on Adobe.com and through authorized resellers.
• Creative Cloud for enterprise—provides the best coverage model for institution-wide access to Creative Cloud apps and services under an Enterprise Term Licensing Agreement (ETLA).

For more information about Creative Cloud enhancements please see today’s press release. Additional details on EEA can be found here.

With conflicting research on how classrooms can and should change to better support student learning, it can be challenging for education reformers to know where to focus.

Recently, the Carnegie Corporation announced a $15M grant program to seed the creation of innovative models for new high schools in the U.S. To qualify, applicants must demonstrate how their school plans to leverage Carnegie’s 10 integrated design principles for a high performing secondary school. In their report, Opportunity by Design: New High School Models for Student Success, Carnegie notes that “Instead of retooling individual elements such as teacher preparation, learning time, or technology in isolation, all the elements that we know work and some emerging tools must be integrated into comprehensive school designs that will truly meet the needs of every student.” In essence, we need a complete redesign of how schools work and what schooling means.

There is a lot to be done, but for starters, we’ve seen how integrating technology into a school’s fundamental design can create new avenues for learning and teaching. New tools for visualizing data enable teachers to explain complex material, while helping students better understand complicated math or science concepts. Technology unlocks access to ideas and resources that have value and application beyond the walls of a computer lab; the power of technology impacts classrooms long after the laptop has been powered down for the night.

Most importantly, technology fosters creative thinking by expanding the tools we have to be creative. By incorporating digital storytelling or mobile game design into the classroom, we allow students to explore and think outside the box. And, as we’ve said here before, companies want employees who can do more than specific tasks – they want people who can think creatively, who innovate and who have the right skills for tomorrow’s workplace. To better prepare our students for success, we should integrate lessons and assignments that promote creative and innovative thinking. Technology is just one tool that will help educators achieve these goals.

The opportunity to innovate is here. What do you think it will take to create the high school of tomorrow?

Today, the world needs creative thinkers to help solve the big challenges we face — in our global economy, in our environment, and in social issues. And we need people who are fluent in the latest digital tools that fuel creativity and self-expression. To inspire young women and help them develop skills they will need to become future problem solvers and innovators, Adobe Education hosted a special Tech Girls event at Presentation High School in San Jose, CA. A group of girls, ages 11 to 14, came from all over Silicon Valley to learn how to use Adobe tools including Adobe Edge Animate and Adobe Muse in a series of workshops. Mala Sharma, vice president of GTM and strategy for Creative Pro and Education at Adobe, spoke to these young women about her background and encouraged them to consider careers in technology.

The workshops were led by Adobe Education Leaders; Deila Caballero of Presentation High School, Jeff Larson of Balboa High School in San Francisco and Kevin McMahon of Bellarmine College Prep. All of the presenters were impressed by the knowledge and talent of these young women and praised Tech Girls for providing youth with such amazing opportunities:

“Workshops like this one directly impact the future of STEM fields by planting the seeds of technological inspiration in the minds of today’s young women. By encouraging each generation of girls to be fearless and confident technology users we give them a chance to explore educational opportunities which they may not otherwise have in the standard education model. The best part of this event was watching each student explore a new technology with excitement, creativity and success.” Deila Caballero, Presentation High School, San Jose, CA

“Having the chance to teach Adobe Edge to the young ladies involved in the Tech Girls workshop was a delightful reminder of the capacity of young people to rapidly learn and work with technology. The girls were quick to pick up on the general workflow and then quickly move into discovering things about the software I wasn’t even sure we’d have time to cover. I hope my daughter has a chance to participate in something like the Tech Girls program at some point, as the program is a beacon for encouraging girls pursuit of STEM related interests.” Jeff Larson, Balboa High School, San Francisco, CA

“The Tech Girls Workshop was a great experience. When teaching new apps such as Muse and Edge, students usually require some adjustment period. But these bright young girls were almost finishing my sentences by the time we were done. Moreover, their website and animation work was quite impressive. As a father of a daughter, the Tech Girls program gives me great hope for the future.” Kevin McMahon of Bellarmine College Prep, San Jose, CA

This is just one way Adobe is getting involved in helping youth explore new opportunities through technology and innovation. Share with us how your work inspires kids in new and creative ways.

Technology is changing the way we teach and the classroom is no longer defined by paper, pencils and chalkboards. Thanks to technology, traditional ways of learning are evolving toward a more creative platform. In fact, educators and students alike are redefining the way they share and gain knowledge.

Last month, we had the pleasure of hosting 125 delegates from 12 countries across Asia Pacific at the Adobe Education Leadership Forum 2013. Many education leaders and institutions such as Strathcona Baptist Girls’ Grammar School in Australia, Institute of Technical Education in Singapore, Learning Links Foundation in India and Korea Education Research Information Service, came together to share their experiences and discuss changes they see in education today.

Trevor Bailey, director of worldwide education at Adobe, addressed the importance of fostering creativity, highlighting that it should no longer be an elective in the classroom – it is the future. He also shared how technology enables teachers and students to tap into new streams of learning.

Bruce Dixon, co-founder of Anytime Anywhere Learning Foundation and the founding director at ideasLAB Australia took the stage as well, stressing that educators shouldn’t underestimate the power of technology as it can help students through their learning journey. In fact, contemporary pedagogical insight comes from a better understanding of the realities of the modern learner’s world and how they gain knowledge. More specifically, today’s modern learner can be looked at in three different ways:

• The Social Learner, who moves from ‘me’ to ‘we’
• The Self-Directed Learner, who moves from dependency to autonomy
• The Inquiry-Based Learner, who moves from the known into the unknown

Today, technology caters to the different learning styles, providing educators with a great opportunity to not only embrace the new tools but to continue the evolution of the way we teach and learn. By incorporating technology and creativity into the classroom we are teaching our modern learners in a language that is native to them. This is what they are used to and the best way to prepare them for future success!

Check out more photos from Adobe Education Leadership Forum 2013 here:

— Team ‘Femme Fatale’ shown in photo left to right: Liza Gutierrez, Jennifer Davidson, Samantha Hannis, Marcella Martinez, Skylar Mowery (Rachel Ramsey not pictured.) Photo by GIT major, Tessa Menken

Under guidance from Graphic Information Technology (GIT) professor Arnaud Ehgner, a team of female students from Arizona State University (ASU) has been working tirelessly on a school project to develop a one-level game on par with those created by industry professionals.

Maia, a 2D side-scroll action game for portable devices, is a magical jungle adventure that leads the player through a series of mysterious temples and ruins where the priestess—Maia—tries to head off an attack and keep peace in the village of Kuma.

The game is developed using 3D models for a 2D game. While the scenery is 2D, the characters are created first in 3D, and then transplanted into a 2D world. The team chose to develop the game using Adobe solutions including Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and Adobe Flash Professional because of the compatibility across platforms. Illustrator is used for the game’s concept art; Photoshop to finalize artwork with shading, touch-ups, and closing up texture seams; and Flash Professional for creating an engaging game with consistency across platforms.

“Adobe Photoshop also helps us play with the different perspectives by easily letting us translate and rotate the 3D models onto a 2D plane,” said team leader Rachel Ramsey.

The game targets female players with a strong leading female character. “I am so excited to be a part of Maia, as it has been one of my childhood dreams to create a video game with a strong female protagonist,” notes team member Jennifer Davidson.

Maia, now being expanded to three levels, will officially launch at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2014 for the Independent Gaming Competition and be available as a free demo for a limited time on iOS and Android tablet and mobile devices.

Find out more information: Maia on Facebook, Maia on Twitter, Maia on Tumblr.

College students, get ready to battle! Today we are inviting you to show off your creative talent and stand out on campus by participating in the Adobe Creative Cloud Battle for the Band contest. Make a t-shirt, poster, backstage pass, video, or any other designs produced with Adobe tools for a chance to win an exclusive on campus concert, produced by Live Nation® and pop punk band – All Time Low.

To help you get a winning edge, download a free trial of Adobe Creative Cloud or take advantage of Adobe’s special price of $19.99 for a student membership. But you have to hurry! The contest ends on April 7.

Submissions will be judged between April 8 and April 11 and winners, selected by All Time Low, will be announced by mid-April. While the grand prize winner will receive an exclusive, on-campus performance by All Time Low, the second place winner will receive $1,000USD and all entrants will receive $20USD in Live Nation® Concert Cash© to be used for any concert tickets or merchandise.

Not ready to show off your creative skills? You can also enter the Rock Flight Sweepstakes for a chance to win an all-expenses paid trip for two to any Live Nation concert in the U.S. or Canada. In addition to reviewing submission guidelines and deadline information, contestants can gauge the competition, submit designs and vote for their favorite artwork on Adobe’s Battle for the Band Facebook page.

So what are you waiting for, go out there and show off your creative skills before it’s too late!

People know Adobe for many reasons, many of which revolve around our technologies that help creative professionals bring their ideas to reality and that enable marketers to create and drive industry-leading campaigns based in smart math. At Adobe Summit this week in Salt Lake City, we are talking about our technologies and the future of the industry, and we have specials guests sharing some incredible stories of overcoming tremendous personal and professional challenges to do something amazing. But we also had the opportunity to share a side of Adobe that isn’t talked about as often as our technology.

Today, at our Digital Marketing Summit, we heard from a great mind – Sal Khan about the idea of breaking down barriers to revolutionize whatever you are passionate about. His work and the vision for the Khan Academy, a not-for-profit with the goal of changing education for the better by providing a free world-class education for anyone anywhere, inspired us and evoked a standing ovation from the Summit crowd. In one of those rare moments where I had the opportunity to proudly represent all Adobe employees, I announced that Adobe is donating $50,000 to the Khan Academy to further its groundbreaking approach to education and community change.

That was an incredibly special moment to be able to share with our customers and partners. Beyond our technologies, Adobe has a philanthropic side that does meaningful and inspirational work, but that at times takes a backstage to Adobe’s business initiatives. Adobe Youth Voices represents this side of Adobe, and was created to ignite creative confidence in youth, empowering them to find their voice and make it heard. To date, Adobe Youth Voices has created opportunities for over 120,000 youth. We have a vision of a world where the future creative and mathematical minds of tomorrow are not hindered by circumstance but have endless opportunities to succeed.

Beyond Adobe Youth Voices, our broadly reaching Adobe Foundation is funded by Adobe to leverage human, technological, and financial resources to drive social change and improve the communities in which we live and work. The Adobe Foundation supports innovative programs that further its mission and goals, and we are proud to support Khan Academy as a partner in creating opportunities for the world’s youth. I’m pretty excited about it and speak for all 11,000 Adobe employees in saying that we believe the work we do to better humanity is the most important work we can do.

Adobe announced the 2013 Adobe Design Achievement Awards (ADAA), a global design competition that recognizes the best work of student graphic designers, photographers, illustrators, animators, digital filmmakers, developers and computer artists. Individual and group projects created with Adobe creative software are eligible for submission and will be judged by an international panel of design experts. The ADAA competition has attracted more than 27,000 student participants from a total of 75 countries since the program was introduced in 2001.

The ADAA 2013 competition features 12 entry categories in three segments: Interactive Experience, Motion and Video, and Traditional Media.

• Interactive Experience segment includes: Information Design, Game Art and Development, Installation Design, and Digital Publishing
• Motion and Video includes: Animation, Audio Design, Motion Graphics, and Post-Production Editing
• Traditional Media includes: Illustration, Packaging (including Fashion), Print Communications, and Photograph

Students are encouraged to enter into either, or both, of the two submission sessions, allowing for more flexibility in their schedule. Submission deadlines are April 12 and June 21, 2013. All entries must be received by Adobe no later than 5:00 p.m. (PST) on June 21, 2013. Students can view complete contest guidelines and submit projects at www.adobeawards.com.

Semifinalists will be announced shortly after each judging phase and featured in the ADAA Facebook community. Three finalists per each of the 12 entry categories will be revealed in September while winners will be announced in October during an online awards ceremony and awarded Adobe software and cash prizes.

For more information, visit the ADAA website. Also, check out our Facebook page or follow us @AdobeEDU for the latest news and updates.

Our economic growth and health as a nation rely on our collective ability to innovate. The most successful innovations – across healthcare, education, and the environment – result from the combination of creative thinking, world-class technology, and cutting-edge design. But today’s education system needs to do a better job of setting our students up for success in today’s global workplace. One area we think is critical is around fostering creative thinking. Creativity can no longer be treated as an elective in education; it must be core to the way we teach and learn. STEAM – adding Art and creativity to the national imperative around Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) – is an important step forward here.

In collaboration with the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), and a broad range of education and industry partners, Adobe is working to drive awareness and impact in this area. Part of this work will take place at the SXSW Education event next week in Austin, Texas, in the panel session called, “STEM to STEAM: Full Circle from Education to Economy.” I am thrilled to join other panelists such as Ainissa Ramirez (Yale University), Rosemarie Truglio (Sesame Workshop), Matt Goldman (Blue School & Blue Man Group) and John Maeda (Rhode Island School of Design) to discuss how art and design methods can be introduced into STEM-centric learning. We’d like to invite you to join us in one of the following ways:

1. Join us at SXSWedu. If you are attending this year’s SXSWedu conference, please join us on March 6 at 1:30 p.m. at the Austin Convention Center Room 16AB. We’re also hosting a STEAM social that night. For more information and to RSVP, go here.
2. Join the conversation. Share your thoughts and comments using the hashtag #SXSWSTEAM. If you are attending the SXSWedu panel please share your takeaways using the above hashtag.
3. Tweet to Give. For every mention of #AdobeSXSW on Twitter and Instagram, we will donate $1 up to $10,000 to STEM to STEAM. Learn more about our conversation for a cause here.

Thanks,

Jon Perera: @jon_perera