Education State of the Union: JNUC 2026

Suraj Mohandas, Vice President, Global Head of Education Strategy and Go-To-Market, welcomed Jamf Nation to the Education State of the Union.

"We are currently in an era of accountability in K-12 education," said Mohandas.

The focus is shifting from simply introducing devices into classrooms to asking how students will effectively use them.

"The stakes have never been higher for developing an optimal learning environment for students with one goal in mind," he continued, "learning outcomes."

"Designing an optimal learning environment is not easy," said Mohandas. "We often spend our days thinking about policies, profiles and blueprints." But the real impact of that work is felt by the people using them — a teacher finding a new way to inspire learning, a student finding a new way to demonstrate their knowledge in the classroom, or those special moments when a learner rushes home, excited to show a parent or loved one what they have learned."

"What is also true," he continued, "and we will delve into the details of this research later, is that when a student is actively collaborating and creating on a device, the correlation with higher learning outcomes for them is six times higher than those using technology merely to take notes."

What we do with technology matters.

New challenges and opportunities for school IT

MacBook Neo

While the MacBook Neo isn't an entirely new device, it has increased choice in the classroom. Students can now choose what device works best for them and work seamlessly across various devices across the Apple ecosystem.

Global focus on screen time

"In the US alone," said Mohandas, "we're seeing over 23 states write screen time legislation — and that same focus is also being heard globally. Not because people are essentially against technology, but because they're demanding a way to prove it has purpose and serves key outcomes."

The education industry needs to not only provide students with genuinely absorbing and interactive opportunities to learn, but also a way to prove to legislators (and parents) that student time on devices in school is well spent.

How Jamf helps Apple admins address these changes

"Today," said Mohandas, "we’re going to show you how we’re making that possible with three interconnected moves."

• Identity is the foundation that removes friction from every login and every enrollment — removing any barrier that exists between the learner and the learning environment.
• Device management beyond MDM that supports security, the classroom management experience and the at-home experience.
• Digital governance is the end-to-end control that you have over your learning environment starting with identity all the way to th eimpact you can have in the classroom or at home.

"And through all of this," said Mohandas, "we want to show how we can Power Up the management you already do by going beyond MDM."

Identity for all learners

Gwen Smith, Director, Customer Success Management, took the stage to discuss the impact of identity on school technology.

"When any lesson starts," said Smith, "the first question is often: 'Can every student access the resources they need to succeed?' Educators want to know that technology supports rather than distracts from learning. Because when it comes to using tech in a classroom, every minute spent logging in is a minute spent not learning."

Seamless learning access

"Last year," continued Smith, "we showed you seamless learning access and asked for your feedback."

Jamf Nation's feedback for Jamf:

• Make it simple enough for the youngest learners
• Make it secure
• Make it fast

Eric Blakely, Senior Consulting Engineer, joined Smith to demonstrate what Jamf engineers have done with that feedback. He walked the audience through a demo of how seamless access gets students to educational resources immediately through the steps IT takes to equip a fictional second-grader new to a Jamf admin's school.

Because the admin has already prepared the ground for the student's arrival, all that her new teacher must do is open Class Assigner and have Joan scan her QR code.

Blakely then showed the audience what happens next:

Due to Jamf School's integration with identity and Smart Groups, the student's iPad configures itself the way she needs for class.

Blakely went on to demonstrate:

• How students access key learning applications
• How the user experience adapts to who the student is and what they need
• How a student's settings can follow them to the next school and a higher level of learning or even into a new school district and more

Apple Education Ecosystem Partners

Damone Jones from Worldwide Education Business Development at Apple joined on the stage to share how the Apple Education Ecosystem Partners are working together to support customers with their deployments. His presentation showed how Jamf MDM and RapidID work together to make management even smarter.

Building on Apple

Mat Pullen, Director of Product Marketing at Jamf, joined to discuss how Jamf builds on Apple's educational offerings.

"I think that word — successful — is really important," said Pullen. "Because successful deployment in education isn’t simply about getting technology into the hands of learners. It's about doing so in a way that reflects the needs of the learner, the goals of the teacher and the outcomes the school is trying to achieve."

Pullen explained how Jamf works with Apple, our wider partner ecosystem and schools themselves to turn those capabilities into solutions that work in real classrooms.

Jamf goes beyond simply deploying apps. "We provide teachers with the confidence that what they plan to do will actually work," said Pullen, "that the right apps will be available on the device at the right time."

Whether a lesson requires Goodnotes for teaching and learning collaboration, Seesaw to support progress, or Kahoot! to support formative assessment, teachers know that with Jamf Teacher everything they need will be there when they need it.

Schools are changing their approach to classroom tech

"It’s not about starting with the device and asking: 'What can we do with this?' It’s about starting with the learner," said Pullen, "and asking: 'What do they need to be successful?'"

The conversation stops being about choosing between Mac and iPad — and starts becoming about how learners can move seamlessly between them, choosing the experience that best meets their needs.

"Now, that only happens if managing it feels just as seamless," said Pullen. "When you're in the Apple ecosystem, bringing in MacBook doesn't mean learning a whole new platform."

That's not, he pointed out, how Jamf started.

"We started with managing Apple devices, full stop," said Pullen. "And as education evolves, we evolve with it. iPad, MacBook Neo or any other device: it's all one seamless experience that follows the student."

Anthony Darlow, Senior Consulting Engineer at Jamf, joined Pullen to demonstrate how Jamf makes that possible.

The scenario

"Imagine it's the week before a new school year starts and a delivery arrives of fifty, a hundred, maybe five hundred MacBook Neos," said Pullen.
"Your success isn’t measured by how quickly you enroll those devices. It’s measured by whether every student or teacher can open the device on day one and get straight to work."

Darlow's demo walked the audience through:

• Using Setup Manager
• Platform Single Sign-on (PSSO)
• Using Setup Assistant

New PSSO capabilities arriving soon

"What I’d like to show you today," said Darlow, "is something that we’ve been working on that is powered by the PSSO enhancements of macOS 27. If I click continue, a native web view pops up asking me to scan a QR code."

As a student in this hypothetical scenario, said Darlow, "I've already got my ID badge with a QR code printed on it, so I'll just scan that. That's it; my local account is being created."

Platform SSO has always let you create a local account tied to an IdP with no new password to remember or create. "Now," said Darlow, "with macOS 27 enhancements, we can use our RapidID platform to make that seamless. A student can create the account, log back in, or unlock the lock screen with a QR code."

Once the student is at their device, they are already logged into their school apps and educational websites.

Look for this enhancement in early 2027!

Setup Checklist

"We've managed a lot so far," said Darlow, "but there are some things that need user input."

Setup Checklist is designed for exactly that. Like Setup Manager, it's fully customizable for your branding and workflows.

Darlow set up a demonstration of how this works.

"So," said Mat Pullen, "We’ve removed barrier after barrier for the end-users: the apps are ready, identity is ready, the experience is personalized and ready to go. But what about the work an admin needs to put into this setup?

Enhancements to blueprints

Activations and Locations and Sites

Darlow showed the audience how much blueprints have changed the game for IT admins by displaying the Jamf School console.

"Declarative Device Management (DDM) and Jamf blueprints are changing how we manage devices," said Darlow. "Apple has determined that DDM is now the standard for managing Apple devices."

"Recently," he continued, "we've added Activations to blueprints, bringing management logic directly to the device."

He walked attendees through how these work step-by-step with a demo.

"We’ve shown you a lot of what happens behind the scenes," said Pullen, "but educators never see any of this. They experience the result."

• A device that’s ready.
• A lesson that starts on time.
• A student who can get straight to work.

"That’s the impact good management has," he continued. "And when we connect that management with identity, security and learning workflows — that’s when it becomes more than MDM."

"And perhaps what's most exciting is that the experience isn't confined to a single device," said Pullen. "A student may move between devices based on their learning need, focus of the lesson or where they may be working. The device may change, the learner may change, but the experience stays consistent."

From screen time to screen value

"Once the technology reaches the classroom, the next question is, increasingly, 'How much time are students on the device?'”

"Parents are asking it, schools are now asking it, governments are asking it, but that question only tells us part of the story," Pullen continued. "Maybe a better question is: 'What are students doing on the device?'"

Jamf Parent, Jamf Teacher and Jamf Safe Internet

Jamf Parent has long provided parents with the tools they need to feel confident their child’s iPad is set up at home to maintain focus and only provide educational access. Our MacBook solution has the same controls.

This is where Jamf Teacher, Jamf Parent and Jamf Safe Internet work together as one connected approach to keep students focused on learning.

"A screen time report can't tell you if a learning barrier got removed, if a lesson landed, if a parent felt confident, if a classroom stayed focused,"
said Pullen. "Those are the things education actually cares about — and none of them show up on a usage dashboard."

Screen time tells you a number. Screen value tells you what that number is worth.

"And now," Pullen continued, "your screen value gets its Power Up."

Screen value rather than screen time

To demonstrate this Power Up, Dr. Emily Froese, Senior Education Leadership Executive, joined Pullen.

"I want to bring a bit of evidence into the conversation," said Froese. "I am pleased to introduce Dr. Damian Bebell, author and researcher behind the study 'Engaged Teaching: Engaged Learning, An Empirical Study of Teaching, Learning, and Student Engagement Across the K–12 Community of Apple Distinguished Schools.'"

Together, Froese and Bebell presented some of the study's methodology and findings on students and devices.

Engaged Teaching: Engaged Learning study

The "Engaged Teaching: Engaged Learning" research study explored classroom practices, teacher values and student engagement across 17,078 K–12 teachers from 323 schools in 31 countries participating in the Apple Distinguished Schools program.

"What did the research tell you about the difference between simply having access to technology and actually using it effectively?" asked Froese.

Bebell explained the findings of the study: Across this set of schools, richer pedagogical practices were more often related to classrooms with more frequent technology use — particularly when it was students using the tech. Researchers also found a positive relationship between students' constructive use of technology (active creation rather than passive note-taking) and levels of student engagement across the diverse sample of global classrooms.

He and Froese had a conversation delving deeper into the findings and into strategies that school IT administrators could incorporate to encourage these kinds of results.

"The measure of a successful technology deployment isn’t really the technology itself," concluded Froese. "It’s what teachers and students are able to do because it’s there. And that means our job isn’t simply to manage devices. It’s to remove the barriers around them — making access seamless, keeping the environment secure, and giving teachers the confidence and control to use technology purposefully."

Ultimately, when all of that works, the technology can fade into the background — and teaching and learning can take center stage.

Keeping the focus on learning

Suraj Mohandas returned to bring the presentation to a close.

"Over the last year, we've invested in identity because we believe it's foundational," said Mohandas. "We've deepened our partnership with Apple because we believe in choice and flexibility. We've built for macOS, for parent support, and for screen value because we believe education is evolving, and Jamf evolves with it."

Identity

Management

Digital Governance

access for parents at home

Routines

Engage in a city close to you. Think of Jamf Nation Meetups as a half-year report. Identity-specific session as well. We're also at EduCause/EduCon?

He continued: "When management works together with identity, security, automation, classroom and at-home workflows, we’re not just configuring technology — we’re creating the conditions where teachers can teach and students can learn."

Success, he explained, isn’t putting technology in the hands of every student. It’s what happens next.

• Can students get what they need without barriers?
• Can teachers inspire their students?
• And can IT make all of that happen simply and securely?

"That’s the experience we’re working to create at Jamf," he said.

He had a suggestion for the audience to think about as they left: What’s one barrier you could remove tomorrow?

• One login that could become seamless.
• One workflow you could automate.
• One opportunity to turn screen time into screen value.