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In 2022-2023, EdSurge asked educators and education leaders to share their insights on learning “lost” and “gained.”
The COVID pandemic has inundated new people with an interest in building tools and businesses that help improve education. And today’s technological environment, with easy-to-use tools and social media, makes it easier than ever for participants to reach learners around the world and sell their products and services. Anyone with a can get started virtually overnight.
However, as someone who has long helped entrepreneurs enter and grow in the edtech space, I can say that turning good ideas into practical innovations that empower educators and students remains a challenge. . Sustaining these innovations has made it difficult to build communities in a time of remote work and lingering pandemic concerns.
To oversimplify early-stage entrepreneurship, the process involves iteration and benchmarking. Entrepreneurs have to absorb and process ‘data’ such as ‘what have you learned about yourself, your team, your customers, your business, your community and the world’. “How can I apply this learning to reframe the problem I’m trying to solve, or the solution I’m trying to build?” As we know where we stand, those building early-stage companies should test each new iteration with the expectations and ethics of the market, the community, and themselves.
Those who repeat often and carefully are more likely to succeed. With each step of the journey, the effort gets closer to identifying “land,” a market need that can be served more effectively or efficiently.
At the beginning of this decade, the habits, communities, and institutions — or “spylands” — that entrepreneurs had on hand to source, iterate, and benchmark data collapsed. Gone were the good times and get-togethers that innovators had come to rely on for mental health and sanity checks, and then building that same trust online proved difficult. Local ecosystems have changed as families and institutions become disengaged and fragmented. The “tribal knowledge networks” that existed for funding, market needs, manpower availability, and “unfair advantage” were dismantled.
Ease of initiation has created new challenges for each entrepreneur as online learning has become more acceptable to institutions and individuals and has become the only option in most cases. Thousands of companies were born overnight, meaning many were vying for the attention of busy decision makers online. Even experienced marketers found it difficult to stand out from the noise and attract customers. The competition required innovators to understand the increasingly complex landscape needed to differentiate their solutions. Getting started has never been easier. But it became harder and harder to stay alive and reach a sure footing.
As the traditionally sticky relationship between innovators and educational institutions became plagued with additional bureaucracy and uncertainty about the future, “the land” itself shifted place and terrain. This left many innovators and educators feeling misunderstood, outdated, and disconnected. With the exception of the innovator who happened to be in the best spot when the wind turned, everyone else forgot what they thought they knew and turned their attention to providing the best possible service to their customers. I had to reconfirm the meaning.
Years later, we are building a new system for entrepreneurial learning and networking. Instead of going to college to get a job, traditional students are increasingly finding or creating jobs attached to college. For example, Inside Higher Ed recently found that the fastest growing segment of students enrolled in online colleges such as Western Her Governor’s College and Southern He University of New Hampshire are traditional age students. emphasized. Online universities still serve working adults, but these working adults are increasingly traditional students who choose to pursue entrepreneurship or pursue an online degree in technology while working. .
These changes have allowed others to focus on themselves anew and to increase their productivity at will. The creator economy has exploded, with over 200 million entrepreneurial creators now active online, each leveraging a diverse portfolio of platforms and business models. While it takes him six months for most creators to earn their first dollar, 10% of creators make more than her $100,000, which is among the top wage earners in the United States. Equivalent to 10%. The boundaries of content, business and self-expression.
As learners become more aware of the impact of their purchasing decisions, businesses are increasingly feeling the need to consider environmental and social impacts. This has led to the rise of social entrepreneurship, where businesses are created not only to make a profit, but to have a positive impact on the world. We increasingly see hybrids of these legal forms that are funded by public and private resources and seek to solve global and local learning challenges. Address problems that are too big or too small for traditional companies.
The sheer amount of information available online can be overwhelming, and it can be difficult for edtech entrepreneurs to know where to start. , various online communities and niche forums have sprung up where ideas, advice and support can be shared. These communities, often in the form of accelerators and incubators, provide a place to ask questions, seek guidance, find support, and provide opportunities for young and experienced entrepreneurs. It has become an irreplaceable resource. In today’s environment, instead of focusing on the right ‘data’, ask for the most fruitful ‘prompts’, i.e. the questions that get the most effective answers when asked by the community (or ChatGPT) is required. Cohorts develop strong bonds, and like-minded buddies can call each other at 4 a.m. in the dark.
While traditional accelerators and incubators may be highly competitive, new-generation inclusive programs are much more receptive, tailored and collaborative to the participants involved. Programs like StartEd (where I work), LearnLaunch in the US, ProjectEd and many others around the world recognize what it takes to solve painful and systemic problems in education. with a more patient business model and nuanced learning experience.
Gone is the requirement for rapid growth at every stage of an Edtech startup that often leads to burnout and disappointment. We are seeing the emergence of a more collaborative culture where entrepreneurs share ideas and resources to help each other survive and succeed.
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