A3 – Stringwood Student Information System

Feedback: Data management is becoming a more and more critical field in education. Accountability continues to be at the forefront and teachers need a strategic way to manage this. Your blurb about the project included information that would be excellent in the elevator pitch. A sample of the program, the fact that it is based off of Google Apps platform and the explanation of the spreadsheet are certainly features of interest. The music was effective as an upbeat way to increase engagement. The educational/tech backgrounds added credibility. I would like to feel that I had more information about the venture from the elevator pitch. Your passion is clearly evident.

Daniel, great solution to a problem that is highly relevant to teachers. Your teacher credentials and technology role within your school certainly lends credibility to your product. Your elevator pitch effectively caught my attention as a fellow educator who could benefit from your product but not as a potential investor. However, I did move on to view your venture pitch which did provide information relevant to investment. You did a fine job illustrating how your product differs from the competition and provided a product demonstration that was very detailed. My only concern with your product is that it is cloud based. I'm wondering if security and privacy issues around student data would not be an issue for parents, schools, school districts etc. I'm also unclear about the ASK for your venture and your monetization plan. As an investor, what would my return be on my investment? So, prior to any considerations for investment I would require some important questions to be answered.

FEEDBACK: Nice pitch Daniel. I fit into your category as being a teacher that enters their marks into a system more than once (a written copy/and electronic copy for MyEd.) Your product definitely fits to solve a problem. As a consumer I'm onboard to use it pending its cost and as an investor I am not sure what the future holds with your product. How much money is your company asking for and what is the return? Do you have any projections for the future after you are funded in the first phase? I would also like to know if you plan to make your model subscription based or have a one time fee.

Great pitch, Daniel! I like how it is geared towards teachers and simple enough that we don't have to have a course to learn how to use it! I too like how it is flexible and adjustable to my needs. My colleague at my school has already said that he'll have a copy! I would like to see more about how much needs to be invested and how much money you're thinking that the investors will get in return (revenue model). As an investor, I'm on-board. I'll start using this tomorrow! This would make my life easier coming into report cards and anything to make life easier, while not compromising quality, I'm in. Thanks, Daniel!

Feedback: Love the pitch Daniel, it was simple and directed to teachers. The reason why I believe your pitch / venture has a good probability of succeeding is because of it's simplicity in solving a need. As an educator I already have to deal with a mountain of paperwork and don't need more complex software which I only use a fraction of, like BCESIS or MyEd. I just want a simple tool to make my job easier, reports. Your tool is familiar with educators because it is google based and accessible which makes it extremely flexible. Lastly if priced at a one time fee I would buy it. However I would have liked to hear more about your revenue model.

Feedback: Daniel, I like the pitch and the product. I see it as a valuable solution to the problem you've identified. I think you're asking the right test group too. The K-12 teachers in this program would likely be your champions. I'm not a K-12 teacher, but I see that there are definite advantages to this for teachers. I also see a lot of use for this type of software outside of just report cards. There could be a pivot to any industry where you need to track comments on specific individuals, products, or topics.

Daniel, you have actually inspired me to look into Google Apps Script because I can see ways I could use this myself. I recognize your pain point, we just invested in PowerSchool in our division and it does not work for any one teaching a module system, so they must maintain a spreadsheet to do their marks and then transfer their results into PowerSchool. For your venture pitch overall, there are a couple of missing factors including the ask and return. Besides the comment that you are hoping investors will contact you, I don't know how much of an investment you need? I felt like the overall pitch was more focused towards the consumer than the investor.

FEEDBACK: What a great venture Daniel! I like the idea of simplifying the structure for marks and reports. Typically, I enter my marks THREE times (one in my personal tracking, one in report central (our report software) and again in MyEducation). I often find myself working as an office assistant to myself rather than focusing on developing lessons and creating connections/providing support to my students. My current reservations are that Google servers are not located in Canada. I know this sounds a bit funny as we are trying to move towards a more global focus. I know from personal experience in my district that administrators are very strict about the use of software/programs with servers that are not in Canada. I think that this will need to be something revisited over the upcoming years but right now it seems to be a large hurdle that many educators in Canada (or at least my district) are faced with. Thanks for sharing!

Pitch Review: Stringwood Software Solutions is a database management system within Google apps. The pain point for this product is not described. Is this really a big problem or just a problem for the product designer? There is extensive information and a demonstration about the product itself and how it can streamline data management for teachers, which is useful but it is more information than is needed at this point. The differentiation between this product and others like it is made clear and Stringwood Software (SS) does have some small advantages over the other programs (a spreadsheet, uses Google platform, ownership). However, there are several similar cloud based SIS programs currently on the market (Alma, School-wide Management System) and it is not made evident how SS is superior enough to draw customers away from the other full service/feature programs. A marketing plan to attract customers is not presented. The target market is teachers in small schools but the actual number of potential customers is not given. Is it small schools in BC, Canada, North America? Based on this lack of information the revenue potential for this product is indeterminable. The readiness for market of the product is not clear either. Is the product ready to go or does it require further development? What is the timeline for completion? How much money will be needed to complete it? Which brings up another issue - there is no 'ask' included in this presentation. What is the point of the presentation if nothing is being asked of the viewers?What is the return on investment for potential investors? This is not addressed either. As a venture investment pitch, critical areas are deficient and this pitch would not encourage someone to invest in it. It comes across as something the author is working on off the side of his desk and not as a true marketable venture. It would be a very risky investment based on the information provided in this pitch.

Thanks everyone. Well if it isn't totally obvious, I made this system for myself. I got fed up with the deficiencies of BCeSIS and the bugs in MyEdBC / Aspen. I noticed that a LOT of teachers keep two copies of their marks, a spreadsheet (or paper/pen markbook) and then migrate those marks over to their SIS when its time. Everyone likes like power and near unlimited possibilities of a spreadsheet. My idea was, well why not make my own SIS that IS a spreadsheet? Actually it started off as a coding experiment, I just wanted to learn how to use Google Apps Script. But it turned into something a lot bigger. Thats not all either, I also made an online test system based on Google Forms and a spreadsheet, it marks it for you too and emails the student their result. :)