The University of British Columbia
UBC - A Place of Mind
The University of British Columbia Vancouver campus
ETEC 522 – Ventures in Learning Technologies
  • Startup
    • How to Begin?
    • Objectives
    • Course Manual
    • Outline & Schedule
    • Participation Guide
    • Assignments
    • ☛ Introduce Yourself!
    • 👥 Authors
  • W01: Emerging Markets
    • W01: Emerging Market Teams
  • W02-04: Bootcamp
    • Global Dynamics
    • Who is the Customer?
    • What is a Venture?
    • 👥 Opportunity Horizon
    • W03: Analyst Bootcamp
    • A Game with Three Pitches
    • Deconstructing a Pitch
    • 👥 Pitch Critique
    • W04: Entrepreneur Bootcamp
    • Venture Genesis
    • Opportunity Activation
    • The Right Stuff
    • 👥 Founders Parade
  • W05-12: Opportunity Forecasts
    • W05: Personalized Learning
    • W06: Mobile Learning
    • W07: Game-Based Learning
    • W08: Big Data & Learning Analytics
    • W09: Immersive Experience
    • W10: Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning
    • W11: Microlearning
    • W12: Wearables
  • W13: Launch
    • Venture Forum Resources
  • Forums
    • W01 – Emerging Markets
    • W02 – Market Projections
    • W03 – Pitch Pool
    • W04 – Founders Parade
    • W05-12 – Opportunity Forecasts (A2)
    • W13 – Venture Forum (A3)
    • Analyst Reports (A1)
  • Global Feeds
    • Announcements
    • Eva’s Café
    • Radio 522
  • LOGIN
Sort By
Show only these categories:
Show only this category:

Eli Luberoff – CEO and Founder of Desmos

By James Seaton on February 1, 2020

Meet Eli Luberoff.

Picture of Eli

Eli is founder and CEO of the ed tech venture Desmos, a free browser-based graphing calculator and math activity builder. I have used Desmos in my classroom for the past year and see enormous value in its use, while knowing that I’ve only scratched the surface of its potential. In addition to the graphing technology it provides, users can create and share activities (in a sort of learning module style) for students to work through. Teachers are able to log into a teacher space and host these activities for their students, monitoring their progress individually and as a group.

 

So who is Eli and what qualities/motivations led to his role as CEO and founder?

A Brief(ish) bio:

Eli took a rather unconventional route to becoming educated (what he refers to as an “absurd educational journey”), due largely to the issues that he found with the educational model presented to him. Seeing little pedagogical value in his middle school experience, he made an agreement with his mother to be homeschooled in grade 8. That year, he ended up auditing some math, physics and language courses at UMass Amherst courses (he refers to this as “pretend(ing) to be a student”, so it’s unclear as to whether this was in an official capacity or not). He was grouped together on projects with his much older classmates at that time, and it helped him develop and appreciation and critical eye towards group work and the ways students interact and express ideas to each other. During that time he also learned how to code in C++ and started creating math aid programs for his brother (in exchange for rides to Kentucky Fried Chicken) and games for his TI-83 graphing calculator – he even created a working version of monopoly.

He ended up returning to public education in grade 9 to attempt the high school model. Though better than middle school, he was still unsatisfied with the experience and dropped out in grade 10 once he was 16 and legally allowed to.

After dropping out of high school, he went back to college and got interested in web design, programming and entrepreneurship. After 2 ½ yeas of college, he took some time off to teach himself how to program (building on his earlier foundation) and to attempt to launch his own venture. He lived with a professor during that time, working as her Chief Technology Officer on her own project.

It was in that time that he created the predecessor to Desmos, a program that facilitated online tutoring. Eli actually used the program himself to conduct tutoring sessions and used the money from these sessions to help pay his bills upon returning to college.

While using his own program, he saw the importance of using graphing technology to help express concepts to students, and realized how important visual representations were for student understanding. This realization was the pivot point for his small company (only three individuals at that point) and focus shifted to what is now Desmos.

 

Eli’s story shows his passion for learning, for creating, and for addressing problems where that he can make the most impact by solving. He has compiled a professional team and strong positive work culture as evidence by their About Us video shown here:

Personal reflection:

I love how Eli has constantly looked to address the issues around him. His education wasn’t suited for him, so he changed his situation. He started his first venture (before pivoting to Desmos) to address the positive gains students had when receiving 1-on-1 support via tutoring. He then discovered a pain point within his own work, and there created this company that is serving a massive community of educators.

 

 

Sources:

https://artofproblemsolving.com/news/aftermath/building-a-better-graphing-calculator-with-eli-luberoff)

https://www.desmos.com/about

Rating
Average: 4.8/5 Stars
 
 
 
 
 
1 Thumbs Up!

Read More | No Comments

Loading...
2 Feb Posted on Eli Luberoff – CEO and Founder of Desmos

Innovation leans towards being unconventional, which is what Eli Luberoff's education was. Rather than letting others dictate what he had to learn, he took his education into his own hands and focused on the subjects and parts of learning that really mattered to him. Although he was a high school dropout, he did not spend his time idly and learned coding, programming, web design, and entrepreneurship. Initially, building the best graphing calculator was done for practical purposes (i.e., to help with tutoring his students); however, Luberoff had the insight and ambition to develop his ideas further and build a team to support the capacity and creativity that is the Desmos online graphing calculator and math activity builder today. He demonstrates the collaborative spirit required of entrepreneurs, particularly start-ups, by noticing a good idea when he sees one and eliciting support from people who can understand and fulfill the needs of their target users - teachers and students. Eli Luberoff is an example of how entrepreneurship often stems from the unconventional.

2 Feb
1 Thumbs Up!
cass @casschan

Innovation leans towards being unconventional, which is what Eli Luberoff's education was. Rather than letting others dictate what he had to learn, he took his education into his own hands and focused on the subjects and parts of learning that really mattered to him. Although he was a high school dropout, he did not spend his time idly and learned coding, programming, web design, and entrepreneurship. Initially, building the best graphing calculator was done for practical purposes (i.e., to help with tutoring his students); however, Luberoff had the insight and ambition to develop his ideas further and build a team to support the capacity and creativity that is the Desmos online graphing calculator and math activity builder today. He demonstrates the collaborative spirit required of entrepreneurs, particularly start-ups, by noticing a good idea when he sees one and eliciting support from people who can understand and fulfill the needs of their target users - teachers and students. Eli Luberoff is an example of how entrepreneurship often stems from the unconventional.

  • Expand
  • 0 Replies
  • in reply to Eli Luberoff – CEO and Founder of Desmos
  • Loading...
1 Feb Posted on Eli Luberoff – CEO and Founder of Desmos

As with other subjects but especially with mathematics, it is difficult to take yourself (mentally) back to what it was like to be a beginner once you've become proficient. Math is a language AND a skill AND a tool, but for many there is a wall of anxiety, a negative mindset that prevents them from buying in and learning what math is and how to use it. All that said, I am impressed that the founder, Eli, had such a convoluted, unconventional journey through education and that he was able to produce such an effective visualization tool/platform. The team clearly is able to do the difficult task of harkening back to what it was like to struggle with equations and the "aha moment" of visualizing the line described by an equation. But the question is: is the founder a strong role model for would-be entrepreneurs? I struggle with this, not just because of my own bias as an educator in the public school system, but also as a believer that education is highly valuable and people should not give up when it seems like the system doesn't work for them. I'm not sure I could encourage others to follow in Eli's footsteps, dropping out of school to pursue a dream. An interesting quote I hear in an interview on CBC Ideas talked about how it doesn't seem to make a difference that we include ethics as part of the curriculum for programming and design education in post secondary, because the people making new apps are not taking those courses - many of the entrepreneurs and up-and-comers are drop outs. One could imagine if Eli had more formal training would he be even more innovative, or less, or the same, but with more informed and thoughtful design elements?

1 Feb
1 Thumbs Up!
christopher spanis @cspanis

As with other subjects but especially with mathematics, it is difficult to take yourself (mentally) back to what it was like to be a beginner once you've become proficient. Math is a language AND a skill AND a tool, but for many there is a wall of anxiety, a negative mindset that prevents them from buying in and learning what math is and how to use it. All that said, I am impressed that the founder, Eli, had such a convoluted, unconventional journey through education and that he was able to produce such an effective visualization tool/platform. The team clearly is able to do the difficult task of harkening back to what it was like to struggle with equations and the "aha moment" of visualizing the line described by an equation. But the question is: is the founder a strong role model for would-be entrepreneurs? I struggle with this, not just because of my own bias as an educator in the public school system, but also as a believer that education is highly valuable and people should not give up when it seems like the system doesn't work for them. I'm not sure I could encourage others to follow in Eli's footsteps, dropping out of school to pursue a dream. An interesting quote I hear in an interview on CBC Ideas talked about how it doesn't seem to make a difference that we include ethics as part of the curriculum for programming and design education in post secondary, because the people making new apps are not taking those courses - many of the entrepreneurs and up-and-comers are drop outs. One could imagine if Eli had more formal training would he be even more innovative, or less, or the same, but with more informed and thoughtful design elements?

  • Expand
  • 0 Replies
  • in reply to Eli Luberoff – CEO and Founder of Desmos
  • Loading...
  • Previous
  • Next
Show only this category:
How to Begin

Custom Search

Tags

2014 2015 2016

Faculty of Education
Vancouver Campus
2125 Main Mall
Vancouver, BC Canada V6T 1Z4
Website pdce.educ.ubc.ca/
Email pdce.educ@ubc.ca
Back to top
The University of British Columbia
  • Emergency Procedures |
  • Terms of Use |
  • Copyright |
  • Accessibility