mackenzie moyer

Kevin, thank you for the feedback. I realize my venture pitch has critical flaws. Namely, ROI at certain stages, etc. It's good to have had so much feedback from peers as they've pointed out these flaws and where I'd need to further polish/hone my message.

Hi Jakin, thanks for the critiques. My research comes from first-hand experience as an e-Learning specialist. The term "e-learning" has a different connotation in the corporate world than in education, so I see the confusion and will need to define this term better in future iterations. In education, we have terms like "blended" and "flipped classroom": broadly, e-Learning is any electronic component/tool/method that is part of training/education. More narrowly, e-Learning can be concentrated into e-Learning modules, which is the focus of my own work as an e-Learning designer/developer. Personally, I feel modules are a missing component to all online learning I've experienced, whether in MET or in different courses. The main benefit to modules is something I try to convey within the venture pitch: drilling and scaffolding. Whether or not these tools are used for a "flipped classroom" is up to the trainer, which is part of the aim of my venture: to give educators access to the tools of e-Learning (aka modular e-Learning design). Thanks again.

Hi Amanda, thanks for the reply. I'll need to reflect upon this aspect as it's certainly a weakness for my venture.

Hi Amanda, thanks for the reply. I'll need to reflect upon this aspect as it's certainly a weakness for my venture.

Hi Scott, thanks for the pitches, I taught English in Asia myself for a few years and junior HS ESL is definitely a weakspot/great potential for an app. That being said, there are apps that teach English generally (e.g., DuoLingo, many VASs native to Asia), and I'd argue those same apps apply to Japanese junior HS users such as those you'd like to target. I do like your approach to revenue, freemium seems a great way to go. I see you plan on making the app without any investors and am interested in your programming background as I think this would be a major undertaking in terms of hours required to build the prototypes, then demo these prototypes, and have them built into a marketable iteration. If this were a real venture pitch, it'd still be cool to see your background info. Thanks for the share! -M

Albert, I like that you're trying to fuse together the concerns of home-schooled students' parents with those of parents more generally, and I see the benefit in addressing the personalized educational gap the way you've outlined. I have concerns about going the centralized route you're going, both bricks-and-mortar as well as the online component. What would make a parent/guardian trust your services? A lot of this will hedge on your team's personability/likeability. To help with this part, it'd be good to include an introduction of yourself and any team-members you may have for the venture pitch. However, the issue will not dissolve from this alone, how will parents trust individual educational managers assigned to them? How will these managers' work be assessed? I think fleshing your venture pitch out in this direction a bit would help strengthen your case.

Great pitches, Ryan. I'm hooked, line and sinker. I can see parallels of your venture with an open-source project like Firefox or Linux, both of which rely on a strong community of volunteer specialists (coders/programmers particularly). Do you see yourself accessing this type of resource base? You mention bureaucracy in your venture pitch, and perhaps you could further address how Open Allies will meet this challenge, as problems here may go beyond price. All in all, thanks for getting me excited :)

Great venture idea, Ghassan. From experience, the pain-point is very real, and I like how you've approached the solution from a capacity-building angle: I think it could really work. This being said, I'd like to know what you want us to invest in EDUcook? What's to prevent schools from sharing your proprietary content with other schools? I think another angle could help with income for your venture: in-person consultancy, ongoing support, and an online support community. These could generate stable income and also ensure the learning experiences of your customers could be shared to support one another, which would really add a lot of value. All in all, great job, thanks for the excellent venture solution.

The elevator pitch was great, you hooked me with your enthusiastic voice/approach, and I "got" the idea right away. Your venture pitch was well polished and on point, and the graphic design made me feel the happy, playful vibe of your venture.. I also liked the yearly challenge you're aiming to hold, and I think this will help to foment ongoing interest in the venture from subscribed teachers. Are schools the ones that will be paying for the subscriptions to the box? In light of our austerity-driven era, I'd like to know more about how you'll pitch the idea to this client base (if they are the client base), and perhaps how we could approach parents as a driving force in regards to getting schools on board.

Hi Stephanie, great elevator pitch, you definitely hooked me with it, and it succinctly explained the app. Your venture pitch continued strong, and hit all the bases. To be honest, you did a better job explaining your app than I did my own venture, which was quite similar. I'm taking notes for my reflection, haha. It was nice to hear your voice and see your skills at work with your GoAnimate videos as well. The ask seems reasonable due to your prospective clients and partners. From the technical angle, I'm wondering at your xAPI approach, because incorporating disparate sources of learning feedback will be a major undertaking, and one the xAPI/TinCan API community is currently still grappling with. I think your $50,000/year pricetag may be able to meet this challenge, which will see your programmers hard at work to ensure users' experiences are captured. Will you focus on specific websites/apps to start (e.g., YouTube)? Other than that, I'm on board. Good venture pitch!