Selected

Online matching platform for teachers and PreK-12 urban schools in the US.

There are 3.7mm full-time PreK-12 teachers in the US. The teaching profession suffers from high attrition, particularly in urban and low-income communities. Every year, more than 500,000 teachers turn over nationally. The estimated annual cost of teacher turnover in the US exceeds $7bn, not including the immeasurable impact on student outcomes. Attrition and a decreasing number of new teachers are causing an acute shortage of teachers. Outside of life events, issues strongly related to school culture and leadership drive teacher attrition.

Our mission is to improve teacher retention by helping teachers and schools make higher quality matches with ease. A better teacher-school fit and efficient discovery process means improved teacher retention and student performance. We do this by matching teachers and schools based on mutual preferences: school culture, teaching philosophy, grade levels, location, etc. -- similar to a dating application!

Teachers simply list their preferences and compatible schools contact them first. On average, a candidate is contacted directly by six schools in the first week on the platform — often cutting the job search period from months to weeks. Candidates receive a personal coach to support them through the job search, including resume feedback. For employers, all candidates are vetted for qualifications and intent — expediting the interview process for both parties. The service is always free for teachers.

Despite a teacher shortage and a supply-demand imbalance significantly in their favor, teachers experience significant friction discovering which hiring schools align best with their preferences and teaching philosophy. By providing additional and more relevant options, we aim to improve teacher retention and student performance -- particularly in urban and low income areas around the world where teacher turnover is the highest and the need for teachers is the greatest.

We are currently offering this service in the Northeast US with the goal of expanding nationally and then internationally to serve teachers and schools (public and private).

Selected uses matching algorithms from the dating world, a modern UX, and a streamlined, teacher-centric approach to simplify teacher recruitment.

Teachers are in short supply, yet current means for teachers to find jobs do not reflect that reality. Selected is designed to be teacher-centric -- features such as preference-based matching to offering free 1:1 resume and interview coaching puts the teacher first.

Teachers simply list their preferences and compatible schools contact them first. On average, a candidate is contacted by six schools in the first week on the platform — often cutting the job search period from months to weeks.

Technology allows us to match schools and teachers at scale and save significant time and cost for both parties. Schools now instantaneously have access to a curated pool of teachers across the multiple geographies we serve.

We offer low prices so our service can be used by schools that need teachers the most. The vast majority of schools that use Selected are public schools.

While technology has allowed us to automate matching, inclusion and human-centric design are core values. We offer free, professional resume reviews and job search workshops, content, and support for all teachers on Selected.

Over the next 12 months, we will refine both the teacher and school experience, provide even greater support services for both parties, and expand our geographic reach. For teachers, we will continue to improve the UX and make it easier to create a profile and engage with schools. For schools, we will expand the size of the teacher pool and improve the relevance of matches. We will also expand the scope of free services and support we provide, such as personalized coaching, content, and workshops. Finally, we expect to expand the geographic reach of Selected to more US states.

Over the next three to five years, we expect to serve the top 50 metropolitan service areas in the US. We also expect tto expand the model internationally. Our goal is to improve teacher retention in schools in urban areas by highlighting school fit, improving school discoverability, and streamlining recruitment for schools.

As a result of improved retention, we expect to improve student outcomes and reduce recruitment costs in the schools and districts that use Selected.

We target schools in urban US metros and teachers who want to teach there. To reach teachers and grow our teacher community, we offer free resume reviews, coaching, content, workshops, and support during their job search process. We continue to build partnerships with graduate schools of education and teacher-support non-profits to offer career and job search support services for teachers. To grow our school community, we offer free advice and consultation to help them streamline their hiring and recruitment process. Finally, our core service offering (of course) is a curated and pre-approved pool of "compatible" candidates for schools to hire!

Selected launched in New York City in April 2016. Now, Selected partners with 650+ public and private schools in major urban areas in the Northeast, including NYC, Newark, Trenton, Camden, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Southern CT, and Boston. Selected focuses on schools most affected by teacher turnover and have difficulty recruiting educators to an urban classroom setting. The vast majority of schools that use Selected are high need public schools.

Over 13,000 teachers have signed up for Selected. The average teacher who is active on Selected receives 6 connection requests from "compatible" schools in their first week.

In 12 months, we expect to serve over 1,000 urban schools and 30,000 teachers in the Northeast and Western US.

In 3 years, we expect to serve 4,000 urban schools and over 150,000 teachers in the top 25 metropolitan areas in the US.

We expect to see 1- and 2-year retention rates among teachers that use the Selected platform higher than the national average among urban public schools.

Our multidisciplinary and inclusive team includes: technologists (e.g., our CTO has built autonomous vehicles, CEO is a web and mobile developer), K-12 educators and recruiters (e.g., former public school teachers and school leaders), product and design expertise (e.g., our COO is a former senior product manager from OKCupid), and non-profit management experience (e.g., our CEO is the former COO of iMentor, a national non-profit). We believe that diversity of skills, backgrounds, and lived experiences make our product and team stronger. We are passionate about social impact, teacher placement and retention, and improving outcomes for students in urban schools.

Our service is 100% free for teachers. We charge schools a flat fee per teacher or school leader hired on the Selected platform. Schools are not charged a subscription or retainer fee to use Selected. We had $150,000 of revenue in our first year and hope to achieve a multiple of that in our second fiscal year ending December 31, 2018.

We hope to reach cash flow breakeven by late-2019. By then, we expect to expand and diversify our school base to include more public school districts. The primary drivers for long-term stability arae: 1) reduce the cost of getting teachers to sign up and submit a profile, and 2) expand the number of schools who are active and hiring on Selected.

We plan to continue expanding in the US to serve more teachers and schools.

We are applying to Solve because we believe diversity and inclusion of ideas and perspectives makes our business more effective and the world a better place. We would love to be mentored, mentor others, and share what we have learned in supporting teachers find ideal school matches and urban schools recruit and retain teachers. We believe strongly in cross-sector collaboration.

Solve can advance our work by improving and building upon our ideas and learnings. We also hope to improve our visibility among the social innovation community and include others into our social mission!

Our key barrier is expanding our teacher and school communities cost-effectively. As a matching platform, our effectiveness depends on size (e.g., liquidity) of both parties -- not unlike a dating platform! To date, we have focused on initially building a strong community of teachers in each metro we serve before reaching out to schools. We spend a significant amount of our limited resources on outreach and collaborating with organizations that support both. We'd love Solve's support in increasing our visibility among high need schools, districts, teachers, and organizations that support all of the above.