Freedom School Online

Many countries face persistent gaps in learning and educational opportunities, which highlights the need to address their educational systems' shortcomings. In America, the education system's problems have led to a misinformed citizenry, especially regarding the country's history.

The National Museum of African American History and Culture reports that U.S. history classrooms only allocate 1-2 lessons or 8-9% of class time to Black history. The Southern Poverty Law Center states that only 8% of U.S. high school seniors can identify enslavement as the leading cause of the Civil War. Furthermore, Education Week has revealed that 17+ states have imposed laws or rules to limit how race and discrimination can be taught in public school classrooms.

To address these issues, Freedom School Online has created a digital platform that offers transformative Black history, antiracism, and creative entrepreneurship for students of all ages. The platform provides tailored and curated curricula for students and educators, enabling them to comprehensively educate their students with relevant subject matters through live and asynchronous learning centering on the Black/Diasporic experience.

Led and instructed by one of the foremost voices of Black History, Freedom School Online has a track record of creatively tackling America's race problem and facilitating digital solutions that address the country's growing underrepresented populations in an intersectional manner. The school aims to connect and build cultural sensitivity and competency among individuals.

Our solution, Freedom School Online, is an educational venue that adds value to traditional classroom curricula while focusing on the omitted histories that are regularly left out. We offer a range of academic modules that cover diverse and urgent topics, including America's reparations movement, the history of Hip Hop, Black-led female approaches to STEAM through Afrofuturism and Inventorship, Art history, and Beyonce's musical ties to both the Renaissance and the Harlem Renaissance in NYC. 

At Freedom School Online, we are deeply committed to the current movement for racial justice. This commitment drives us to create nontraditional approaches that center Black youth and people beyond the traditional K-12 and academic circles. Our platform is unapologetic and digitally-led, designed for all but with a particular emphasis on the uneducated. 

By focusing on these areas, we can reach the most unengaged Black youth and inspire them to take ownership of their learning and alter the trajectories of America's school-to-prison pipeline.

Freedom School Online is dedicated to serving those who have been denied the opportunity to learn about the valuable contributions of African Americans to American history. The program targets explicitly Black youth who are enrolled in traditional K-12 settings but whose participation, grades, and outlooks may suffer due to a lack of adequate representation of their lived experiences in the classroom. As a result, these students risk falling through the cracks of America's educational system and may even end up in the carceral system as early as third grade. Freedom School Online aims to be a life preserver for these students, offering resources that enhance, engage, and rehabilitate them through studying American history.

Freedom School Online has a unique team that can deliver a solution for educating Black youth in America. Our school's founder, Tyree Boyd-Pates, has personal experiences as a Black boy in the American educational system, especially in the inner-city schools of the Los Angeles Unified School District. These schools have a history of low retention rates for Black students, a struggle he intimately understands. 

The founder himself nearly fell through the cracks of his high school. He graduated with a low GPA and was discouraged by his counselor from attending a four-year college. However, he used his entrepreneurial spirit and digital skills to excel academically. He eventually became a college professor teaching African American studies to first-generation Black and Brown youth in South Los Angeles.

He understands that Black students are likelier to take ownership of their education when taught about figures who reflect their experiences. That's why he has dedicated his entire career to reaching out to Black youth where they are, on social media platforms like TikTok.

As a digital platform that provides transformative Black history, antiracism, and creative entrepreneurship through virtual courses, 1:1 coaching, and speaking engagements, Freedom School Online is passionate about educating student youth and teachers to respond constructively and creatively to make a more just and equitable society. 

Winning the Solve Challenge would enable us to expand our reach, create more courses, develop better teaching materials, and offer our services to even more people. Participating in the 9-month virtual support program, which includes tailored capacity workshops, leadership coaching, and access to in-kind and pro bono resources such as software licenses and legal services, would help us improve our operations and increase our impact.

The opportunity to connect and network with peers, collaborate on projects, and learn from others' successes and challenges would be invaluable. Finally, joining a robust network of impact-minded leaders across industries and sectors, with dedicated spaces to meet year-round and travel stipends to join Solve's flagship events, and gaining exposure in the media and at conferences would help us take our educational platform to the next level and achieve even greater success in our mission.

As a digital platform that provides transformative Black history, antiracism, and creative entrepreneurship through virtual courses, 1:1 coaching, and speaking engagements, Freedom School Online is passionate about educating student youth and teachers to respond constructively and creatively to make a more just and equitable society. 

Winning the Solve Challenge would enable us to expand our reach, create more courses, develop better teaching materials, and offer our services to even more people. Participating in the 9-month virtual support program, which includes tailored capacity workshops, leadership coaching, and access to in-kind and pro bono resources such as software licenses and legal services, would help us improve our operations and increase our impact.

The opportunity to connect and network with peers, collaborate on projects, and learn from others' successes and challenges would be invaluable. Finally, joining a robust network of impact-minded leaders across industries and sectors, with dedicated spaces to meet year-round and travel stipends to join Solve's flagship events, and gaining exposure in the media and at conferences would help us take our educational platform to the next level and achieve even greater success in our mission.

Freedom School Online is a unique digital platform that offers asynchronous, high-quality, curated Black historical education. This platform is led by an actual historian of Black history, which sets it apart from others. The platform is dedicated to enriching the general public and is driven by leading practitioners. Its mission is to combat and confront the erasure, censure, and sanctioning of Black history by governmental agencies. Additionally, it aims to prepare laymen and women - especially youth - who are on the frontlines of racial justice in real-time for essential election cycles and fights for equity and justice.

We believe that Freedom School Online can play a crucial role in addressing the issue of racial inequality in education by providing essential academic resources to K-12 students. According to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, U.S. history classrooms only devote a small percentage of class time to Black history. Moreover, the Southern Poverty Law Center reports that only 8% of U.S. high school seniors can accurately identify enslavement as the primary cause of the Civil War. To make matters worse, Education Week notes that over 17 states have implemented laws or rules to restrict the teaching of race and discrimination in public school classrooms.

Unfortunately, access to quality Black historical education is limited to traditional Freedom School offerings provided by the Children's Defense Fund every summer. These schools cannot reach students digitally within American classrooms, nor are there many digital resources or platforms for Black history available for homeschooling parents and families—built by Black historians to meet the growing exodus of Black students leaving public school due to classroom racism for Homeschooling options.

Recognizing this gap, Freedom School Online is uniquely positioned to fill this void and improve all students' learning outcomes, especially those outside traditional classroom settings.

Freedom School Online is an educational venture that seeks to create a comprehensive Black history curriculum for schools across the United States. This initiative aims to provide students with a more accurate and inclusive understanding of American history by highlighting the contributions of Black Americans and exploring the impact of systemic racism on our society.

To achieve this objective, Freedom School Online plans to develop a detailed and engaging curriculum that can be easily integrated into the existing curricula of schools in all 50 states. This curriculum will cover various topics, including the African diaspora, the Civil Rights Movement, Black literature and art, and contemporary Black community issues.

By 2035, Freedom School Online aims to have successfully implemented this curriculum in schools across the country, helping to ensure that all students have access to a more complete and nuanced understanding of American history and the Black experience.

We utilize the internet as our platform's technology. However, we also incorporate NOMMO, a West African cultural technology of passing the word, to guide our instructions. Griot culture had a significant influence on the experiences of West African people who were kidnapped, sold, and enslaved in the Americas, so we incorporated this ancestral technology to offer instructions through digital means, such as call and response.

Currently, there is 1 fulltime staff person, and a part time contractor.

14 months.

Freedom School Online is a Black-led venture and places the utmost emphasis on hiring talent who identify with the Black experiences and seek to change the lived experiences and outcomes of those from that background. We strive to be inclusive, especially across gender lines, because we adhere to an intersectional approach to bolstering the outcomes of marginalized and subjugated individuals.

Our mission is to provide impactful educational experiences and resources that promote Black history, antiracism, and creative entrepreneurship to diverse populations. We achieve this through the following approaches:

Virtual Courses: Our platform, FreedomSchoolOnline.com, offers a range of virtual courses that cater to individuals from different backgrounds, including emerging antiracists, abolitionists, advocates, and creatives.

Subscription Model: To ensure sustained engagement and learning, we employ a subscription-based model where users can access exclusive content, live sessions, and community forums, fostering continuous development and a sense of belonging within our platform.

Digital Products: Besides our courses, we provide supplementary digital products such as e-books, workbooks, and guides related to our course content. These resources enhance the learning experience for our users.

Consultation Services: We offer personalized consultation services to individuals and organizations seeking guidance on antiracism initiatives, diversity training, or creative entrepreneurship. Our consultations are tailored to address specific needs and can be accessed through hourly sessions or package deals.

Partnerships: We collaborate with educational institutions, corporations, and community organizations to extend our reach and offer customized programs, workshops, and sponsorships. These partnerships enable us to reach wider audiences and create mutually beneficial revenue-sharing opportunities and impact.

Our business model is designed to generate revenue, facilitate meaningful educational experiences, and promote positive societal change.

Freedom School Online has devised a comprehensive strategy incorporating diverse revenue streams and evidence-backed approaches to ensure profitability and long-term financial sustainability. Our plan includes generating revenue through various channels, such as a subscription model where users pay for access to premium content, live sessions, and community forums, as well as sales of digital products like e-books and guides related to our course content. Additionally, we offer consultation services on antiracism initiatives, diversity training, and creative entrepreneurship. We seek partnerships and sponsorships with educational institutions, corporations, and community organizations to secure funding support for specific initiatives. We will implement cost control measures and continuously evaluate our performance to adapt to market dynamics. Our subscription model has attracted a significant user base with high retention rates, while our digital products and consultation services have garnered positive feedback and steady sales. By building upon these successes and maintaining a proactive approach to profitability, Freedom School Online is poised to achieve financial sustainability while delivering impactful educational content.