JOINING THE TANGO: With a name like Entangled Ventures, it should come as no surprise that the San Francisco-based “studio” has its hands in a wide mix of activities. In addition to investing in and owning a stake in edtech companies including Raise.me, Viridis and Practice, it runs a consulting arm, Entangled Solutions that advises on a variety of education projects. Last year it was picked as a quality assurance entity in the U.S. Department of Education’s EQUIP pilot to ensuring that public-private postsecondary programs can deliver on student outcomes.
Recently the Solutions group teamed up with the World Economic Forum’s education council to build Matterfund, an online platform that aims to help governments, NGOs and other funders find and support education initiatives around the world. It aims to surface and connect projects and funders via a “social graph,” similar to how AngelList and Crunchbase operate. Matterfund has been in beta for several months in South Africa, with nearly 500 organizations onboard.
Solutions appears primed to get involved in more projects thanks to a couple new high-profile additions. Seth Andrew, a former edtech advisor at the White House and U.S. Department of Education, is coming onboard. His efforts at ED include working on Computer Science for All, Future Ready and ConnectED. He’s also helped launch two charter schools: Democracy Prep Public Schools and Washington Leadership Academy (one of the winners of the $10 million XQ Super Schools award.) Another new teammate is Deborah Seymour, former professor and Chief Academic Innovation Officer at the American Council on Education. Her storied career includes leading adult education programs in New York City and competency-based programs at Laureate Education. These two additions bring Entangled Solutions to 15 full-time employees.
