OUTSCHOOL, which offers a marketplace where parents can find and sign their kids up for small-group online classes covering K-12 subjects, has raised $1.4 million in a seed round led by Collab+Sesame, the tag-team venture fund run by Collaborative Fund and Sesame Workshop.
Founded in 2015, the San Francisco-based startup currently offers more than 1,000 classes from independent teachers, who charge anywhere from $5 to hundreds of dollars per course, depending on their duration. (The company does not require instructors to have formal teaching credentials.) Outschool takes a 17 percent fee from each enrollment. Roughly 20,000 students have signed up for its classes, according to TechCrunch. The company aims to add features that allows students to build an online portfolio that documents their learning.
“We see a future where in-person learning is enhanced by live online learning to offer parents a higher level of choice and variety in their children’s education,”Outschool co-founder Nick Grandy said in the press release.
Other investors in the round include Caterina Fake, Y Combinator, SV Angel, FundersClub, Spectrum28 and Learn Capital. (Disclosure: Learn is an investor in EdSurge.)
