Company description
View our video on Vimeo! http://vimeo.com/30562770
Background
M-Prep is an early-stage, for-profit company founded by New York City 2005 Teach For America alum, Toni Maraviglia. Toni was also a program director in NYC from 2007-2008, co-founded an educational organization called WISERBridge in rural Kenya, and worked at Harlem Village Academies Leadership Charter School from 2009-2011. In August 2011, Toni dropped out of business school to pursue MPrep.
Our Mission
MPrep’s mission is to become a great equalizer in education. We utilize technology that the masses ALREADY use in an affordable way so that all kids can study, all teachers can retrieve quality data, and everyone has a shot at an excellent education. We supplement classroom learning and enhance excellent teaching.
Our Vision
M-Prep will start by giving Kenyan Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) candidates and KCSE (Secondary School) candidates a way to utilize mobile phones to review for their exams and receive feedback from teachers. It will expand rapidly, providing services to all upper primary grades and secondary. After its Kenyan launch, M-Prep plans to expand to the U.S by 2013.
M-Prep’s goals are three-fold:
1.) We make high-quality review for national exams available to all students, catering to students’ individualized needs.
2.) We empower teachers with meaningful data about their students’ performance.
3.) We give students at the bottom of the pyramid equal access to study tools so that they can compete with their wealthier peers.
Team
M-Prep's current team is as follows:
Co-Founder and CEO: Toni Maraviglia (TFA NYC '05). Toni is an impassioned educator with 6+ years educating in high-poverty areas. She was a Teach for America corps member and program director, and charter school teacher. She also launched an educational achievement program, WISERbridge in Kenya. Toni speaks a local dialect in Kenya - Luo.
Co-Founder and CFO/COO: Brian Busch (MBA Candidate 2013, UC Berkeley). Brian is passionate about using business to address social and environmental problems, particularly in education. He has 4+ yrs working in microfinance based in Latin America is the Co-Chair Global Social Venture Competition at UC Berkeley, Haas.
Technical - Powered by internationally renowned Kenyan technology company, Symbiotic
Mike Milanya - Director of Kenyan Curriculum Development and Math Curriculum Lead. Michael is an expert upper primary teacher at the highly respected school, Nairobi Primary. He helped lead his students to a 97% percent passing rate on the KCPE in 2010. Michael has over 10 years experience teaching in Kenya.
Elector Achieng - English Curriculum Lead
Hellen Omondi - Kiswahili Curriculum Lead
Nancy Maingi - Science Curriculum Lead
Gibbonce Ager - Social Studies Curriculum Lead
US: ACT Content Lead: Laurie Brown (Alabama '12)
Open roles:
CTO and Lead Programmer
Director of Marketing
Saleforce Manager
Business model
MPrep has designed a proprietary curriculum, aligned to the 8th grade exit exam in Kenya, and an individualized study program to improve educational outcomes. In the future the curriculum will extend to the 12th grade exit exam (similar to the SAT or ACT in the US) and to other developing countries. MPrep offers this series of bite-size quizzes on a pay-per-use basis to students, (most suited to customers’ needs,) pre-paid packages to students or as packages to private schools. Individual users pay for quizzes with the minutes from their pre-paid cell phones or mobile money, making payment easy.
Competitive advantage
There is no one in Africa who is doing precisely what MPrep plans to do. Indirect competition exists in the form of review books, online study programs, and tutors. Books and tutors are both too expensive and all options are inaccessible in rural areas. Thus the market potential is largely untapped. Within Kenya the market is 2M students each year - 6M once MPrep extends to secondary school. This equates to a market opportunity of roughly 21M in East Africa and over 200M in developing countries worldwide.
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