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Grockit Launches New App for Facebook Timeline

By posted January 19, 2012

The New Year brings with it some pretty exciting news for Grockit. You’ve probably heard that Facebook just announced that you can now enhance your Facebook Timeline with Entertainment, News, Music, and other apps, letting you share more of your interests with friends. I’m pumped to say that Grockit is one of those applications. This means that if a user adds the Grockit app to their Facebook Timeline, they can now share their Grockit experiences within Timeline.

For today, the full list of Grockit activities that can be shared on your Timeline include:
● Total Questions Answered: To show off how much work you’ve done.
● Creating and joining a Study Room: So your friends can join and you can study together.
● Earning an Achievement: Showing off your accomplishments.
● Playing a Game: To show off how often you study.

We think it’s cool that Facebook is bringing various corners of the web into one place where people can share, interact, and discover a variety of content they wouldn’t otherwise be exposed to. Grockit’s app for Facebook Timeline makes it easier for you to study with your friends, and show the world the hard work you’ve put into learning.

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Grockit CEO On The Education Gap, Technology, and the Economy

By posted January 18, 2012

Grockit CEO, Roy Gilbert, connects the dots between the unemployment rate and education in America.   In his US News & World Report article, Roy discusses how STEM initiatives and engaging learning tools, like Grockit, will lead to  a generation of degree earning students and decrease unemployment in the United States.  Read the entire Article.

Here’s an excerpt:

“While the unemployment rate in the U.S. is at 9 percent, it is far lower for educated workers. Have a college degree? The rate is 4 percent. Have a professional degree like a JD, MBA, or STEM degree? Two percent unemployment, a rate so low economists say it is theoretically impossible.”

 

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Better Answers

By posted December 19, 2011

Since first announcing Grockit Answers in October, we’ve improved our video collaboration tool in a number of ways. These changes were driven largely by the feedback that we received from teachers and students, so keep it coming! Below are video clips (in 1080p HD!) demonstrating six of these recent improvements:

Discussions are now live-updating!

When groups of students are watching the same video at the same time, newly-posted questions and answers are live-updated on all connected viewers.

Embed video search results into another website

When you search for a video on Grockit Answers, you can now embed the results onto your own webpage, like this:

Here’s a short video explaining how to do this:

Start moderating classroom discussions faster

Moderation controls are now more readily-accessible, simplifying the process for a teacher to get started using Grockit Answers in their classroom.

Share videos and questions with your students through Edmodo

Any video, question, or answer on the site can now be shared with others through Edmodo.

Teachers and moderators now receive activity updates

Once a day, teachers and others who moderate videos will now receive an update listing all new Q&A activity on those videos:

Grockit Answers now powers all Grockit video courses!

You’ll now find Grockit Answers powering SAT and GMAT video courses. Grockit Answers also now provides opportunity to ask questions and offer help around every question video explanation on the site, both in reviews and in solo game explanations. Thousands of Grockit video discussions, added earlier this week:



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Machine Learning for Student Achievement

By posted November 29, 2011

We at Grockit have just posted a new educational machine learning competition focused on analyzing student performance: http://www.kaggle.com/c/WhatDoYouKnow. The competition is hosted on Kaggle, which has rapidly become an excellent site for hosting data mining and forecasting competitions.  Our sponsored competition revolves around analyzing students’ past study habits and predicting whether they can correctly answer future practice questions.  Like Netflix did for movies, we’re trying to improve on education industry standards for adaptive learning algorithms.

I’m very excited that we’re reaching out to the machine learning community, because I’m tremendously excited about the potential for technology to change education. I think leveraging the data we can collect is a huge part of that. I honestly believe that by improving assessment, we can improve the way people learn. By knowing what areas you’re strong and weak in, you can better know when you’re at a suitable level and how to direct your future studying. We want to be able to help students direct their studying — and eventually, improve student testing itself. There’s a lot more to knowing your level than simply what questions you got right or wrong, and we want to take advantage of that as much as possible.

This is a manifestation of the Grockit value of putting the learner first. We’re doing this purely to try and improve the way we help students study. We’re putting our money where are mouth is, too, with cash prizes will also be awarded to the top three finishers. The competition runs through February. Details on the data set, the prizes, and the competition are all available at:

http://www.kaggle.com/c/WhatDoYouKnow

Thanks for reading, and we hope you check it out!

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Help Grockit spread the word: Grockit Discount for US military veterans, active personnel and families

By posted November 11, 2011

As you probably know, today is a national holiday honoring the efforts of nearly 25 million American military veterans.  The holiday was created to commemorate the armistice ending World War I on November 11, 1918.  The first observances of Armistice Day on November 11, 1919 celebrated war veterans with parades in the streets of small towns throughout America.  The spirit of those parades expanded over time, and by 1954, all American military veterans were celebrated through Congressional actions formalizing Veterans Day as a national holiday.

Like other US holidays, Veterans Day and the time away from work creates commercial events and sales opportunities. Grockit wants to focus our Veterans Day commercial efforts on helping veterans, active military personnel and their families by introducing a special discount and offer specifically for veterans, active military and their families. If you are in this category, please visit the pages linked below to redeem and share a 40% discount on the purchase of Grockit products. This discount can’t be used in combination with another offer, and purchasers will be asked to attest to their military service and status.  This is not a seasonal effort; the discount will be offered for the foreseeable future to all qualifying persons.

So, why is Grockit doing this?

It’s tradition on this Holiday to make a donation, write or call a veteran friend or family member and express personal gratitude for the military service of veterans. Like most businesses, the Grockit family can turn to colleagues and leaders, like Grockit’s CEO, Roy Gilbert, and express our gratitude and appreciation for their service.  And, this year prominent American figures across the political spectrum are calling on American businesses to hire American military veterans as force deployments overseas are being drawn down, and men and women are discharged and integrated back into the civilian workforce.  We support that effort wholeheartedly.

But, at Grockit we know that the American labor market is a highly-competitive environment, and securing a future increasingly means securing higher education. This is where Grockit believes we can help veterans, active military personnel and their families.  These Americans deserve the best test prep products when preparing for the tests required for admissions to undergraduate and graduate school programs.  We’re not doing anything new or groundbreaking, other test prep companies discreetly provide military discounts upon request.  We’d really appreciate it if everyone reading this post shared on Facebook or emailed this discount to people that can use Grockit as they embark on a new chapter of life.

Thanks for any help you can provide in promoting this program focused on helping veterans, active military personnel and their families.

To visit special discount redemption pages, click on the specific test links below:

40% off of Grockit ACT
40% off of Grockit SAT
40% off of Grockit GMAT
40% off of Grockit GRE
40% off of Grockit LSAT
Note: If you are a veteran, active military personnel or an immediate family member of either, and you are in the rare circumstances of needing help preparing for the AP Calculus or AP US History exams or the IIM CAT (for India), please contact us via email at support@grockit.com to request a 40% discount.  You may be asked to provide some form of military service proof.

 

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The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Gets Behind Startup Weekend

By posted November 4, 2011

The press announcement is below and over at edu.startupweekend.org. Huge thanks to Bill and Melinda for the support of Startup Weekend EDU.

Startup Weekend Receives $250,000 Grant from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for EDU Events

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – November 2, 2011 – Startup Weekend, a non-profit organization, powered by the Kauffman Foundation, and Grockit, a social-learning Internet start-up, today announced that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation issued a grant in support of Startup Weekend EDU, a dedicated education (EDU) vertical within Startup Weekend that is designed to attract and assist the education community working to bring new solutions to the industry. With a grant of $250,000, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is backing educators, developers, designers, marketers, product managers, and startup enthusiasts, all of whom share a common goal – to bring new innovations to education.

“The Kauffman Foundation is excited to have the Gates Foundation support this important initiative that will help entrepreneurs with innovative education business solutions learn how to execute their ideas,” said Nick Seguin, manager of entrepreneurship at the Kauffman Foundation. “Startup Weekend EDU builds upon the Kauffman Foundation’s interest in teaching entrepreneurs how to build successful education ventures that have the potential to be some of the next great high-growth companies of the future.”

Startup Weekends are 54-hour events where startup enthusiasts come together to share ideas, form teams, build products, and launch startups with the ultimate goal of bringing new innovations to education. October has already seen three successful Startup Weekend EDU events in Seattle, San Francisco and Washington. The first London Startup Weekend EDU event is slated for November, and the series will announce additional events around the world taking place over the next 12 months.

“Given its dedication to education reform and extensive networks in the space, the Gates Foundation is the ideal partner for us to scale the Startup Weekend EDU initiative,” said Farb Nivi, founder of Grockit.

To register for the London Startup Weekend EDU event please visit edu.startupweekend.org. To learn more about becoming a Startup Weekend organizer please visit startupweekend.org/about/event.

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Answering the question that you’re about to ask

By posted October 17, 2011

We’re happy to announce the newest addition to the Grockit social learning platform: Grockit Answers, a tool for hosting timely Q&A discussions around web videos. We started by designing this for our own videos, but quickly decided that it could have more impact if we expanded our scope a bit. So as of today, Grockit Answers works with any video hosted on YouTube or Vimeo.

There’s a wealth of educational videos available online, but the primary mode of interaction among viewers — short-form commenting — doesn’t do much to enhance or facilitate learning. When you’re trying to grok a challenging lecture from an AI course at Stanford or an open talk at MIT, you need more than comments. You need a way to ask a question about a particular point that confused you, or ask for a clarification or maybe a useful reference on something mentioned in the video. You really need a Q&A site, and you need to be able to attach each of your questions to a particular time in the video. You need Grockit Answers. Here’s a quick video clip (live Q&A discussion here). Feel free to ask questions about this video on Grockit Answers.

Built on Popcorn.js, a fantastic new HTML5 media framework for better connecting web videos to web pages, Grockit Answers displays each question and its answers at the exact point in the video that they are most relevant. As a viewer, some of the things that confuse you are are likely to be the same as what confused others before you. In a time-anchored Q&A on Grockit Answers, just as the question begins to form in your mind, it may magically pop up on the screen, along with a few great answers.

For the educators out there, I’m happy to say that we developed a number of additional features with you in mind. You can create a Q&A page on a video that only you and your students have access to, and you can moderate the conversation to get additional controls and deeper insight into what’s happening. Finally, and most exciting, you can add these Q&A pages to your own course websites (example), easily replacing links to YouTube or Vimeo videos with your moderated discussions. Feel free to contact us at answers@grockit.com with any questions about this.


Start a Question & Answer page for any video on YouTube. Share it with your classroom or share it with your friends. And please, let us know what you think.

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Grockit Funding News

By posted October 17, 2011

It’s a busy news day over at Grockit.  See our funding announcement and press coverage below.

New York Times with screens of Grockit’s new facebook canvas app

Grockit in CNet with a link to Grockit Answers

Venturebeat insights on Grockit funding news

Grockit makes the Spark of Genius series in Mashable

The Wall Street Journal mentioned the news. And they mentioned again here.

TechCrunch was the first to cover Grockit Answers

HackEducation expands on the funding news

USNews & World Report comes in with a new angle

Grockit Raises $7 Million to Drive Social Learning

Previous Backers Lead Round; NewSchools Venture Fund and GSV Capital Make First Investments in Grockit

SAN FRANCISCO, CA. (October 17, 2011) – Grockit, a social learning company, announced today that it has received just over $7 million in Series D venture funding led by Atlas Venture, a current investor in the company. Benchmark Capital and Integral Capital Partners, both return investors, also participated in the round, along with new investors NewSchools Venture Fund and GSV Capital Corp. (Nasdaq:GSVC). The funding will be used to support Grockit’s growth both domestically and internationally. The company’s total outside investment to date is over $24 million.

“Technology like Grockit’s has the power to transform the way students learn,” said Jennifer Carolan, Associate Partner at NewSchools Venture Fund. “When we invest in companies, we look for meaningful innovation in the education sector, the potential for big impact and a strong management team. Grockit meets all these criteria and it adds to them a very happy customer base. We’re thrilled to support the team at Grockit.”

Improving scores through social learning
Today’s students use technology to communicate, play games, share videos and more. Grockit combines the online tools students are already using, such as social networking and gaming, with an adaptive learning platform, to help students better prepare for college entrance exams, including the SAT, ACT, GMAT, LSAT, and GRE. Compared to independent studiers, social learners on Grockit spend 30 percent more time solving problems, solve more than twice as many problems, and are 10 percent more likely to answer questions correctly.

“The education sector is due to be transformed by a new wave of disruptive companies. Grockit has built a framework for social learning that will engage millions of college-bound students across the globe,” said Michael Moe, Founder and CEO of GSV Capital. “Grockit is ambitious; they’re focused on extending studying where students currently socialize online; and they have a plan to significantly grow the universe of online social learners.”

Expanding its base of customers around the world
In addition to the products available at www.grockit.com, the company is also partnering with higher education institutions to provide test prep as part of an academic institution’s study aids. This month, Georgetown University will begin providing students and alumni with access to Grockit’s GRE, GMAT and LSAT test prep programs. In the coming months, Grockit will be rolling out similar programs with universities in the U.S. and around the world.

“Grockit has made all the right moves to become a dominant player in this space,” said Jeff Fagnan, Partner at Atlas Venture. “Grockit is at the epicenter of the education technology space, and we’re excited about the future for the company.”

In the last month, Grockit has:
● Surpassed 10,000,000 questions answered by learners,
● Integrated with Facebook’s updated Open Graph API to make studying more social,
● Introduced a “one-for-one” business model to help under-resourced students achieve dreams of higher education,
● Expanded in India with a new product to help students prepare for the IIM-CAT, a required test for applying to India’s most prestigious management school,
● Added a new VP of Engineering to its growing management team,
● And, together with Startup Weekend and the Kauffman Foundation, announced a new Startup Weekend EDU series around the world.

“We’re growing quickly, and now is the time to accelerate the business. Every day, we add the equivalent of one American high school to our user base,” said Roy Gilbert, Grockit CEO. “While we continue to build from that momentum in the next year, our goals and focus will remain the same: to help more students learn by using the incredible power and scale of the Web.”

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Grockit Accepted at Georgetown

By posted October 13, 2011

Rusty Greiff About the Author: Rusty Greiff is Grockit’s Chief Strategy and Corporate Development Officer and a resident of the greater Washington DC area.  Rusty has an extensive background in politics and education.

For over a year Grockit has developed and managed private-label and co-branded products for K-12 schools, virtual schools, charter school networks and major online Universities.  Today, I’m proud to share that Grockit and Georgetown University have partnered to provide premium online test prep and collaborative learning for Georgetown undergraduate students, and we will co-market Grockit premium subscriptions at a significant discount for Georgetown alumni.

As one of the most selective academic universities in the world, Georgetown continues to drive online strategies and initiatives that improve student success – we are excited that they have chosen Grockit as a solution for their students and alumni.  Georgetown will leverage Grockit’s personalized assessment engine, adaptive and social learning platform and gaming mechanics to drive superior student engagement.  Like us, they believe in the power of social and collaborative learning to prepare students.

We’re looking forward to working with like-minded universities in the future.  I promise to update Grockit followers with posts every time we create new relationships with Universities, so that you can know when your school has joined the Grockit community.

Just in case you’re wondering, here are just a few reasons why Grockit is attractive to major universities:

* Over the past few years, more than a million students all over the world have used Grockit to practice and study together online to achieve their best scores on standardized tests

* Grockit’s social learning has proven to help students learn more, faster and perform better

* Grockit has figured out how to add and move massive amounts of content, check and curate that content quickly

* Grockit already works with accomplished, forward-thinking schools with strong support and broad awareness

* Grockit is a leader in developing for the most pervasive and important platforms for students and teachers

* Grockit is actively trying to improve learning outcomes for millions of students in under-resourced communities

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Grockit Launches New IIM CAT Product

By posted September 28, 2011

Earlier this year, we began working to create a new Grockit learning community centered around the Indian Institutes of Management Common Admission Test (IIM-CAT).  Over 300,000 students sit for the CAT each year, fighting for as few as 2,000 seats in one of the prestigious Indian management institutes, making it one of the most competitive standardized tests in the world. In 2009, the CAT moved from paper to a Computer-Based Test (CBT), a transition that has simplified the administration process, but presents a range of new challenges to students preparing for the exam.

In helping students meet these challenges, we are thrilled to announce the official launch of the Grockit IIM-CAT group!  Here’s the first story covering this news, see the press release below.

With Grockit’s Indian user base growing fast, (in 2010, 27% of GMAT students in India used Grockit) it’s evident that CAT 2011 students are also seeking online solutions. Test Series and practice materials run upwards of Rs. 5000 ($112), and restrict students’ learning environment to test centers, packed classrooms, and the confines of a physical textbook. Grockit expands these borders, providing students 24/7 access to adaptive customizable assessments, social group study, detailed strength and weakness reports and a computer-based experience similar to the one on Test Day.

We are launching with over 3,000 practice questions covering every topic area presented on CAT since 2001. Since we’ve found Verbal Ability to be the most important section for students to practice, two-thirds of our content will be in these areas. We’ve made the Quantitative Ability and Data Interpretation sections super difficult, drawing from the expertise of our experienced CAT authors, editors and IIM alumni. And we plan to continue to build out our curriculum on a rolling basis, using information from newly released tests and ongoing feedback from our users. See our official press release, below.

 

Grockit Introduces Test Prep for India’s CAT Exam

September 28, 2011 — Grockit, the leader in collaborative and social learning, today announced the availability of its test preparation program for India’s Common Admission Test (CAT), the required exam for admission into Indian Institutes of Management (IIM). Grockit, which is currently used by over a quarter of students in India studying for the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT), is releasing the IIM CAT program in response to customer demand and the company’s rapidly growing Indian user base.

Grockit’s IIM CAT prep differs from existing programs in that it’s built around an adaptive, social and interactive experience for students. Users have the advantage of preparing for the exam in a virtual group setting and receiving real-time feedback from their peers and Grockit tutors. This “anytime and anywhere” approach allows students who may not live in big cities with easily accessible testing centers to have access to an affordable, web-based alternative. The personalised study plan format adapts to each individual user’s level and shifts as the student improves and progresses.  And since the IIM CAT recently moved from a paper-based test to a computer-based test, Grockit’s web-based format gives students a similar experience to what they’ll have during the real test.

“Students in India are incredibly enthusiastic about Grockit,” said Roy Gilbert, CEO, Grockit. “We’ve seen remarkable growth in India over the last year, and we’re excited to help our Indian users tackle one of the highest-stakes exams in the world.”

Grockit created the test prep program for the IIM CAT by working with partners on the ground in India, leading American and Indian authors, and IIM CAT specialists and alumni. The pricing for the program is significantly lower than alternative options currently available; for more information visit our programs page and IIM CAT blog.

“Grockit is the most addictive, creative and engaging product for learning I’ve come across. Thanks guys!” says Shuba, a student from Chennai, India.

The launch of Grockit’s CAT test prep follows Grockit’s launch of Rupee pricing and localised Indian payment options earlier this year. Currently, more than 25 percent of people taking the GMAT in India already use Grockit to study, answering 1.25 million study questions in the past year alone.

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