HOWARD TULLMAN APPEARS ON BOOTSTRAPPING IN AMERICA

WATCH THE SHOW HERE:

New INC. Magazine Blog Post by 1871 CEO Howard Tullman

READ THE WHOLE PIECE HERE: http://www.inc.com/howard-tullman/bury-the-unicorpses-and-get-real.html

READ THE WHOLE PIECE HERE: http://www.inc.com/howard-tullman/bury-the-unicorpses-and-get-real.html

CHICAGOLAND ENTREPRENEURIAL CENTER NAMES SEVEN FINALISTS FOR ANNUAL MERRICK MOMENTUM AWARD

CHICAGOLAND ENTREPRENEURIAL CENTER NAMES SEVEN FINALISTS FOR ANNUAL MERRICK MOMENTUM AWARD

Award Will Be Bestowed At The Conclusion Of The 2015 Momentum Awards Dinner to Support 1871; Annual Award Recognizes The Best And Brightest Companies In Chicago

CHICAGO (SEPTEMBER 25, 2015) – The Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center today announced the seven finalists for the 2015 Merrick Momentum Award. The finalists include Avant, elevate DIGITAL, Raise, SMS Assist, Sprout Social, ThinkCERCA, and Vibes. The Merrick Momentum Award is sponsored by Merrick Ventures, led by Michael Ferro.

“Each year, we present the Momentum Award to recognize a top up-and-coming company that is on the cusp of being an established enterprise and significantly impacting the Chicago economy,” said Jim O’Connor, Jr., CEC Board Chair. “These companies represent the best of Chicago’s innovative tech community, and showcase the wealth of innovation and entrepreneurial success taking place throughout the city.”

The Momentum Award is bestowed annually to a company in Chicago that is showing momentum and is on track to be one of the next great companies to emerge from Chicago. Past recipients of the award include kCura, Braintree, Cleversafe, GrubHub, SitterCity, Eved, and SAVO.

“As the leading advocates for startups in Chicago, 1871 and CEC are able to create substantial improvements in the city's entrepreneurial community,” said 1871 CEO Howard A. Tullman. “New businesses play a critical role in fostering job growth and economic opportunity, and the Momentum Awards Dinner enables us to celebrate these businesses and continue our efforts to foster innovation and prosperity throughout Chicago.”

The Merrick Momentum Award is one of four awards that will be bestowed at the coming event, including the Chicagoness Award, the Corporate Champion Award, and the Entrepreneurial Champion Award. The event, which will take place at the Radisson Blu hotel, will draw 750 of the top supporters of business and entrepreneurship in Chicago together. It is the largest gathering of the tech community annually and the primary fundraiser for CEC, which supports the activities and operations of 1871.

Anyone interested in attending the Momentum Dinner can register at http://www.1871.com/2015Momentum. 1871 makes an effort to open up the dinner to entrepreneurs, and facilitates strong interactions between some of our best entrepreneurs and the attendees of the dinner.

About 1871

1871 is the home of more than 325 early-stage, high-growth digital startups. Located in The Merchandise Mart, this 75,000 square foot facility is also the headquarters of nationally recognized accelerators, Techstars Chicago and Impact Engine; half a dozen industry-specific incubators in key areas such as real estate, education technology, food and financial technology; several emerging tech talent schools (Flatiron, The Fullbridge Program, Designation and the Startup Institute), and the state's leading technology advocate, the Illinois Science and Technology Coalition. It is the second home to Chicago-based VCs, Pritzker Group Venture Capital, MATH Venture Partners, Hyde Park Angels, OCA Ventures, OurCrowd and Chicago Ventures, as well as satellite offices for Northwestern University, University of Illinois, University of Chicago, Loyola University Chicago, Illinois Institute of Technology, and DeVry. 1871 has fast become recognized as the hub for the city’s entrepreneurial/technology ecosystem and has been featured in Inc. Magazine, TechCrunch, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Chicago Tribune and Crain’s Chicago Business among other top media. 1871 is the flagship project of the Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center.

About Avant

Avant is a fast-growing marketplace lending platform that is lowering the costs and barriers of borrowing for consumers. Through the use of big data and machine-learning algorithms, the company offers a unique and highly customized approach to streamlined credit options. At its core, Avant is a tech company that is dedicated to creating innovative and practical financial products for all consumers. To date, Avant has secured more than $1.4 billion in funding and another $400 million through its institutional marketplace. More than 250,000 loans have been issued through the Avant website. Avant has been featured in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, TechCrunch, Fortune, Bloomberg and Crain's Chicago Business. In 2015, Avant was named to Forbes America's Most Promising Companies list as well as Forbes list of Next Billion Dollar Startups. Find out more at www.avant.com.

About elevate DIGITAL

elevate DIGITAL is the leading developer of street-level software technology. The elevate platform manages and controls connective messaging, digital applications, geo-targeted services and data collection within SMART display technology. elevate’s software platform dramatically changes traditional digital technology and provides clients with a new, highly interactive channel to reach the consumer and retain data. The platform has advanced general methods of communication, by enabling brands, municipalities and locations to engage with people and devices within verticals that include; city streets, IoT, hospitality, transportation, entertainment and more. For more information, visit www.elevateDIGITAL.com.

About Raise

Raise is the largest, most trusted gift card marketplace where members can save on gift cards for any brand and sell gift cards or store credit for cash. For every seller cashing in on old cards or credit, a happy buyer saves on a favorite store, brand or restaurant. With the Raise app for iPhone and Android, members can take the marketplace on the go and instantly redeem cards or credit right at the store counter. Every transaction is backed by a 100 percent money-back guarantee. For more information, visit www.raise.com.

About SMS Assist

SMS Assist is a Chicago-based technology company providing multisite property management to a roster of clients with more than 90,000 service locations. Using its proprietary software platform to manage its network of more than 20,000 affiliate subcontractors, SMS Assist offers a suite of property management benefits including leveraged pricing of products and services, risk indemnification, real-time services validation, instant invoicing, automatic service audits and data analysis to ensure quality and cost efficiency. SMS Assist is revolutionizing multisite property management services for its growing list of national and Fortune 500 clients including Family Dollar (NYSE: FDO), O'Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ: ORLY), JLL (NYSE: JLL) and Colony Capital (NYSE: CLNY). To learn more, visit smsassist.com.

About Sprout Social

Sprout Social offers social media engagement, advocacy and analytics solutions for leading agencies and brands, including Anthropologie, GrubHub, Hyatt, Spotify and Zipcar. Available via web browser, iOS and Android apps, Sprout’s engagement platform enables brands to more effectively communicate on social channels, collaborate across teams and provide an exceptional customer experience. Headquartered in Chicago, Sprout is a Twitter Certified Product, Facebook Preferred Marketing Developer, LinkedIn Company Page Partner and Google+ Pages API Partner. Learn more at sproutsocial.com.

About ThinkCERCA

ThinkCERCA is an online platform designed to empower teachers to personalize literacy instruction across disciplines. ThinkCERCA helps whole school teams differentiate for engaging learning in classrooms of diverse learners. The CERCA Framework provides a common language for students, teachers, parents, and administrators to drive sustainable growth in student achievement. For more information, visit www.thinkcerca.com.

About Vibes

Vibes is a mobile marketing technology leader that helps some of the world’s biggest brands unlock new revenue by arming them with the technology and guidance they need to succeed in mobile marketing. Vibes' Catapult Mobile Relationship Management (MRM) platform enables marketers to manage all mobile communications including text messaging, push notifications, Apple’s Passbook, Google Wallet and mobile web campaigns — all from a single interface. Vibes has delivered more than 5 billion mobile experiences since 1998 on behalf of customers such as Sears, Home Depot, Verizon, Allstate, The Gap, Pep Boys, Tribune, Gannett, Imagitas and Excentus. Vibes is a Tier 1 aggregator with direct connections to all U.S. wireless carriers. To learn more about Vibes, visit www.vibes.com or connect on Twitter.com/Vibes.

How Chicago Edtech Companies Are Rising to the Head of the Class

Earlier this month, two Chicago-based education technology companies -ThinkCERCA (who we told you about last year) and Classkick - raised institutional venture capital rounds. And while both companies are individually impressive and already influential in the burgeoning edtech sector, they have a lot of corporate classmates in the Windy City that are also attracting strategic and pure venture capital.

As we write about regularly, instructional delivery models in education - particularly within K-12 - are rapidly transforming. Educators have access to more digital resources than at any point in history, and are using a combination of apps, videos, and websites to flip their classrooms, personalize instruction, and assess student performance both individually and in aggregate.

The Chicago-based edtech startup where I work, appoLearning, recently unveiled a universal search engine that lets teachers search for by keyword for the best resources to teach subjects ranging from Number Sense to geology to high school political science

Other Chicago-based startups, often founded by educators who sense opportunity amidst all of this disruption, smell blood.

"Big companies with top-down approaches and highly paid sales teams don't get what startups are good at," explains Howard Tullman, longtime entrepreneur (edtech and otherwise) and CEO of Chicago's digital media incubator 1871. "But what startups need to understand is that they have to solve the adoption issue (of their product) first, and then they can worry about writing a giant contract."

Combining the best of both worlds 
In recent years, several 1871 edtech companies have raised angel, institutional and corporate venture capital.

ThinkCERCA, which creatively couples informational text and reading assignments for students grades 4-12 with Common Core-aligned assessments, in March raised $3.2 million in venture capital in a round led by the venture capital arm (managed byAtrium Capital) of Chicago area educational publishing pioneer Follett. Other investors included Chicago-based Math Venture Partners, Amicus Capital, Great Oaks Venture Capital, and angel investor/OpenTable founder Chuck Templeton. ThinkCERCA has previously raised $1.5 million from individual investors.

Beyond the capital from Follet, which will be deployed to sales and engineering talent, ThinkCERCA CEO Eileen Murphy (a former Chicago public school teacher and administrator) sees relationships to tap into from a company that was founded two years after the Chicago fire (1873).

"One thing that Follett can bring today is a lot of credibility with customers, which helps us stand out." We have yet to work out all of the details of the partnership, but we are figuring out how to leverage their enormous network of schools."
Follett CEO Mary Lee Schneider concurs.

"Follett works with more than 70,000 schools across the country," she said, "and through this partnership, we'll be able to expand ThinkCERCA's reach, as well as foster developments that will make the technology even more effective and easier to use."

ClassKick, another Chicago edtech company to recently raise venture capital, has already attracted customers nationwide and in 75 countries around the globe with its slick technology that lets teachers individually monitor students in their classrooms as they are working on problems on their iPads. The company raised a $1.7 million seed round led by leading edtech investor Kapor Capital, Lightbank, Great Oaks Venture Capital and Yammer founder Adam Pisoni. ClassKick's founders hail from Teach for America and Google.

Other 1871 edtech companies that have either recently raised significant outside capital or are expected to include Learnmetrics (an analytics company that aims to do for educational data what Mint.com does for financial data), NextTier Education(which is reimagining the college application process) and Infiniteach (developer of the Skill Champ app for students with autism).

Beyond funding 
Edtech companies springing up at 1871 and other Chicago locations are also benefiting from local organizations like Leap Innovations and DV X Labs. Founded by former New Schools for Chicago CEO Phyllis Lockett, Leap Innovations is based in 1871 and helps educators discover the best new educational innovations (while also providing feedback to edtech developers). DV X Labs, a joint venture between 1871 and DeVry, is an accelerator for edtech companies seeking to pilot and market their offerings.

Of course the best resource for an early stage edtech company (in Chicago or otherwise), explains 1871's Tullman, is a good customer relationship management system.

"They need a good CRM program to find champions and advocates within schools, and not spend too much time on marketing to everybody," he says. "I wouldn't even call it viral. It's simply class warfare."

Three Ways Software Is Empowering Teachers by Bill Gates - Features 1871 Alumni Company Think Cerca

Trends in Ed Tech 

Three Ways Software Is Empowering Teachers

By Bill Gates 

| August 16, 2015

Forty years ago, Paul Allen and I started Microsoft because we wanted to help everybody get as much out of computers as we did. Back then, only big business had access, and we thought millions of people would benefit from having that kind of power at their fingertips. Since then, the personal computer, software, and the Internet have revolutionized every aspect of life in the United States—almost. 

It is still surprising to me how little technology has affected education. These days, I spend a lot of time thinking about what teachers can do if they get new tools in their hands, especially if they have a say in what those tools look like. A year ago, I wrote about six websites for teachers that had caught my eye, though I noted that it was “too early to say which ones are going to break through.” It's still too early, but we're starting to be able to identify patterns in the ways that teachers are using computers and the Internet to give their students a more dynamic education.

Here are three trends that teachers have been telling me about.

Newly available data is revolutionizing the way teachers and students collaborate. Right now, most teachers spend hours grading homework and tests and then copying everything down into spreadsheets they made themselves. And after all that, teachers often only have a partial sense of how each student is doing—based on rows and rows of numbers and whatever qualitative insights they can keep in their head. But online systems can give teachers pinpoint diagnostics for each student at the touch of a button. At Summit Public Schools—a charter school network that started in California—students and teachers collaborate on the Personalized Learning Platform, which generates troves of data. Teachers not only get to see how each student did on the days' assignments; they can use predictive analytical tools and sophisticated visualizations to determine whether students are on track, so they are continually adjusting in real time to target the areas where students are having trouble. 

Game-changing educational software is rising to the top. It takes a while for teachers to sort through all the options and find the technology that works best. Then it takes a while longer for developers to incorporate teachers' feedback and improve their products. But there are more and more successful examples. A piece of software called Newsela, for example, translates the news of the day into articles pitched at different reading levels. That way, no matter how varied the skill levels are in a single class, teachers can lead a group discussion on the same reading, which is a strategy proven to benefit everyone's learning. Another example is ThinkCERCA, software for essay-writing. It's easier to conceive of doing a math problem online than writing an essay online, but ThinkCERCA helps teachers and students collaborate through every part of the process, from gathering notes to creating an outline to iterating on drafts. It doesn't generate the feedback or grade the essays—the teacher is still working one on one with each student—but the online environment gives students more structure and enables them to get more input every step of the way.

Teachers are using online aggregators in huge numbers to share great ideas with colleagues around the country. For years, students got a textbook and teachers got a manual, and if they didn't like it, well, tough. But the Internet is helping teachers put all sorts of lesson plans into the public domain. Not only that, but teachers can communicate with each other about how to teach the lessons, and they can share feedback so that the lessons get better over time. As a result, teachers enjoy a level of choice and collaboration that simply didn't exist before. A few years ago, New York state assembled a collection of high-quality lesson plans called EngageNY. They were rigorous about including only the best material, and teachers loved it. So far, teachers from all over the country—not just New York—have downloaded material from EngageNY more than 20 million times. Other sites, including Better Lesson and LearnZillion, have developed equally faithful followings. Teachers can use the content exactly how they want to: teaching it whole, picking and choosing from here and there, or adapting and improvising in their own way. 

Two common denominators connect these trends. First, they give teachers more resources we know that they want. Teachers have more time, better information, and more options for how to act on that information. Second, teachers have been instrumental in developing and implementing these technologies. ThinkCERCA’s CEO is a teacher. The teachers at Summit have been working with developers to refine their online system for years. And teachers are voting with their feet on which software and lesson aggregators they prefer. 

For me, technology has always been about what people can accomplish when they use it. We are starting to see teachers using it to improve the quality of the interactions they have with their students every day. It will still take time to find out which ideas will have the biggest impact, but it's exciting to see the changes that are already happening.

How Chicago edtech companies are rising to the head of the class

Brad Spirrison

3/23/2015 @ 2:15:07 PM

You could put it on the blackboard! Yes, Chicago is an epicenter for educational innovation.

Earlier this month, two Chicago-based education technology companies - ThinkCERCA(who we told you about last year) and Classkick - raised institutional venture capital rounds. And while both companies are individually impressive and already influential in the burgeoning edtech sector, they have a lot of corporate classmates in the Windy City that are also attracting strategic and pure venture capital.

As we write about regularly, instructional delivery models in education - particularly within K-12 - are rapidly transforming. Educators have access to more digital resources than at any point in history and are using a combination of apps, videos, and websites to flip their classrooms, personalize instruction, and assess student performance both individually and in aggregate.

Startups, often founded by educators who sense opportunity amidst all of this disruption, smell blood.

“Big companies with top-down approaches and highly paid sales teams don’t get what startups are good at,” explains Howard Tullman, longtime entrepreneur (edtech and otherwise) and CEO of Chicago’s digital media incubator 1871. “But what startups need to understand is that they have to solve the adoption issue (of their product) first, and then they can worry about writing a giant contract.”

Combining the best of both worlds

In recent years, several 1871 edtech companies have raised angel, institutional and corporate venture capital.

ThinkCERCA, which creatively couples informational text and reading assignments for students grades 4-12 with Common Core-aligned assessments, in March raised $3.2 million in venture capital in a round led by the venture capital arm (managed by Atrium Capital) of Chicago area educational publishing pioneer Follett. Other investors included Chicago-based Math Venture Partners, Amicus Capital, Great Oaks Venture Capital, and angel investor/OpenTable founder Chuck Templeton. ThinkCERCA has previously raised $1.5 million from individual investors.

Beyond the capital from Follet, which will be deployed to sales and engineering talent, ThinkCERCA CEO Eileen Murphy (a former Chicago public school teacher and administrator) sees relationships to tap into from a company that was founded two years after the Chicago fire (1873).

“One thing that Follett can bring today is a lot of credibility with customers, which helps us stand out.” We have yet to work out all of the details of the partnership, but we are figuring out how to leverage their enormous network of schools.”

Follett CEO Mary Lee Schneider concurs.

“Follett works with more than 70,000 schools across the country,” she said, “and through this partnership, we’ll be able to expand ThinkCERCA’s reach, as well as foster developments that will make the technology even more effective and easier to use.”

ClassKick, another Chicago edtech company to recently raise venture capital, has already attracted customers nationwide and in 75 countries around the globe with its slick technology that lets teachers individually monitor students in their classrooms as they are working on problems on their iPads. The company raised a $1.7 million seed round led by leading edtech investor Kapor Capital, Lightbank, Great Oaks Venture Capital and Yammer founder Adam Pisoni. ClassKick’s founders hail from Teach for America and Google.

Other 1871 edtech companies that have either recently raised significant outside capital or are expected to include Learnmetrics (an analytics company that aims to do for educational data what Mint.com does for financial data), NextTier Education (which is reimagining the college application process) and Infiniteach (developer of the Skill Champ app for students with autism).

Beyond funding

Edtech companies springing up at 1871 and other Chicago locations are also benefiting from local organizations like Leap Innovations and DV X Labs. Founded by former New Schools for Chicago CEO Phyllis Lockett, Leap Innovations is based in 1871 and helps educators discover the best new educational innovations (while also providing feedback to edtech developers). DV X Labs, a joint venture between 1871 and DeVry, is an accelerator for edtech companies seeking to pilot and market their offerings.

Of course the best resource for an early stage edtech company (in Chicago or otherwise), explains 1871’s Tullman, is a good customer relationship management system.

“They need a good CRM program to find champions and advocates within schools, and not spend too much time on marketing to everybody,” he says. “I wouldn’t even call it viral. It’s simply class warfare.”

Game Changers in Education at 1871

Present Game Changers in Education A Showcase of Educators, Entrepreneurs, and Funders Leading Chicago's Education Technology Community Date: February 25, 2015 Time: 6-8:30 pm Place: 1871 Auditorium 222 W. Merchandise Mart Plaza, Suite 1212 What:  Food, drink, and program $10 Tickets Chicago is setting the bar for the nation when it comes to innovation in education. Come meet those blazing the trail, including speakers:   Entrepreneurs Christopher Flint, Infiniteach Brian Hill, Jail Education Solutions Eileen Murphy, ThinkCerca   Educators Steve McWade, Spencer Tech Academy Melissa Zaikos, IntrinsicSchools   Funders Mark Achler, Math Venture Partners Heather Anichini, The Chicago Public Education Fund Courtney VanLonkhuyzen, Motorola Mobility Foundation With special thanks to our sponsor: And deep appreciation of our partners: