Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google


AT&T Seeks Ed Tech Ventures for New Funding Accelerator

  • By Dian Schaffhauser
  • 01/27/15

AT&T wants to invest in organizations working to enhance education and improve high school success and career readiness for students. The company has just launched a new "accelerator" to fund education technology ventures, whether they're being developed by for-profit companies or non-profits.

The AT&T Aspire Accelerator will fund each operation up to $75,000 — $50,000 as an investment and $25,000 to cover program expenses. In the case of for-profit entities, the $50,000 investment is in return for up to 5 percent of equity in the endeavor. For non-profits, the money is given as a general contribution in exchange for participation in the accelerator and meeting certain program requirements, such as submitting impact measurements.

The Aspire Accelerator team will review the applications and invite finalists to take an interview with the selection committee. The winners will be selected, according to the company, "based on their ability to create and scale exponential change in education that will empower educational and/or career success." Extra credit goes to those projects with "an ability to reach and/or impact at-risk students."

The minimum requirements to apply for the program are threefold:

  • The team must be working on a product or service that uses technology to support students' educational or career success;
  • It must already have the start of a viable product and some proof of product-market fit; and
  • It must have at least on member who will participate in the Aspire Accelerator.

Along with the funding, winning applicants also receive mentoring from AT&T staff and external experts within education and technology and access to a national platform, the broader AT&T Aspire initiative, which is promoting education innovations on a national scale. Applications for this first round of the initiative are due by Feb. 20, 2015. Applicants will be notified of their status by April 15. The program will officially kick off in May; and "demo day" will take place in October.

"Technology is changing how teachers manage their classrooms, how students digest information, and how parents and administrators communicate," said Charlene Lake, AT&T's chief sustainability officer. "The AT&T Aspire Accelerator is designed to support and scale ed tech ideas that make brighter futures — ideas from for-profits and non-profits that want to make a difference."

About the Author

Dian Schaffhauser is a former senior contributing editor for 1105 Media's education publications THE Journal, Campus Technology and Spaces4Learning.

Featured

  • Silhouettes of business professionals stand against a blurred futuristic city skyline at night, with a glowing digital network data connection

    It's Time for Higher Ed to Get Serious About AI Strategy

    Without a coordinated strategy that involves multiple academic and administrative units across the entire campus, colleges risk wasting resources, duplicating efforts, and ultimately failing to deliver on the promise of deploying technology to improve learning and operations.

  • large group of college students sitting on an academic quad

    Student Readiness: Learning to Learn

    Melissa Loble, Instructure's chief academic officer, recommends a focus on 'readiness' as a broader concept as we try to understand how to build meaningful education experiences that can form a bridge from the university to the workplace. Here, we ask Loble what readiness is and how to offer students the ability to 'learn to learn'.

  • silhouette of business person facing wall of data

    Why AI Strategy Belongs in the President's Office

    Institutions that are succeeding with AI share one thing in common, and it is not a better committee, a larger budget, or a more sophisticated technology stack. It is a president who never handed off the steering wheel.

  • Jason Palm

    AI, Identity, and Speed: Cybersecurity Priorities for Higher Ed

    Fortinet Security Operations Specialist Jason Palm explains how AI is raising new security challenges for higher education, requiring stronger governance, identity protection, threat detection, automation, and incident readiness.