Chicago Ventures partners closely with exceptional entrepreneurs building companies in undercapitalized high-potential ecosystems.

Chicago Ventures

S3 Ventures is a venture capital firm that helps entrepreneurs in building high-impact companies. The company provides patient capital and substantial resources to visionary entrepreneurs, enabling them to nurture exceptional, high-impact businesses in the fields of business technology, digital experiences, and healthcare technology.

S3 Ventures

Tensility Venture Partners is a seed-stage firm that partners with mission-driven founders of early-stage enterprise AI startups in security, digital health, and novel, vertical-applications. The firm seeds and grows companies that will revolutionize business by delivering the promise of AI to the enterprise. It invests in cybersecurity, digital health, and vertical industry applications. Founded in 2016, Tensility Venture Partners is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.

Tensility Venture Partners

Bronze Valley is a conference, online resource, venture capital fund, and entrepreneurship and innovation coaching program.

Bronze Valley

Investing in Chicago’s future. We help passionate founders, disruptive startups & innovative orgs change the world

Lofty Ventures

Upkey

Upkey is a provider of remote career readiness and talent engagement tools for students, universities, and companies. The company's platform provides students with innovative tools including personal branding services and materials, vast network reach of jobs and opportunities, and on-demand services based on professional needs, enabling competitive candidates to polish, present, and brand themselves more effectively and amplifies their success in transitioning into the professional world. UpKey was founded in 2016 by Amir Badr, Mark Pawloski, and Mo Bitar.

Founded by Amir Badr in 2016, Upkey claims to be the world’s first and only student incubator by offering free career readiness tools for high school and university students. The company’s tools help students with resume and interview preparation and also virtual classes and internships at universities and companies. The Upkey Dashboard is a personalized career map for students to meet their professional goals. Upkey’s internship programs also help businesses build their pipeline of candidates. In the twelve months before February 2021, about 100,000 students across 70 countries had used Upkey’s career readiness tools.

Remote learning is driving an education technology revolution.

EdTech: K-12

Upkey Opens Summer Virtual Internship for 10,000 Students

Founded by Amir Badr in 2016, Upkey claims to be the world’s first and only student incubator by offering free career readiness tools for high school and university students. The company’s tools help students with resume and interview preparation and also virtual classes and internships at universities and companies. The Upkey Dashboard is a personalized career map for students to meet their professional goals. Upkey’s internship programs also help businesses build their pipeline of candidates. In the twelve months before February 2021, about 100,000 students across 70 countries had used Upkey’s career readiness tools.In February 2022, the company launched Upkey's Career Creation Platform, a suite of online tools that support prospective job seekers in overcoming discrimanation based on socioeconomic background. A month later, Upkey launched a free online career creation course for early-stage job seekers, featuring job exploration, interviewing, career launch, and professional evolution.In February 2021, Upkey raised USD 2.6 million in seed funding to expand operations and open a second office in Austin, Texas.

Founded in 2016, BookNook is an online literacy platform designed for learners in grades 1-5. Partnering with school districts and non-profit organizations, the company focuses on human-to-human learning and works with children one-on-one or in small groups, enabling it to gather rich, observational data. As of June 2021, the company partnered with hundreds of schools, school districts, and non-profits across 35 states.BookNook differs from other digital literacy tools by not requiring students to take formative assessments to check for their understanding. Rather, the platform lets teachers record qualitative data on oral fluency, such as whether a student pauses at punctuation marks as they read aloud, or reads in set phrases. Students can also record self-reflections on the platform.In June 2021, the company partnered with MIND Research Institute, a neuroscience and education social impact organization and creator of the PreK-8 visual instructional program ST Math, to deliver a High Dosage Tutoring program (HDT) for math to K-8 students to address unfinished learning. BookNook tutors will deliver tutoring sessions using the ST Math program over BookNook’s synchronous learning platform. The company launched a new teacher application portal at booknooktutor.com in October 2021, giving experienced teachers the opportunity to apply to become BookNook virtual tutors on its platform. BookNook intends to engage 10,000 virtual teachers to support 80,000 students by the end of the 2021-2022 school year.

BookNook

Story2 uses its proprietary Moments Method writing system, its StoryBuilder software, and live online group coaching to help high school students and professionals improve their writing, speaking, storytelling, and collaboration skills.The company aims to help different segments with their specific needs: students with college admission and scholarship essays, professionals preparing for interviews and creating cover letters, and business teams to improve sales, recruiting and company messaging through effective storytelling.Since 2013, Story2 has worked with more than 200,000 individuals in 21 countries with college admission essays, interview preparation, and pitching ideas. The company is expanding into China and India in 2020 and plans to focus on helping science and technology students improve their communication and leadership skills.

Story2

<div>
 
 Vooks offers a subscription-based, ad-free curated library of children's books converted to video with narration and some slow-paced animation, allowing children to read along while watching. Aimed at young children aged 6 months to 8 years, Vooks promotes reading aloud to develop fluency and comprehension. The company was founded by siblings Marshall Bex and Shannon Bex, and Russell Hirtzel, and is reportedly the first-ever streaming service for books with illustrations, read-along text and animations.
 
 
 In February 2020, Vooks raised USD 12 million in Series A funding; however, the investors and purpose of the funding were not disclosed. In November 2020, the company raised USD 21.9 million in equity investments from more than 30 investors.
 
 
 In November 2020, Vooks partnered with United Way of Metropolitan Dallas (UWMD), a community-based, nonprofit social change organization, and Atmos Energy, a natural gas distributor, to provide around 78,000 one-year Vooks subscriptions for children aged 3 to 6 and early education teachers in the Greater Dallas area. The program is funded by a USD 1 million contribution from Atmos Energy, and contributes to UWMD’s Aspire United 2030 education goal of increasing the number of North Texas students reading at grade level by third grade by 50%. Similarly, in March 2021, the company partnered with Reach Out and Read Of Greater New York (ROR GNY), a nonprofit organization of healthcare providers who promote early literacy. The partnership aims to provide more than 75,000 preschool children with one-year Vooks subscriptions starting in March 2021.
 
 
 In July 2021, it was reported that Vooks is offering its service to authors and producers as a way of quickly testing ideas with audiences through simple animated shorts. Thereby, Vooks expands its library of original content while authors and producers get real-time performance data.
 
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Vooks

Xeropan offers an AI-powered, game-based approach to learning English through 14 of the most widely-spoken languages. As of October 2020, the app had more than one million players.

Xeropan

<div>
 
 GoGuardian is a provider of student security software solutions to help educators identify learning patterns, protect students from harmful and distracting content, and support students at risk of self-harm and suicide. As of August 2021, the company had partnered with more than 10,000 schools in the US, covering more than 22 million students.  
 
 
 In November 2020, GoGuardian announced a 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/1863">
 merger with Pear Deck
 </a>
 to deepen the support provided to students and teachers and improve their in-class experience. Founded in 2014, Pear Deck is a student engagement platform that allows teachers to create, edit, and launch multimedia content and formative assessments on students' devices to increase student engagement. At the time of the merger, Pear Deck was used by 8 million educators and students in more than 17,000 schools worldwide. Pear Deck co-founder and Chief Educator, Michal Eynon-Lynch, will join the GoGuardian Board of Directors. In May 2022, the company acquired 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/10683">
 TutorMe,
 </a>
 Zovio’s tutoring services business, for USD 55 million in cash to strengthen its product offering. 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In August 2021, GoGuardian secured a USD 200 million investment from Tiger Global Management. The funds will be allocated for product innovation, talent acquisition, and business development. 
 
 
 
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GoGuardian

Businesses providing education delivery solutions such as learning management systems (LMS), and tech solutions for data analytics, administration, and other services to educational institutions.

Businesses delivering curriculum-based learning, particularly relating to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education to educational institutions and individual students.

Mostly for-profit corporations running state-funded, tuition-free schools as an alternative to traditional public schools.

Businesses providing extra-curricular education relating to the arts, hobbies, and life skills, and entities providing college and career guidance.

Businesses delivering English language arts (ELA) education, and language learning and literacy support to educational institutions and individual students.

Platforms providing students with after-school tutoring support on an individual or group basis.

Businesses delivering early childhood education, special education, and social-emotional learning (SEL) programs to educational institutions and individual students.

Entities providing professional development resources and tools for teachers, and those providing testing and assessment solutions to educational institutions and educators.

Platforms providing student-parent-teacher-school communication and networking solutions, and those providing search, reference, and marketplace solutions.

Companies that use GenAI as a core part of their product offering for EdTech: K12 solutions

Uses GenAI to provide interactive AI tutors, create personallized learning pathways,  and gamified learning solutions

Uses AI/ML to create personalized learning plans, adaptive learning platforms, and intelligent tutoring systems

Adaptive learning platforms, personalized learning plans, and AI-powered analytics provide insight into student performance

Learning platforms that promote an inclusive and equitable educational culture for underserved communities

Upkey

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