CommuniTeach: Learn new skills from your neighbors for free
CommuniTeach is an online platform that creates vibrant learning communities worldwide by enabling neighbors and friends to exchange skills in person for free. Individuals are matched based on their skills and meet for one-on-one and group community learning events. To support this free service, we offer a premium package for corporations interested in low-cost employee team building and skill enhancement.
About You
About You
First Name
Sarah
Last Name
Press
Website
Organization
CommuniTeach
Country
United States, IL
About Your Organization
Organization Name
CommuniTeach
Organization Website
Organization Phone
(847)691-2669
Organization Address
2225 W Wabansia #502
Organization Country
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Your idea
Name Your Project
CommuniTeach: Learn new skills from your neighbors for free
Country your work focuses on
United States
Describe Your Idea
CommuniTeach is an online platform that creates vibrant learning communities worldwide by enabling neighbors and friends to exchange skills in person for free. Individuals are matched based on their skills and meet for one-on-one and group community learning events. To support this free service, we offer a premium package for corporations interested in low-cost employee team building and skill enhancement.
Website URL
Innovation
What makes your idea unique?
Unlike traditional classes in which students pay professional teachers, CommuniTeach offers free skill exchanges in which participants actively teach and learn. The unique offering of free community learning opens our model to individuals from all economic backgrounds, who might otherwise find cost an insurmountable barrier to expanding their knowledge base. Additionally, our unique approach of encouraging users to be both teachers and learners empowers participants to play an active role in strengthening their community.
Additionally, we facilitate in-person learning interactions by leveraging the efficiency and social networking features of Web 2.0. When users fill out a profile, they are immediately matched with neighbors who have complementary skill sets. Individuals can also join a customized CommuniTeach Network along which the friends, co-workers, or classmates they wish to share skills with. We draw upon online social networking to help strengthen connections among real-life network members.
As the only website to bridge the gap between online social networking and free, in-person learning,
CommuniTeach is a unique innovation that has the potential to be a truly disruptive innovation that transforms the way we think about education, and each other.
Do you have a patent for this idea?
No
Impact
This Entry is about (Issues)
What impact have you had?
Even in this early stage, the impact of CommuniTeach has been far reaching.
In Chicago, CommuniTeach and a committee of dedicated volunteers organized Learnapalooza, an all-day community learning festival with over 75 free classes taught by community members in 15 locations in the Wicker Park neighborhood. Over 400 people came to teach and learn skills such as photography, improve comedy, women’s self defense, and salsa making. The festival earned rave reviews. Moreover, survey results indicated that individuals learned a great deal and enjoyed the social connectedness that the festival effected.
In Pittsburgh, we have taken a grassroots approach, reaching out to local community organizations such as the Polish Hill Community, to organize social learning events that appeal to organization members. With the help of a Seed Award from the locally based Sprout Fund, we have facilitated around 20 free learning sessions, with up to 20 individuals at each event. Some of the more popular Social LearnIts have been vegetarian Indian cooking, knitting, and homebrewing. Survey results have shown that individuals learned a great deal from these events, they feel closer to their communities as a result of the events, and they feel inspired to attend other community events. The initiative earned a laudatory newspaper article (http://bit.ly/pghpaper), which lead to even more new users.
Across both pilot cities, the community response has been overwhelmingly positive, demonstrating that we are effectively building community and making progress on our goal of making the world a better place by facilitating peer-to-peer skill exchanges.
Problem
CommuniTeach addresses two critical issues for American adults: the growing need for non-traditional, low-cost learning opportunities, and the desire to broaden their social networks. As the economy has slowed and the national unemployment rate has increased to 10%, individuals need cost-effective and flexible ways to build their skill sets. Yet their primary options are community classes or college coursework, which are prohibitively expensive for adults of low socio-economic status. At the same time, recent research indicates that individuals are increasingly trying to experience a greater sense of community by strengthening their offline social networks. CommuniTeach addresses these parallel needs by providing a platform that enables people to learn for free while also connecting with one another in person.
Actions
We have taken several steps to make our vision a reality.
1) We built an web platform, http://communiteach.com, that makes it easy for individuals to teach and learn from one another in person, for free.
2) We executed kickoff learning events in our test sites of Pittsburgh and Chicago, inspiring community members to create their own events along the way.
3) We are building website support for network-based learning, which enables people to exchange skills with people in their social and professional networks, to strengthen connections among members.
One risk is that some of our users may not have high quality teaching skills, since they are not paid professionals. To mitigate this risk, we have implemented a user review system so that low-performing teachers can be identified and be helped increase effectiveness, We will also create a teacher portal where users can share tips for effective teaching.
Results
In the short term, we expect that the number of active users and Social LearnIts in our initial markets of CommuniTeach and Pittsburgh will continue to grow to several thousand participants. Through participating in CommuniTeach, these individuals will not only learn new skills but also feel more connected with their communities. We will continue to solicit regular feedback about their experiences with our site as we further build out our web platform and make it as effective as possible.
Over the long term, we hope to accelerate our outreach strategies and scale this model nationwide and internationally, so that our vision of learning communities where everyone feels empowered to share their skills and connect with one another in real life can be fully realized.
What will it take for your project to be successful over the next three years? Please address each year separately, if possible.
From August 2010 to August 2011, we will continue using our initial seed investments to 1) develop our premium corporate package and acquire corporate customers, 2) deploy social marketing strategies to acquire additional users and elevate the CommuniTeach brand, and 3) evolve our consumer-facing web platform based on feedback from our current users. These steps will enable us to demonstrate the demand for CommuniTeach and prove the viability of our revenue generation strategies. As a result of these efforts, we will be well positioned to expand to several large cities—cities which were chosen for their significant presence on Meetup, history of skill sharing events, and large university presence. Within the next year, we plan to expand to New York City, San Diego, and Washington, DC. From August 2011 to August 2012, we plan to expand to Los Angeles, Houston, Portland, Boston, Denver, and Philadelphia. Finally, from August 2012 to August 2013, we will begin to promote nationally in all major cities.
What would prevent your project from being a success?
We have identified three potential obstacles to success. The first is that some individuals believe they have nothing to teach. We have capitalized on this challenge by providing a fun online quiz that quickly identifies a user’s assets. Users have provided very positive feedback on this feature. We will continue to address this potential obstacle by highlighting skills that many people want to learn but almost anyone can teach. For instance, if you can speak English or cook a simple dish, you have a skill that millions of individuals would like to learn.
The second potential obstacle is that some individuals may be excited to learn new skills but reluctant to take the time to teach others. If we find that this is a serious problem, we plan to implement a CommuniCredit system to provide an incentive for teaching. In this system, each time a user teaches a skill, he or she gains a CommuniCredit, which she can redeem to learn a skill.
Finally, there are potential legal obstacles that threaten any website that facilitates in-person interaction. To safeguard against potential legal issues, we formed an LLC, implemented terms and conditions, added a privacy policy, limited site usage to users eighteen and older, recommended that users meet in public places, and included liability waivers for Social LearnIts. In the future, we plan to continue safeguarding against legal issues by issuing a safety guide and providing specific recommendations for safe public places to conduct learning events.
How many people will your project serve annually?
More than 10,000
What is the average monthly household income in your target community, in US Dollars?
$1000 - 4000
Does your project seek to have an impact on public policy?
Yes
Sustainability
What stage is your project in?
Operating for less than a year
Is your organization a
Non‐profit/NGO/citizen sector organization
Is your initiative connected to an established organization?
No
If yes, provide organization name.
How long has this organization been operating?
Less than a year
Does your organization have a Board of Directors or an Advisory Board?
Yes
Does your organization have a non-monetary partnerships with NGOs?
Yes
Does your organization have a non-monetary partnerships with businesses?
No
Does your organization have a non-monetary partnerships with government?
No
Please tell us more about how these partnerships are critical to the success of your innovation.
In Pittsburgh, partnerships with Polish Hill Civic Association, Fe Gallery, and West Penn Recreation Center have helped tremendously by providing venues for learning events and by promoting our events. Free Skool Pittsburgh is a burgeoning organization that promises to bring a more politically minded contingent of individuals to CommuniTeach. Advisors from the Sprout Fund have been helpful in discussing ideas and providing community contacts to venues and supporters.
In Chicago, a partnership with the Learnapalooza Planning Committee has already lead to approximately 150 new CommuniTeach members who are enthusiastic about learning. A nascent partnership with the Wicker Park Arts Center will provide a centralized location for learning sessions. Finally, a group of advisors from Scalewell have been critical in providing website feedback, strategic planning, and links to investors.
What are the three most important actions needed to grow your initiative or organization?
The three most important actions needed to grow our initiative are (1) making our website easier to use, (2) developing and marketing our premium corporate package, and (3) aggressively pursuing our network-based promotion strategy.
First, we aim to improve our website ease of use in order to deliver one of the most seamless user experiences on the web. As a result, users who are not tech-savvy can still benefit from our site and all users can benefit from the ease of use. A great user experience leads users to share the site with their friends and coworkers.
Second, to cover our operating costs, we are developing a premium corporate package, which will provide companies with a cost-effective way not only to enhance employees' job-relevant skills, but also to increase office morale by helping employees engage in social learning events. Our premium corporate package will be a high quality, financially attractive alternative to traditional team building and corporate training programs. Developing, piloting, and selling this service will not only help us secure a continual source of revenue so we can be sustainable, but it will also draw tens of thousands of new users to the website.
Finally, to grow CommuniTeach, a key strategy is to offer our services to networks of individuals to help them learn from one another and strengthen social bonds. For instance, we will promote our service to apartment complexes, churches, networking groups, and alumni groups, as a way for them to strengthen the connections among group members. Aggressively pursuing this strategy will provide a strong boost to our user base.
The Story
What was the defining moment that you led to this innovation?
When I started at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, I was placed with an early-to-bed, early-to-rise type roommate. So as to not wake her up while doing late night work, I would often work at the dorm lounge and then fall asleep on the couch there. The next morning, the housekeeper Wanda would wake me up with a friendly shake and insist that I get up and make it to class. Due to her kind intervention, I was able to maintain an impressive GPA. I felt grateful to Wanda, and I noticed how the rest of the UNC staff improved the quality of my education as well.
One day, Wanda brought her eighth grade daughter, Alisa, to work with her. As I watched Alisa suffer through difficult English homework, I realized that I could tap my talent in English composition to help her, and in that way show my appreciation to Wanda. And realized that perhaps other friends of mine would want to show their support for the UNC community that helped them. This lead me to created the Student Worker Alliance for Tutoring (SWAT), a student organization that provided free private tutoring for the children of UNC staff members. I set up a website to help UNC students report the subjects they could teach and the times they were available, and then I matched them up with students that could benefit from their strengths. After I presented the program around campus, 80 students immediately signed up and ultimately tutored 50 children of staff members. The program succeeded not only in giving back to the staff members and their families, but also in enhancing community ties between staff and students.
While conducting the SWAT program, I noticed that, while we were making great use of the college students’ strengths, the children’s strengths were going untapped. The children we were tutoring had many skills to teach us as well, from piano to Spanish to cooking. Cities shouldn’t be divided into two categories – the teachers who have the knowledge and the students that need the help. Everyone has both skills they can share with others and topics they want to learn. And we all have a drive to connect with members of our community and support them with our skills – we just need an easy way to do so. Thus, CommuniTeach was born.
Tell us about the social innovator behind this idea.
My passion for social innovation began at UNC, where I not only studied social entrepreneurship but also lived it. I received an Undergraduate Research Fellowship for a project I devised, investigating the social, political, and economic impact of Indian women’s self help groups in Rajasthan, India. I also worked as a Development Intern at Ashoka.
After graduation, I accepted a position as a management consultant at Bain and Company to refine my skills in finance and strategic planning in order to be an effective change maker. I also completed a six month externship with the Civic Consulting Alliance, a not-for-profit consulting firm that works to increase the effectiveness of education, transportation, and workforce development in Chicago. Recently, I have accepted a position as the Project Manger for i.c. stars, an organization that uses project based training to teach information technology and leadership skills to unemployed Chicagoans, to help them become not only successfully employed but also community leaders.
My varied experiences in the citizen sector have all served to reinforce my two primary passions – education and community building. CommuniTeach, a sustainable social enterprise focused on connecting neighbors and building relationships through free learning, represents the evolved ideal of this passion.
How did you first hear about Changemakers?
Email from Changemakers
If through another, please provide the name of the organization or company
 | 92 weeks agoSarah Press submitted this idea. |
