Shishir miglani – a technology evangelist and CEO of Kurativz Technologies – used her start-up coaching skills to train disadvantaged children in problem solving and life skills in a school.

To his surprise, most of the kids not only brought in innovative ideas, but also made it clear how they wanted to execute them.

This was the genesis of Kidzpreneur – a platform for children to learn life skills which are important to excel in real life.

The platform helps children develop skills in problem solving, creativity, communication / storytelling, money management and design, among others, to absorb and engage in conversations relevant to their career goals.

While the startup was owned by Shishir’s tech company Kurativz Technologies – a mobile app development company – for almost a year, it was officially launched in 2021 in Delhi-NCR once it was finalized. its minimum viable product (MVP).

In addition to helping students acquire life skills, the e-learning startup also supports them with seed funding and mentoring through a Noida-based accelerator program.

The first days

Shishir teamed up with Amit Mishra and Monika Miglani to engage with students and bridge the gap between regular education and the hands-on skills they need to be successful.

Amit has been teaching and promoting entrepreneurship all over India, especially in small towns, for a long time. Monika is also an active community builder and mentor with experience in the startup ecosystem.

“We have provided this unique roadmap, which no one is offering until now – a platform to test student learning in real life. We do this as part of a government-recognized accelerator platform, where after coaching, the accelerator provides seed funding for students to explore the implementation of their ideas. This is where the game plan changed, and various government agencies working on the Entrepreneurship Studies program have sought help in providing students with a path to real life experiences, ”said Shirish Your story.

Kidzpreneur also launched a series of intervention programs, which helped students further develop their ideas. “Today we are proud to have three lucrative startups from this batch of students,” says Shirish.

The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted the startup to make a course correction in its overall strategy and move from an offline engagement business to an online platform, which imparts intelligent life skills to all. who have Internet access.

“The new education policy (NEP 2020) speaks of the same principles and skills that need to be improved, which have been part of our curriculum for the past two years. Thanks to our experience and our technology platform offerings, we see ourselves working closely with more players in the education sector, ”says Shirish.

What does it do?

Kidzpreneur is designed to complement the already established school education system so that parents understand the usefulness of real life skills in the future.

While spending time with school children, Shishir and Amit saw great potential to create life skills programs beyond the school curriculum – a more ingrained and scalable program that can create a greater impact on students of various kinds. schools and regions.

The founders decided to pool their experiences of building products and supporting start-up entrepreneurs to create an acceleration program headquartered in Noida, Uttar Pradesh.

Through this program, Kidzpreneur supports ideas from selected students and turns them into businesses. Currently, he mentors students from six countries.

In fact, the startup also mentors and supports startups that create products and services for the state and beyond at the local level.

The works

Kidzpreneur offers a series of curated interventions based on the founder’s own learnings and the combined wisdom of other experienced professionals who have built similar activity-based programs.

These programs help students understand different concepts, while allowing them to use these learnings to work on their ideas, even in real life.

Schools and students can individually access Kidzpreneur’s exclusive community platform to share ideas, engage with peers, and even access relevant resources to continually refine their learning.

“We have also collaborated with one of the leading technology ideation platforms, which is used by student entrepreneurs in over 20 countries to bring them to students in India,” said Shirish.

The booted start works both B2B and B2C business models. In its B2B segment, the startup offers its programs to schools and government agencies to help students who pass through them.

In its B2C segment, it runs smaller programs for children funded directly by their parents.

Kidzprenuer is engaged with nearly 35 schools. He also owns one of the engaging education news channels on Facebook, where he spoke to over 200 professionals from over 12 countries who share their experience and wisdom with viewers.

“Our unique clientele consists of the state governments of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, as well as various individual schools. We also undertake CSR supported programs, where we operate both digital and non-digital platforms for learning and deliver that learning for as little as Rs 299 per month, ”says Shirish.

Market and future

RedSeer predicts that the K-12 online education space will grow 6.3%, creating a market of $ 1.7 billion by 2022. According to Statista, the global learning market online was docked to $ 101 billion in 2019. By 2026, the market is expected to grow exponentially to reach over $ 370 billion.

The focus on extracurricular activities in schools is growing in India, with platforms such as Kyt, backed by Sequoia India Capital, KidEx, founded by an IIT alumnus, and Crejo.Fun, backed by Matrix India Partners .

“Soon we plan to involve a higher level of technology that will allow schools and parents to map student strengths and design a personalized learning solution for them. With our current and future execution plans, we plan to grow the platform to at least five million students over the next five years, ”said Shirish.