Australia is offering world-class education and with the increasing penetration of ICT into the education sector it is becoming even better.
The country is a big hit for its higher education where more than 20% of the total higher education student population comes from overseas in Australian universities. With important developments in educational technology and growing number of startups, the Australian education sector is set to be impacted over the coming years.
Below is a list of edtech startups from Australia that are here to bridge some gaps and helping the country to stand out in the edtech sector as well.
1) Literatu
Launched in January 2013, this Australian EdTech startup is set to change the way educators teach, without altering their pedagogy. It is a teacher driven, formative assessment platform that collects and measures student learning data. With visible data and learning analytics at your fingertips new conversations begins across class and school ecosystem.
Teachers can transform their digital or paper-based course materials into interactive online activities simply by adding question, response capabilities and supporting interactions instantly delivered across iOS, Android, Windows and web-based platforms. Literatu fits easily into existing school ecosystems as it is a cloud application and is fully integrated with Edmodo and Google apps for education.
According to Literatu’s Founder, Mark Stanley, teachers not only engage students with their own pedagogical approach and materials, but also save over 75 percent of grading and feedback time whilst building Big Data analytics about their students.
“They became teachers to deliver their own pedagogy, in their own style, to make their own difference,” Stanley said.
The startup was a finalist in the US-based 2014 EdTech Digest Awards in the New Product and Assessment Solution categories, and winner in the Reporting Solution category.
It makes 3D design and printing accessible to everyone by providing fun and easy to use tablet based iPad/android/win software designed specifically for 3D printing. This top-class team, comprising an award winning game developer, Maker’s Empire will be the first point of contact for young adopters of this rapidly proliferating technology.
3) Cashtivity
It is a play based learning company. The most recognized product of the company, Build a Business is a teaching tool that helps students develop business and leadership skills.
Online access helps students play and learn the practicalities of business. Through Cashtivity services, students are able to experiment with their ideas and build a business while developing their critical thinking, analysis, team work and decision making skills. Teachers are also able custom design lessons and learning experience using any combination of applications from the Cashtivity application center.
4) Edrolo
It offers online prep courses to students preparing for SAT. The platform offers free and paid both type of prep courses. Free samples in SAT reading, writing and math section are provided to students for a better understanding of the platform. The company combines video tutoring and testing software to prep high school students for the SATs. The principal tutor is Lisa Tian, who got a perfect score on the SAT the very first time she took it at the age of 16. Edrolo has more than 20,000 registered students in both USA and Australia. It also sells directly to schools.
An online platform to automate paper forms in education, reducing cost and improving efficiency and liability management. It is a SaaS tool to capture parent permission and responses for their kids school activities. The platform helps schools in saving time, money and improving liability management.
Read more by Gina Baldassarre, reporter at Startup Daily, who tells about how Parent Paperwork is helping schools.
Its Australia’s largest provider of online compliance training, which is providing e-learning support to various organizations across Australia. With having a solid reputation as trusted advisors in the e learning industry the firm has Australia’s largest course libraries and a user base of over 700000 active users. Learning seat is committed to shaping the future of workplaces through digital education.
This eLearning platform empowers teachers and developers to create, manage and analyze adaptive eLearning content. Smart sparrow promotes adaptive and personalized learning technology. The firm believes that technology is not the sole domain of games and movies and that learning is way better when its adaptive and there is much more that soft wares can do for teaching other than multiple choice questions. ‘Lets build amazing and smart content together.’
8) MathSpace
This online platform enables user to learn math step by step. The students are guided alongside as they proceed with their exercises. Features of the platform are:
Digital workbook, help on demand and adaptive curriculum. The platform has been winner of
BETT Awards 2014- Secondary Digital Content,
Best Company for Advance Innovation Australia Summit 2013
Winners of Echelon Ignite: Australia 2013.
Lexicom Learning is a leader in online education. Offering short courses on just about everything, from philosophy and religion to literature and nutrition they stands out from the crowd with lively animation, interactive games and absorbing audio narration. Short courses have never been this interesting or engaging.
The tutors are carefully selected to offer students the best combination of industry and academic knowledge, balanced with a genuine desire to support you in learning something new.
Studying with Lexicom Learning provides the chance to fill a lingering curiosity, learn something new or brush up on some skills from the comfort of your own home, without the pressures of formal studying.
School App Solution is the perfect communication tool to bridge the gap between the school and the community. With instant Push Notifications, the circle of all community members can stay in touch as well as easy access to Newsletters, Notes and the school Calendar, with only a single tap. Streamline school operation with this simple management system, great integration options with current systems, and the option to submit Absence Notes digitally saves precious time.
11) Clonnecto
This tool is a communication platform that helps parents stay in touch with educators and school. The easiest way for schools to connect with parents and guardians, sending information, calendar dates and newsletters direct to their mobile phone. The tool helps parents to stay connected with child’s school. Multiple schools, multiple children and family passcodes are all included so you can manage your families’ busy schedule. Also, their app is a great deal for the industry as it gives amazing features like sync of calendar, push notification, uploading of newsletter that gets delivered to the whole class easily and more.
12) SitEducate
SitEducate features electronic newsletters, a powerful website solution and a range of online efficiency tools for secondary or K12 schools. SitEducate is a powerful solution for schools to engage parents, students alumni and teachers. Parents, students and alumni are increasingly seeking the latest information online or via mobile phone and eNewsletter. This tool is a good way to fulfill their needs with an easily deployed and controlled communications solution.
13) AppInstruct
AppInstruct provides an online delivered Course in the mobile apps business. With plenty of choice now existing in the leading 2 app stores, it’s increasingly important that entrepreneurs and developers approach the market in a professional and knowledgeable manner, in order to maximize their chances of success they offer courses to comprehensively provides all the critical knowledge and skills required, split across 10 easy to follow tutorials. The tutorials have been prepared by leading experts in each of the relevant fields.
Providing students with the skills and knowledge, they help them to:
– Professionally research their app idea.
– Technically understand the app they’ll make.
– Get started designing it.
– Find and engage professionally with developers, and Find a market and launch.
– Greatly increasing their chances of being successful.
14) GroupMap
GroupMap has developed a recognized real time, online group response and planning tool for facilitators, educators and managers looking to improve the effectiveness and productivity of their team activities in areas like Ideation workshops, Strategy planning days, Team building days, Perceptual mapping, Work team meetings, Flipped classroom and training activities and many other activities that calls for collaboration among peers. It manages information overload, reduces group think and removes the noise and edit wars from current collaboration systems. This results in more focused and effective discussions based on the input from the group. All results are shown in real time and there is no manual collation. GroupMap can be used in face to face settings, as well as any virtual environment.
15) GoSkills
GoSkills is an online learning company that helps anyone learn business skills to achieve their personal and professional goals. With a GoSkills.com subscription, members receive personalized courses consisting of high quality and to-the-point video tutorials, transcripts, cheat sheets, exercise files and short quizzes.
GoSkills selects globally-recognized experts, who are passionate and brilliant teachers. Members say that a GoSkills.com subscription helps them to learn exactly what they need to know, and in a much more enjoyable and convenient way than is available elsewhere.
16) LearnMeter
LearnMeter was developed to assist children improve their online learning skills without be spied on. It works by analysing children’s computer use and study habits, reporting the results back to the children and the parents. LearnMeter can therefore help children achieve their academic goals and reach their full potential. For parents, understanding what their children are doing online (without any access to content) means they are more informed about their activities and can manage their screen time with confidence.
17) NexusNotes
Nexus Notes operates an online marketplace for university students to buy and sell their course notes. It allows its users to upload their assignments and questions to get feedback from available tutors.
Nexus Notes was incorporated in 2011 and is based in Darlinghurst, Australia.
18) EarlyWorks
The formative years of a young child or toddler’s education are some of the most important, however keeping up-to-date with their progress during this time is often bogged down by paperwork and documentation. EarlyWorks looks to get rid of all of that with its centralized system for early learning centers across Australia. With its comprehensive and intuitive interface, EarlyWorks revolutionizes communication between the Centre and parents to provide up to date, detailed progress reports on a child.
The online-based system caters to a variety of observational mediums, including learning journeys, anecdotal records and photo journals. The service even provides detailed statistical data on each child’s progress, and allows for full customization and automation of reports for the administrative backend.
19) BackPack
Backpack from Fluid Education is an all-in-one app for students, parents and teachers that manages everything from homework to teaching resources and class timetables. The app acts as a virtual central hub for the school, greatly increasing efficiency for students and teachers. Teachers can push notifications to classes and assign homework, all of which go directly to student smartphones.
20) Kanopy
Kanopy is an online streaming service for educational institutions, which allows access to a database of over 26,000 curated documentaries and films. The Australian-born company services 12 million students and staff, and includes titles from PBS and BBC. Kanopy’s wide catalogue ranges from foreign films to scientific documentaries and social studies, making it an excellent service for K-12 education and tertiary institutions.
21) Velpic
Velpic aims to transform induction and training in the workforce by providing an online eLearning platform for business and industry. It includes an authoring tool that administrators can easily use to create their own PowerPoint-style presentations complete with graphics, media, voice-overs, music and quizzes. The platform can also schedule lessons and provide weekly or monthly reports on progress. The cloud-based service simultaneously simplifies and enhances the training process
22) Ediply
Ediply is an online service which matches students to tertiary institutions based on study interests and budget. With a few simple questions, Ediply opens up a world of study opportunities for prospective students. Currently, their database includes thousands of courses from Australian and New Zealand tertiary institutions and is marketed to students in South East Asia. However, Ediply aims to add more to this list as time goes on to provide an intuitive, centralized information service for all students.
Mention other edtech companies from Australia you know of.
