Bostonia: Why design the software for counselors instead of for teachers?

At the beginning, Brave Up was for teachers. But we noticed that the “bully” in a classroom was often mislabeled as a bully. He’s not necessarily a bully; he’s a troubled kid who’s having trouble somewhere else. He needs help as well. Let’s say he doesn’t like his teacher and the teacher doesn’t like him; that bias can make it so they never build a rapport. That’s why we have the Brave Up Mode; it’s a communication channel that jumps from students directly to a counseling team.

Bostonia: How does the software work to prevent bullying?

That starts with the student surveys and data visualizations. The first survey takes place at the beginning of the school semester. Based on those results, we can create things like “friendship networks,” showing the interpersonal dynamics between groups of students. I can tell you who’s the popular student, who’s the outsider, and who’s the mediator. So the friendship networks show counselors who is the “bully” and who is the “victim” in a group. Let’s say that Paola is the mediator for Enrique, the outsider. The visualization will recommend seating Paola with Enrique because she’s going to be the one who is going to bring him closer to the rest of the class.

The second survey happens in the fourth or fifth month to see if the implementation plans that a counselor is doing work or don’t work. That shows us what we can improve and if classroom dynamics are improving. And the third one, at the end of the year, is to see and measure how successful we were. And most important, after the third survey, the tool becomes predictive for instances of bullying.

Bostonia: What were some of the challenges you faced when launching Brave Up?

Ed tech, or education technology, is very interesting. I would say it’s one the hardest industries to tap into. There are some very big companies that have been around since the 1980s, and they have all the channels to the educators and school districts in the States. In the beginning, it was very, very hard to convince adults who have been doing things the same way for 30 years that there’s a different, better way to go about things.

Also, as the young guys, people have had certain skepticisms [with Enrique and me]. The two of us recently had a meeting with a school district, and they asked us, “What’s your age? Why are you working with schools; weren’t you in school like, one year ago?” It’s been good to also leverage our cofounder and CEO, Álvaro Arriaza, who’s older and is really, really experienced in working in education and ed tech.

Bostonia: What advice would you give someone else trying to break into ed tech?

You need to have an amazing, amazing mindset and be very open-minded. Because it’s like falling down, but at the same time building up your baselines. I would say that our fall was not understanding the sales cycle for schools. No one’s thinking about buying new software until the summer. So any change with your product has to be ready before the summer starts. It’s ed tech—your whole calendar should make sense according to the school year. When September starts, do pilots, demos, development, all the way through November. Offer your product for free, get exposure, get traction, and get numbers, because next month, you’re going to need to raise capital. And for that, you need traction. 

Focus your strategy to sell for the summer. And start going out and doing that. Check for conferences—for example, we went to a conference in New York for school counselors. There, we got feedback, we got marketing, we got exposure. You also want to listen to the proper feedback. Google isn’t going to give you the answers about working in ed tech. Only people with experience can do that. Get good advisors; go to LinkedIn and send messages with questions to people who work in ed tech—they’re going to answer you because they know how hard it is to break in. 

And most important, believe in your product. Believe in what you have. Do not try to accommodate your product to every single school. Because they’re going to ask for changes that you’re not going to be able to deliver, and if you try to customize to every single school, you’re not going to end, ever. So, listen to people with experience—and who believe in your product—and deliver on what you have.