Melbourne-based education services start-up Maths Pathway has closed a $AU2.1 million seed investment round, led by Social Ventures Australia (SVA). The $1 million investment from SVA is the organisation’s first equity investment from its $15 million SVA Diversified Impact Fund, which reached final close earlier this year.
Maths Pathway, an education services start-up and certified B Corporation, is changing the way students learn maths. It is an innovative approach to teaching maths that leverages technology and classroom best-practice to teach to each student’s point of need. This is vital in today’s schools with a vast spread of student maths comprehension in the typical classroom.
Its online platform provides individualised lessons with rich data to inform explicit teaching and opportunities for timely feedback interventions. The teacher development program helps teachers bring practices that have the greatest impact on student learning to the classroom. The program leads to a maths growth rate twice that of a traditional classroom, according to data collected by Maths Pathway in 2017.
The investment will be used to improve classroom outcomes through product improvements, driving student engagement through interactive content and providing teachers even greater access to student data and planning information.
Co-founded by two teachers in 2013, Maths Pathway has grown to be used in over 250 schools by more than 50,000 students. Maths Pathway co-founder Richard Wilson says when seeking investment, it was a shared concern for social impact that drew the organisation to SVA.
“Our classroom data has shown students learn twice as fast with Maths Pathway,” he says. “An impact such as this demonstrates Maths Pathway is a market catalyst influencing broader change in our education system to help students learn. SVA is just as concerned with creating systemic change as we are.
What problem is Maths Pathway looking to solve?
“The typical year 7 classroom has an eight-year spread of maths comprehension. In many classrooms across Australia, there may be students learning year 4 multiplication tables and others learning year 10 algebra. Teachers struggle to manage lesson plans, assessments, and reporting, for such a wide range of learners in one classroom.
“Gone are the days of a teacher delivering content at the front of the classroom. Instead teachers can work with each student on an individual level, more regularly.”
SVA Executive Director, Impact Investing Michael Lynch says with Maths Pathway already making a big impact for schools, teachers and students, he’s excited to see its growth and maturity as a social purpose organisation.
“Maths Pathway is committed to improving the educational outcomes of the greatest possible number of Australian students,” he says. “SVA’s $1 million investment will help them to innovate the model, scale operations and work towards that goal.
“Our investment mandate is to support organisations that create meaningful social outcomes for people experiencing disadvantage in Australia and we’re impressed with Maths Pathway’s impact so far.
“We’ll continue to look to invest in more great organisations which, like Maths Pathway, are ready to take investment to scale their operations and social impact in areas such as education, employment, housing, disability, health and working with First Australians.”
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