As part of our endeavour to share some of the unique and compelling startup stories from the ecosystem, we spoke to Rohit Prakash Co-Founder at iDream Education to understand more about his vision and the way forward. iDream Education is a social edtech organisation facilitating enjoyable and personalised digital learning to schools, NGOs and learners. Let’s read more!
Excerpts from our conversation with Rohit:
Tell us a little bit about yourself and your startup please;
My name is Rohit Prakash and I belong to Delhi. Finished my graduation in electronics engineering from Jamia Millia Islamia and immediately thereafter went onto do my MBA in Marketing from Management Development Institute, Gurugram. Graduated in 2007 and joined Marico as an Area Sales Manager. Worked there for close to 2 years before deciding to leave and start something of my own. It was early 2009.
I had some sort of a natural love for education but was not really sure about what I would do then. After a few months of searching around, I started a company called i-dream, where we developed experiential and game-based programs to teach students concepts in Science & environmental sustainability in a fun way. The company grew steadily and by 2014, we had reached close to 3,000 schools in 10 cities across the country.
That’s when I got exposed to government schools. Till that time, our entire work was with only private schools and we have worked in some of the best private schools in India. But as a part of a project, which we were doing for a corporate, we were asked to also design programs for government schools. That was a turning point in my life. When I first saw a government school, I came back with a lot of questions. I was confused as to why is there such a stark contrast between the private and government schools. I just could not understand why. I also saw technology in various forms reaching such schools, but still very limited impact.
Coincidentally and thankfully, that’s when started a series of conversations with now my co-founder Puneet Goyal. We were both batchmates in our business school and he too, after having worked in Oracle for a few years had started an ed-tech company distributing interactive learning solutions and ed-tech products. Upon such discussions, we realised that we have a mutual love for solving the last mile learning challenge. We fell in the love with the idea of taking enjoyable digital learning to underserved learners in their own local language. It was then that in 2016, we seeded iDream Education with a vision to facilitate access to enjoyable & growth-oriented digital learning content to all learners across the world in the language that they understand best.
As a core, we design, deliver and support tablet and mobile-based digital learning solutions with English medium and local languages content. We also have other solutions such as a Learning TV, an iDream Learning App and smart class content delivered offline on pen drives. We have basically built a platform that works on all kinds of android devices, works both offline & online and delivers multiple categories of content in English medium or local language as needed by the learner.
How do you find the industry/niche that you’re in?
As I have shared above, between me and my co-founder Puneet, we simply fell in love with the idea of taking digital learning in local languages to last-mile learners. And this happened because of the work we did in the government schools in each of our previous avatars.
We realised that even though the technology is reaching remote locations, it’s the biggest challenge is non-regular usage and non-engagement across all students uniformly. And this is happening because the technology is not aligned with the natural psychology of all stakeholders. So, the hardware is tough to use, content is not in local languages, infrastructure is a limitation such as the requirement of extra space, regular electricity, internet etc. We knew that if we have to solve the problem at scale, we need to come up with a solution that makes it extremely easy for all stakeholders to use and engage with.
One insight we picked up from our earlier work was that the students even in some of the most remote locations in India were becoming very comfortable with touch-based devices. They were already playing games like temple run, angry birds etc. We thought if we can leverage the natural affinity which these children have to touch-based devices and give them content which builds a proactive interest in students to learn, we should be able to break open the barriers to regular usage of digital learning tools. And that’s exactly the space in which iDream Education today operates.
What gets you out of bed in the morning i.e. what’s your source of motivation?
In the last 3.5 years of running iDream Education, we have taken our solutions to over 60,000+ students in 14 states across the country. And because of that I have myself seen and experienced some of the most transformational stories of change.
Take, for example, Lalit, a class 6 student studying in a govt school in Rohtak, Haryana. Till about a year ago, he was on verge of dropping out of school because he did not find interest in the way learning was happening in his school and he was lacking far behind academically compared to his peers. His teachers tried but the learning gap was widening. That’s when TABLAB – our tablet-based digital learning lab was set up in his school. In the next one year, Lalit started coming to school regularly, took a deeper interest in his learning and started showing improvement in his academic performance. And all this, while he had lots of fun. Lalit told me that with a tablet in his hand, he was able to watch a story-based video and much better relate the concept being taught by his teacher. He also did not shy from looking at the content of junior classes and thus cover up on the learning gap. This is simply amazing.
Imagine for a while that there are millions of students like Nikhil around the world whom we can impact.
For me, the biggest thing that has happened in the last three years, as we have continued to grow and innovate is the confidence and the clarity in our goal, our purpose. It is very simple and clear now, that is to be able to take enjoyable and growth-oriented digital content to all learners around the world in the language that they understand best.
And that’s what motivates me every day in the morning.
Can you share a bit more about the solution you have put together for government schools?
TABLAB is our flagship solution, which we have custom designed for government schools. It is like an integrated solution, where once set up and installed, schools do not have to worry about anything else. It consists of a certain number of tablets, storage and charging trolley which is used to securely store the tablets and simultaneously charge them with just one switch. Each tablet is pre-loaded with multiple categories of content as per the curriculum and student wise reports saved both offline and online on our cloud-based reporting dashboard. This enables us and the stakeholders to review the project from anywhere and anytime.
You can watch TABLAB in action in government schools in a short video:
Our vision with TABLAB is to break open all barriers to regular usage of digital learning tools in schools, be it electricity, internet, space, furniture, wiring etc and to engage all students equally basis their interests and learning levels. We have designed it in a way such that is becomes extremely easy for teachers and students to access the content and such that is builds a proactive interest in students to learn and truly empowers the teachers.
What comes first for you – money or emotions?
Money is important but when you see stories of transformation like that of Nikhil, a sense of very strong emotion fills you up. You realise that with your solutions and with the business you are building, you can impact lives. And that kind of overpowers every other requirement.
I have learnt from my mentors and role models that you should always have clarity on your purpose, you should know why you are doing what you are doing and you should be able to enjoy it. The money will come.
How do you handle the pressure and manage stress?
Yoga and meditation. In the last 6 months, these two have helped me immensely to manage pressure and stress. As entrepreneurs, there is always pressure to do a lot of work in much less time. What meditation has enabled me to do is slow down the things to actually make them much faster. It may be a difficult concept to understand but that is exactly what I have done. I have slowed down, my breath is more controlled now, and I am able to get more done in less time.
Meditation has also helped me to bring a lot of clarity in my head on what is important, how to prioritise things and then get after them.
What is one strategy that you believe has helped you grow as a person/startup?
Build absolute clarity in your purpose – It may be taken time and you may be going with the flow early on, but it is crucial to get the clarity on “why” of what you are doing. And this helps in various ways. You need to sound confident while talking to a client. It also helps the organisation to innovate in terms of designing products, finding better ways to market yourself, to explore new distribution channels and how to cut costs build an operational efficiency
What iDream Education started off in 2016 and what it is today, there is a huge difference. Today we have many more products in our portfolio, there are various ways in which we sell our products and we have built processes which help us to do things at much lower costs and in much less time. All of this has happened because we are very clear on our goal. And then we find innovative and best ways to keep moving toward our goal.
In your opinion what are the keys to success?
Believe in yourself – There will be times when you may doubt yourself, your capabilities and you may lose confidence. But to succeed, it is important to have a very strong belief in yourself, have confidence in the way you think and what you are doing
Stay humble and always open to learning – Coming from the first point, while you may have the confidence in what you do, you should also have the humility to accept in case things do not go the way you had planned or implemented. You may have a certain way of doing things, but your partner may have a better way. Always be therefore open to learning and growing
Stay eternally hopeful – Things will go wrong, situations may become very desperate, but if you believe in your goal, please know that eventually, things will fall in place. Just keep working.
What advice would you give to someone starting out?
Focus on solving a genuine problem and build a business model which is sustainable. If you are building your business in a way that you think you need investor’s money to build a product and launch it, that I feel is not the right way to do things. Unless of course, you have chanced upon an idea which is revolutionary and may, therefore, attract investors at a pre-revenue phase.
Always remember the “Why” of your business. Most people know what, how and where but they don’t know “why”.
Be in it for the long haul. It has taken us 10 years of being on the ground, researching, fine-tuning, and not giving up to reach where we are today. If you believe in what you are doing, be ready for a long journey ahead.
BrilliantRead is committed to bringing stories from the startup ecosystem, Stories that reshape our perspective, add value to our community and be a constant source of motivation not just for our community but also for the whole ecosystem of entrepreneurs and aspiring individuals.
Note: If you have a similar story to share with our audience and would like to be featured on our online magazine, then please write to us at [email protected], we will review your story and extend an invitation to feature if it is worth publishing.
