Empowerly, a rising edtech startup, has recently announced a whopping $15 million raise in funding led by Conductive Ventures. This new capital will fuel the company’s expansion, with plans to enhance their AI-powered services and launch their highly anticipated mobile app in the U.S. by the end of 2024. Impressive growth for a company that has already raised $30 million to date.
“The past year has been challenging for the entire startup ecosystem, and some are saying this has been one of the worst funding environments in the past decade,” says co-founder Changxiao Xie. “This round is a testament to the platform and services we’ve created, from our recruitment of former Ivy League admissions officers to the ways we’ve leveraged data and machine learning to evaluate and improve students’ outcomes from high school to college and beyond. We’re working with more students and families than ever before and seeing fantastic outcomes year over year, and are excited to keep up the momentum.”
Empowerly’s funding comes at a crucial time when the college admissions process is becoming increasingly competitive. With high school counselors often ill-equipped to provide expert advice, the need for specialized college counseling and guidance is at an all-time high. The figures from Common App’s Research Brief speak for themselves, showing a 65% surge in college applications for the 2023-24 academic year compared to 2019-20.
“Last year was one of the most competitive college admissions seasons of all time,” co-founder Hanmei Wu shares in an interview with TechCrunch. “Some Ivy Leagues, like Yale, reported the lowest acceptance rates they’ve seen in decades. Yet, students still aren’t getting the right support. The counselor-to-student ratio is over 400-to-1, and students are feeling left behind just like I did years ago.”
Founded in 2018, Empowerly has a simple yet powerful mission – to alleviate the pressure on students during the college application process. Empowerly’s innovative approach involves creating personalized plans for each student after a free 30-minute consultation. From college counseling and essay editing to financial planning and internship prep, Empowerly offers a diverse range of services. Students also have access to expert counselors, essay specialists, and former admissions officers from top universities in their field of interest. With over 100 college counselors focusing on areas such as pre-med, engineering, STEM, business, law, and humanities, Empowerly caters to the diverse needs of its clientele.
Pricing for each service varies, but the company reveals that their “comprehensive counseling packages” typically start at $5,000. However, the prices can vary significantly depending on the services being included. Reddit users report paying anywhere from $1,600 for private essay sessions to a substantial $9,000 for Empowerly’s services. For comparison, popular college consulting platform CollegeWise charges between $2,000 to $10,000 for personalized packages.
What sets Empowerly apart from its competition is its proprietary technology – The Empowerly Score. This unique system evaluates a student’s extracurricular activities, achievements, academics, and essays, generating a single score. This score highlights the areas where students need to improve to enhance their chances of being accepted into their desired colleges.
“It is the only predictive technology that can also quantify subjective material,” Xie proudly states. “Our platform utilizes tens of thousands of data points and internal datasets, providing students and counselors with the most up-to-date information. This includes what schools and competitive summer programs are looking for in applicants (such as standardized tests and essay strategy), what new opportunities are available, what opportunities best suit a particular student, and what scholarships they may qualify for.”
The Empowerly score further assists counselors in identifying the areas where students should focus their efforts, whether it be enrolling in additional extracurriculars or improving their standardized test scores.
“Each of the top 200 U.S. universities (with more colleges being added) has a specific benchmark associated with its admissions difficulty level. Our platform and counselors compare each student’s Empowerly Score to these benchmarks, providing insights on the areas where they are strong and where they need to improve,” Xie adds.
Empowerly also offers various experience-focused programs to help students enhance their college applications. For instance, they connect high school students with virtual internships at startups in the Bay Area. Students can also engage with Ph.D. students who have conducted research at prestigious schools like Columbia, Brown, and MIT.
In 2023, Empowerly joined the Sequoia marketplace, expanding their services as an employee benefit for working parents.
