Adult Education. Three Commonalities and One Difference between Ukrainian and American Experiences
Among EdCamp Ukraine’s anti-crisis initiatives in the war year of 2022, cooperation with Hallo, the American online platform, is among key ones.
Hallo is a place for learning English in a special way, by communicating with native speakers at convenient time, exploring the culture, and joining the community — instead of standardized lessons, textbooks, and homework. Ukrainian students and teachers have also joined the platform’s learning community, with the youngest participants being aged 10, and the oldest — 60 years old.
Hallo platform was launched by Joon Beh, who had been studying English since the age of five in South Korea. After moving to the United States, Joon realized that speaking is one of the key language skills, so he started an online platform for improving his own. In his talk with Joon, EdCamp Ukraine’s head of the board Oleksandr Elkin found out that a U.S. startup and a Ukrainian NGO working in the education sector enjoy many commonalities.
Oleksandr Elkin told the New Ukrainian School about steps to take when creating a successful education project:
· how personal experience helps starting own business,
· how a community is an important asset for any organization,
· how important engagement of the team is,
· how to develop investor relations,
· and a bonus: a free opportunity to learn English for Ukrainian educators.
Vision above all
One special thing about Hallo is that its users can start practicing English from the very first second on the platform — online, in real time, wherever they are, on their way to work, to school, or at home. “I was lucky and fortunate to be able to move and interact with native speakers 24/7 but there are so many people that are not able to do it but still want to improve their English,” Joon says. He got so excited about the idea of creating an interactive platform that he stopped his consulting job with large tech companies like Amazon and Uber, started his own business, and has been developing it for few years now. At the beginning, he completely focused on his idea and used his own language learning experience instead of market research. “Wherever you go, there are going to be other companies that are doing exactly what you are doing or are doing it better than you do. Not every company’s the same, and you need to just focus on who you are, what your unique propositions are and execute better,” the entrepreneur says.
When launching his startup, Joon relied on his personal experience and idea. For me, all my life has been evolving around education.
I had worked in nonformal education for a while, gave lectures, and was involved in college education processes. After that, working in IT sector, I would develop and coordinate ed-tech projects in Ukraine and abroad. At one point I realized that innovation is not possible without people from the education sector. Technology, software, new developments are great, but not sufficient for changes. Key investment that brings success in education is investment in people. Because education is about people. That’s what made me risk after the Revolution of Dignity in 2014, leave behind a successful career in IT sector, and try to make one of my biggest dreams come true — the dream of investing in educators. I wanted to start with schools because school education is the foundation of any person’s learning.
Back then, I was searching for ways to do it. One day, in an education blog I came across advertising of EdCamp, the format of open experience exchange. That resonated with me, and I sent an email to EdCamp Foundation about possibility to launch the idea in Ukraine. They responded quickly, saying that EdCamp operates only in the U.S. but that I can use their idea. So, I decided to give it a try.
As we were preparing for our first national event, we weren’t certain if there would be more, like second or third. It was a risky affair that took up all my time: I had to pilot the idea, find like-minded people, secure support for the event. As we held it, educators responded with positive feedback. I was optimistic that a miracle would happen, but no organization approached us immediately to offer support. It was a pivotal moment: I took the group of volunteers who worked for a year on putting the first (un)conference together and decided we would move on. Now, after all that EdCamp Ukraine has been through, I can say it was a right decision.
Community as a driver of development
Joon Beh always says that Hallo is not just an online platform, but a community of people united around the idea of learning. The platform enjoys over 2 million users from 170 countries who spend over 100,000,000 minutes annually speaking English on the platform. For such a community to strive, Joon believes, it should have a shared goal.
People that moderate the community also need to be taken care of. “If you bring people, it’s a lot of work. And a lot of types of people come. You have to be able to manage them, lead them in the right way, help them focus on the purpose. Safety is really important when people are interacting with each other,” Beh says. It’s also important to build the community out of people who share its goal and purpose. “If they are not here to learn English, it’s not their purpose, I think it’s OK to let them go or decline their desire to join. We let them go, ban them, suspend their accounts, and remind them of the purpose of the group,” the entrepreneur says.
I totally support Joon’s principles of building the community on shared idea, goal, and with facilitation of its activities.
EdCamp Ukraine has gone a serious transformation path, from an organization offering professional development in the format of participatory (un)conferences to the movement aimed at changing the entire community. After our first event, educators started asking me how they could adapt the (un)conference model in their communities. That’s why we have been implementing the idea of educators’ engagement and community building, which is now 40,000-person strong. Over the years, we held 234 large events; 38 regional (un)conferences are to be held soon. During the full-scale invasion, horizontal ties across the community were very helpful — mutual support allows not only to stand strong, but to continue professional activities and growth.
Dedication to the cause
The team of Hallo platform includes six full-time employees and 20 administrators moderating the community. Personnel turnover in this small team is low, with no resignations over the past 18 months. According to Beh, this is due to a special approach to hiring people who love their work, are excited about the process, and this creates great climate in the team. “You are the owner, you have the majority of the ownership of the company, so it makes sense for you to think about it 24/7. But I learned that you cannot expect the same from other people that don’t have as much equity, that don’t have as much ownership of the company. If you want to expect more, you need to share more. So, for the people I want to work with and who I want to work as hard as I am, I give as much as I can. I give equity, or ownership, or compensation. But at the end of the day, I realized that it’s not about the money or compensation, it’s about the relationships and the environment they are in,” Beh says.
I so much relate to this approach. I myself see EdCamp Ukraine as my lifework but I don’t expect the same from the rest of the team.
It’s quite hard to accept, but it’s fair. As an owner, you might think others should be as passionate about it as you are. It’s something we wish for, and the owner must pass on the fire of devotion to those around him or her. But it’s not something to expect as a default. Over EdCamp Ukraine’s existence, 90% of people stay with us, both from the team and the partnership circle. I am very proud of it.
Why investors matter
For a startup and an NGO alike, the issue of funding is critical. It’s not possible to take first steps without investors’ support and their faith in your project. That’s why some rookie entrepreneurs try to make their startup look good for investors, often against the nature of their business. “To be honest with you, I used to do that, and I am ashamed of it. It’s not a good strategy because I know deep inside that they are not good decisions for the company for the long term,” Beh says. He believes it sometimes takes making difficult but right decision for the good of the business. For instance, expanding for the sake of increasing metrics is not worth it, while operating in a way that brings revenues and decreases dependence on investors is.
For an NGO, investors might come from donor organizations and national or international foundations. At the beginning, we used to be highly dependent on priorities set by our donors; we had to take them into account. Now we can choose our own priorities and do what our community needs, to have a say about the policies. I believe both approaches are right, depending on the development stage of an organization.
Building investor relations is part of the growth process for a business or organization.
Standing with Ukraine
After russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Joon Beh and his colleagues joined the effort of supporting Ukrainian teachers and students.
“Ukrainians are very brave and amazing people. Even though Hallo is a small startup, we wanted to see if we could support and help. That’s something we are also trying to embrace as a company: we are not here just to make profit; how awesome would it be if you build a business and also do good in the world,” the U.S. entrepreneur says.The cooperation between Hallo and EdCamp Ukraine continues. The first cohort of Ukrainian teachers and students have taken their free classes on the platform. Its advantages include the opportunity to learn whenever you want to: the platform operates constantly, and you can look for speaking companions from any country of the world and attend individual classes and group discussions around topics of interest.
For the convenience of the platform learners, EdCamp Ukraine has developed a with outlined goals for the 10 weeks of the learning.
The second cohort for Ukrainians on Hallo starts on Jan. 20, 2023. EdCamp Ukraine will announce an additional call for applications on Dec. 10–15, so follow the organization on social media to use this opportunity.
