Planet Pilot

With the emergence of the pandemic, this year has witnessed a huge learning deficit and correlated anxiety in everyone involved. Simultaneously, it has opened doors for tech driven, interdisciplinary, experience-based learning. Planet Pilot’s long-term goal is a hybrid school that offers lifelong learning to any child anywhere. We are currently building an open-innovation platform that allows children with internet access to keep learning in a fun way, while engaging with the world's greatest challenges and building skills for the future. Our methodology uses Montessori, Design Thinking, Sprints and Gamification. Our 'Quest' caters to 9-12 and 12-15 year olds. Over time technology will play a key role in delivering our mission by harnessing data, collected to deliver personalized learning experiences. We expect to be an example of collective intelligence at work. Planet Pilot’s success at scale will allow an entire generation of kids globally to grow into capable leaders of change.

The current education system is not preparing young children for the real world. This is visible through an increase in dropout rates from school and rampant unemployability after college. We believe that the root cause of this is that schools do not give enough importance to experiential learning and self-discovery. 

It is our belief that every mind is unique and not giving young children the opportunity to discover their inner genius is hampering their abilities to be creative and innovate adults entering the job market . We want to empower kids to take charge of their own learning and utilize it to shape future citizens and build a better future.

We have created an online academy, which runs regular 5-10 day themed, “Quests” for children a.k.a Planet Pilots aged 9-12 and 12-15. Participants have a choice of joining a single Quest or subscribing to a season/annual pass but each quest takes the pilots through a journey of self-exploration and collaboration by engaging with real world problems and coming up with prototypes of tech led solutions. They are designed to build critical skills (e.g., communication, storytelling, kindness, empathy, prototyping and ideation) and blend Montessori philosophy, Design Thinking framework and Design Sprint culture. The Quests combine gently but expertly guided live interactions via Zoom between 7 participants up to twice a day with relevant pre-recorded materials for self-learning pre, during and post Quest delivered on an LMS. The kids also use a variety of tools and games such as Minecraft, Splice, Canva, Mentimeter and whatever else is available to them to collaborate and bring their innovations to life. Soon we will introduce gamification into our platform, along with a personal dashboard, an active online community plus a conversational chatbot to allow children to remain engaged and motivated to continue growing with Planet Pilot.

In its current form our solution caters to any 9-15 year old child with access to the internet and a smart device anywhere in the world. Our online Quests allow children to build interdisciplinary skills, showcase original thinking, entrepreneurship and thrive outside of or alongside traditional education. It aims to build dynamic global citizens by building cross-cultural awareness. 

With 5 of 8 core team members being parents, we are passionately creating a solution for ourselves as much as for the world. However to remain uniquely customer centric we are setting up a unique Children’s and Parents’ Advisory Board to guide us with their feedback along the way. Our solution, which emphasises, “learning through play” and “learning by doing”, is helping parents bring out the best in their children while they build global perspectives and make new friends alongside developing a useful project portfolio, which will enable them to transition into higher education or the job market. In the current period it is also bringing relief to parents who have been thrust into teaching their kids at home. Over time we intend to make our Quests vernacular and extend to low income communities without internet and smartphone access.

Lack of safety and social/cultural biases are key barriers faced by girls through their education. Problems such as a lack of separate bathrooms for girls and a lack of qualified female teachers are high up on the list for why girls are less likely than boys to complete their schooling. As an online platform, the first challenge we tackle is that of access. Planet Pilot is a safe, curated online platform that girls can access privately from anywhere to learn and experience conditions for self-discovery and breakthrough in a way that may not be possible in their localities.

Our Quest based approach marks us truly unique in several ways:

1. Rather than focusing on imparting knowledge it focuses on using it and the kids passions to build interdisciplinary and practical skills in children 

2. It Is a fundamentally collaborative and global platform for children like none else, and centred around topics which are globally relevant e.g., UN SDGs

3. It is highly scalable through technology with a potential to become a new kind of school and a platform for lifelong learning

For now we are operating as an extracurricular, holiday or after school activity so we compete with all such activities but none of them are global like we are and only a few focus on bringing together the approaches we do in a meaningful way. There are alternative schools too e.g., Acton Academy but they are purely offline and not global either. Planet Pilot combines the best of what an Acton offers and is making it into a global hybrid product.

Planet Pilot is an open innovation universe applying the powers of high-tech to create personalized learning experiences for its users. It is built as a software platform which gives the user access to a gamified universe of different thematic quests (learning modules) represented as various planets with their own quest/mission. Each quest provides the user with skills that are converted into badges and rewards that are reflected on the users personal dashboard. A user can showcase his/her solution within the universe to the rest of the Planet Pilots users. With time users will be suggested quests based on their interests and passions - empowering them to move forward and keep exploring the universe and learning. With the power of A.I and technology - knowledge and learning will be made possible to every child throughout the world - disregarding where they are from, their economic background and the networks that they are exposed to. Anyone can develop themselves further and discover their fullest potential. With the  power of augmented reality we plan to develop a virtual universe that really allows users to “travel” throughout their learning  journey - visiting places of interest and wonder. Through the power of A.I. Each Planet Pilot will have his own virtual co-pilot (a conversational chatbot) - who will act as a buddy throughout their planet pilot journey - chit chatting with the Pilots about various topics, and suggesting learning material (quests) based on the Pilots educational level and interests as well as improving team dynamics.

Majority of the technologies we intend to bring in are proven in the market or in our previous ventures. However we are yet to prove the interplay of all the technologies will work but it will be a process of learning by doing and small agile experimentation.

Our approach is to empower kids by providing a space for them to engage with real world problems and gain skills through hands-on exercises. The process of learning by doing allows for children to experience what they are good at and where they can improve. It also opens up a space for discovery of their passions - things that they feel deeply for and those that they don’t connect with as strongly, things they like to work on and things that are less enjoyable. Additionally the uniqueness of being online results in a scope for cross-cultural and cross-contextual collaboration at a very young age. This diversity in perceiving and thinking is likely to lead to a better grasp of and engagement with complex problems in the future. It is also likely to build more empathetic and less biased young leaders. Considering our product is in its prototype phase, our theory of change is still building and its potential is now starting to be tested. WIth the evidence that we continue to collect, we are confident that our theory of change will become more robust and replicable. What we have already seen to emerge from our first few pilots is an increase in overall self-confidence of the kids that have participated. Here is a testimonial from a parent of a child from the Quest we ran in May - “I had an amazing call from her teacher saying she was very mature and not as fidgety or distracted...I think it's paying off on her attention at school."

In our current prototyping stage we have already run 3 successful global test Quests with 15-20 kids from five different countries. Through this we have established there is global potential as the needs of children and parents are similar across geographies. We expect to serve at least 10,000 children in one year by running 100 global Quests/month where each Quest has 7 participants and by collaborating with schools which run their own Quests in partnership with us. In the next 5 years we expect to have served up to 2 million children. Our exponential growth projection is based on having established an early template to make these Quests scalable by using a combination of live learning via Quests led by Quest Mentors (people who gentle guide the kids in a live session), Technology (e.g., LMS, which allows for offline collaboration and learning, conversational chatbot for personal help and guidance, and AR/VR in future), Peer-to Peer learning (where children who have previously participated, lead subsequent Quests as part of their own development) and Partners (e.g companies who sponsor Quests or promote us in schools etc, institutions which distribute our product e.g., British Council and global Networks like OpenExO platform which provides access to customers, other partners and Quest Mentors). 

Our goals for the next year include: 

• Building interdisciplinary skills in at least 10,000 pilots of which 50% are girls, and establishing a way to successfully measure these outcomes

• Building an unparalleled team of passionate core team but also a thriving community of pilots, parents and people engaged in playing different roles within the Planet Pilot universe (e.g., Junior Quest Mentors, Quest Mentors, Ambassadors, Promoters, Bus. Developers etc.)

• Establishing a model to scale the Quests in terms of people, processes and technology e.g., self-perpetuating way to hire Quest Mentors, a platform that allows all interactions to happen in one place for AI readiness in future, 

• Establishing key partnerships to acquire customers and deliver consistently e.g., with at least 10 schools, 20 companies and possibly 1 government.

Our goals in the next 5 years include:

• Successfully building interdisciplinary skills in at least 1m pilots of which 50% are girls  

• Worked with governments or large scale non-profit institutions (e.g., Gates Foundation) to roll out pro-bono programmes to serve another 1m kids in underprivileged communities

• Begun to establish Planet Pilot as hybrid alternative to a traditional middle and high school (8-18) because we are able to deliver all learning in an interdisciplinary and highly personalised fashion while also helping children learn globally (e.g., through a rotation programme online and in person across our centres in select countries)

• Help create at least 100 young entrepreneurs or ideas that get funded to help solve some of the most pressing problems locally, globally.

1. Credibility: We are an independent startup, with no affiliation yet to any established educational institution, no direct link to traditional education and no formal certification (yet) which could affect the number of parents who engage with us on a paid basis.  

2. Efficacy: Establishing a method to deliver and measure the skills we endeavour to impact in young minds. 

Scalability: We believe technology is essential to scale, for quality assurance and to measure efficacy and while our leadership team has significant experience in building tech start-ups at scale we need to carefully buy vs. build but either way, develop a platform which effectively captures, and harnesses collective intelligence

The top 3 barriers to Planet Pilot accomplishing its goals include:

1. Credibility: By building a team and an ecosystem parents and children trust and want to engage with, by collaborating with schools and other educational institutions rather than being critical of them, to help them embrace a different, complementary way of skills building and finally, by getting an institution such as MIT to help offer us the credibility new transformative ideas need especially in education. 

2. Efficacy: By working closely with experts at MIT, possibly OECD or indeed other institutions globally to establish a method to deliver and measure the skills 

3. Scalability: By hiring and/or collaborating with the best minds in tech and platforms to collaborate with. We particularly want to work with collective intelligence experts in MIT on this topic to develop a scalable method of harnessing the data and human interactions. 

Our core team consists of 8 highly diverse and experienced professionals with backgrounds in Tech, Social Innovation, Education, Teaching, incl. Montessori approach, Design Thinking, Consulting and Gaming. This team has worked part-time for five months now but galvanised, with many spending a significant portion of their weekends too, with the feedback we have received from participants to build a school of the future. We’re expecting to transition to full-time as soon as we build traction commercially and/or get funded. We have also started building up a pool of talent for the projects that we are launching commercially.

Alongside timing, the strength, diversity and global reach of our team is the biggest reason we truly believe we can build Planet Pilot into a venture that changes the lives of millions of children worldwide, boys and girls alike. We not only bring deep experience of having built successful global ventures but also in teaching, design thinking, gaming, besides top notch professional experience 

• Prashant Raizada: A London based Global EdTech entrepreneur with a 20+ year track record of establishing ventures, ranging from humbling failures, multi-million $ businesses to a $2bn unicorn.

• Lars Lin Villebaek: An Copenhagen based entrepreneur & coach with 20+ years of experience in leading the delivery of global business transformation services, to drive disruptive, exponential innovation.

• Roxane Jurkovskaja: A Copenhagen based results-driven serial entrepreneur adept at translating high-level strategy into field-level functional impact, focused on the application of technology as a catalyst to democratise access to education.

• Diana C Bernal: A Beijing and Bogota based passionate EdTech entrepreneur focused on gamification and cultural branding with international business development experience 

• Crystal To: A Hanoi based former banker with 10 years of experience as for companies in diverse industries.

• Eeshta Malhotra: A Delhi based facilitator with experience in design thinking, education and theatre on a pursuit to re-imagine education.

• Kate Whelan: A Melbourne based teacher with 15+ years of experience, passionate about guiding children to find power in their creativity, mind and voice.

• Justyna Pietrzak: A Brussels based psychologist and Montessori educator with a corporate HR background

Currently we are partnering with OpenExO, a global transformation ecosystem with more than 5,000 coaches, investors, consultants and innovation specialists helping organizations, institutions and people unlock abundance to change the world, Educate.For.Life a community dedicated to changing the paradigms of education and Oppimi, developer of AI-based clinically-validated tools for diagnosing and treating children affected by learning disabilities and its community of 400+ families.

We are currently in talks with the British Council.

Planet Pilot offers 5-10 day themed “Quests” throughout the calendar year, which bring together 9-15 year olds on a virtual (and in future hybrid) open-innovation platform to come up with their own solutions to the most pressing problems facing humanity locally, globally. This approach builds interdisciplinary skills in children besides putting them in the pilots seat to lead the world in a genuinely collaborative way.

Our quests are paid for and our business model has three principal components: 

1. Subscription: Although we are initially priced on a per Quest basis, we will progressively move towards a season or annual subscription as that offers us a greater chance to work with a child and develop his/her skills besides enhancing the viability of our own business. Over time we intend to have lifelong subscribers to our platform because we know them intimately and bring new skills and opportunities to them throughout life. 

2. Inclusion: In addition, we will endeavour to bring in at least one child in each Quest who cannot afford to pay. Over time we will support one child who cannot pay for one who can.

3. Exponential: This 3rd and perhaps most crucial component to our business model will rely on individuals, communities and institutions coming forward to propagate and even help deliver Planet Pilot Quests in return for a share of revenue. We are already a part of the worldwide (Exponential Organisations) ExO Community - a ready platform to adopt this approach.

Our hypothesis to achieve scale is horizontal growth i.e. we will target a wide range of children across countries, social economic segments and age. We are launching with a paid for product upfront and while we expect these quests to be self sustaining, we will soon be raising capital from impact investors and indeed be looking to win grants such as this one to invest in a rapid scale-up (e.g., technology platform, recruitment and digital- marketing) because an offering such as ours is essential for the development and education of all kids right now. Our approach to growth is exponential- we are creating a community based growth model where we leverage our global network (e.g., within ExO) and beyond to incentivise them to distribute and deliver our product on a revenue share basis. Our initial feedback shows strong interest from potential partners.

We also want to ensure we are in a position to reach people and places where a startup wouldn’t, at least in the initial stages of their own journey. For that we expect to work with the government on a paid basis or supported by grants from well known global institutions such as the Gates Foundation etc. Finally, over the next five years we also expect to transition into being an alternative to a traditional school, which will significantly enhance our customer lifetime revenue and impact. As an experienced team of entrepreneurs we have the learnings to try to make sure our business is self-sustaining ASAP 

We are  currently living in times where technology is advancing and becoming rapidly available exponentially. Artificial intelligence is already being applied in many different aspects of our lives. We would like to focus our efforts on developing our learning universe -  and virtual co-pilot, which is based upon text recognition and analysis. Augmented learning is defined as an on-demand learning technique, where the learning environment adapts to the needs and inputs from learners. This makes the application of augmented reality to education very feasible. Virtual reality is the use of computer technology to create a simulated environment. Unlike traditional user interfaces, VR places the user inside an experience. Instead of viewing a screen in front of them, users are immersed and able to interact with 3D worlds. We plan to  have a fully gamified virtual reality universe within Planet Pilot - allowing our learners to fully immerse themselves into this learning platform. Augmented reality learning solutions are more accessible and affordable nowadays as they can run on smartphones by simply downloading an application. Virtual & Augmented reality educational programs have the value of being learner-directed and relevant to students’ interests. Learners have the freedom and responsibility to choose what, how, where, and when they learn - allowing them to take full charge of their own learning and development. 

This prize money would allow us to kick-start the development of our augmented learning universe.