Kiddom Launches 'Atlas' AI Platform
Edtech company Kiddom has launched Atlas, an AI-driven platform designed to augment high-quality instructional curricula like Illustrative Mathematics®. Atlas automates the analysis of formative assessments and generates targeted interventions and lesson warm-ups. The platform aims to save teachers time by delivering AI-curated insights and resources based on student performance data, amplifying existing curricula rather than replacing it.
- Founded in 2015 by former college roommates Ahsan Rizvi (CEO) and Abbas Manjee (Chief Academic Officer), Kiddom has raised a total of $56.5 million from investors including Owl Ventures, Khosla Ventures, and Altos Ventures. - The company's focus has evolved significantly; it launched in 2015 as a gradebook connected to a library of K-12 materials and later shifted to focus on integrating and delivering tech-enhanced High-Quality Instructional Materials (HQIM). - Atlas is designed to be a non-adaptive, teacher-in-the-loop system; it uses a closed AI system to analyze student work overnight, identify misconceptions, and then recommend specific lesson materials and small student groupings for the next day. - This launch follows the introduction of other generative AI features by Kiddom in April 2024, including tools for generating tailored feedback on assignments, a "Lesson Clipper" to adjust lesson length, and a generator for creating complementary practice questions. - The platform's AI capabilities are layered on top of existing curricula from partners, a key one being the nonprofit Illustrative Mathematics (IM), with whom Kiddom became a certified premium partner in November 2023 to provide a digital version of their IM 360 math curriculum. - Early results for the Atlas platform indicated that students in participating classrooms demonstrated performance gains of up to 18% compared to their peers. - Kiddom's Chief Academic Officer, Abbas Manjee, was previously a high school math teacher, which informed the company's teacher-centric approach to product development. - The development of Atlas was a collaborative effort involving partnerships with Achievement Network (ANet) and the non-profit Teaching Lab to help design how the platform's AI would support instructional decision-making.
