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EdTech Dream Jobs: Doing Good While Getting Paid

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This article is more than 10 years old.

This is a guest post from Elli Sharef, cofounder of HireArt, a jobs marketplace that uses online challenge-based interviews to vet job applicants.

In recent months I've spoke to more and more smart Millennial women who tell me they are intent on finding a job with social impact. On a recent phone call I spoke to Sarah, a 24-year old Ivy League candidate who was just finishing a 3-year stint at the prestigious Boston Consulting Group . She told me: "I want to go into education, probably focused on K-12." Like many in her generation, Sarah wants to work on something that can actually make the world better place. Programs like Teach for America attract droves of smart young men and (mostly) women who want to get into the trenches and make a change.

But in recent years a new trend has emerged: Young people can have an impact and make a change without taking on as big a financial sacrifice. How can they do this? By working in education technology (or one of the myriad other social tech fields). Whereas teachers generally top out at around $80,000 (and only if they get masters/doctoral degrees), education entrepreneurs have shown that making money and doing good are not always misaligned.

As part of this trend, we've also seen an explosion of venture money going into social fields, particularly education. Venture money is traditionally spent on employees, so this new inflow of capital has generations hundreds of new jobs.

Which are the most promising ed tech start-ups? While this is a hard question to answer, some of the companies that are hiring most actively (based on public posts) include Knewton to Udacity and Coursera.

Here are three tips for candidates who want to go into education technology:

No. 1 Get Smart About Education

Education has changed significantly over the last 10 years. Whereas online education was a rare and somewhat frowned upon in the 90s, today MOOCs have become one of the biggest trends. Learn about what’s going on.

No. 2 Learn About Technology

If you don’t have a technology background, make sure that you get smart about tech. You may not need to learn how to program, but you’ll want to understand the basics of HTML and CSS at the very least.

No. 3 Start Networking

Ed Tech has generated its own very unique group of people who are passionate about the field and have spent years in. If you don’t know anyone in the field, go to Meet-Ups or conferences and start meeting people who could help you understand the trends.

Last week, we at HireArt, decided to tap into this excitement around education technology. We started what we called an “Education Technology Challenge” to identify the best candidates who want to work at the top ed tech companies. Over 50 companies have signed up so far, and the applicants have begun flocking in. Each HireArt applicant has to say why they want to work in ed tech (they record a 60 second video) and the answers are both surprising and inspiring. To apply, candidates can click here.

Sharef is co-founder of HireArt, a jobs marketplace that uses online challenge-based interviews to vet job applicants. She began HireArt to fix a broken hiring and interview process and get people hired based on skills, not connections. Since starting HireArt, Elli and her team have placed hundreds of candidates in sales, service, and marketing jobs at dozens of employers. Prior to HireArt, she worked as a Business Analyst at McKinsey and Director of Strategy at the University of Phoenix.