Alex Bernadotte knew firsthand the impact that a college degree can have on someone’s life trajectory. What made the difference for her were the mentors who helped her decode her college’s hidden curriculum — the unstated expectations that students need to know to succeed, but are often not taught explicitly.
Alex’s experience led her to create Beyond 12, a nonprofit organization that aims to close the economic divide by providing students with the tools they need to graduate. Beyond 12 combines near-peer coaching with an AI-powered mobile app to guide students to success. Their mobile app, My Coach, connects students with their coach for 1-1 support, and prescribes targeted actions based on students’ personalized characteristics. Since its founding, Beyond 12 has served over 150,000 college students, 76% of whom are the first in their families to attend college.
Now, Beyond 12 is on an ambitious goal to serve 1 million america phone number list students annually by 2030, over 10 times the number they serve today. Keeping students apprised of the latest information across a large higher ed system requires a lot of resources that could be better spent supporting students. This process is currently managed by a team of six. To that end, Beyond 12 is building an AI-powered “Content Development Assistant” to automatically pull information from college websites and generate short-form content tailored to first-generation college students. Beyond 12 anticipates this tool will decrease time spent on repetitive tasks by 66%, reserving their staff’s time to better support learners with an authentic human connection.
Beyond 12’s tool is just one example of the myriad ways AI in education can close equity gaps and be leveraged for good. AI is reshaping the world, demanding trust and equity at its core, and through the Salesforce Accelerator – AI for Impact, nonprofit organizations like Beyond 12 can test out innovative solutions.
Closing education equity gaps with AI
AI is being used to improve equity in education and advance economic opportunity. Sit down with Beyond 12 as they illustrate the power AI can have on building a better world.