Poland-founded edtech Smartschool raises $1.5M in a pre-Seed round

Smartschool, a San Francisco-based edtech startup, has raised $1.5 million in a pre-seed round. The investors are Inovo VC, The Explorer Fund, and several business angels. The fresh funds will be used to accelerate the company´s market presence in the US and for the further product development. Smartschool told AIN more details.

• The startup was founded by Matt Maslowski, Paul Burzynski, and Agata Mroczkowska with a mission to address educational inequalities through an AI-driven learning system tailored for K-12 students. Smartschool offers Yoko, an AI assistant designed to revolutionize SAT prep with personalized learning plans, offering a cost-effective alternative to traditional tutoring.
• Yoko’s capabilities include assessing students’ needs, identifying learning gaps, and customizing study strategies, ensuring comprehensive understanding and goal achievement. The company has already assisted over 1,000 students from Europe and Southeast Asia in exam and competition preparation.

We are thrilled for every student who has improved their exam scores. We take pride in our tutors for sharing their passion and knowledge. However, it was clear from the beginning that personal tutoring couldn’t reach everyone. Meanwhile, according to the U.S. National Assessment Governing Board, American students’ math and reading performances have been declining, reaching their lowest points since 1990 and 1970, respectively. The emergence of the first LLMs capable of multi-step reasoning and complex problem-solving marked a clear path toward the future of tutoring,

Matt Maslowski, Smartschool’s co-founder, says.

• The round saw participation from the Polish private equity firm Inovo VC and The Explorer Fund, a California-based fund that invests up to $100,000 in pre-seed founders.
• Angel investors, including Andreas Michaelides, Chief of Psychology at Noom, and Konrad Howard, co-founder of Booksy, also participated in the funding.

SmartSchool embodies the ideal qualities we seek in a pre-seed investment: a vast market potential, a robust and well-rounded team proficient in education, technology, and market entry strategies. Impressively, they have also successfully launched a product that has significantly aided numerous students in excelling at their SAT exams,

Michał Rokosz, partner at Inovo VC, says.

The startup plans to use the fresh investment to accelerate its market presence in the US and for the further development of its content and products.