StartupCafe

Julius Gunnemann is an aspiring entrepreneur, about to start his 3rd year of university studies in Edinburgh. Having completed the International Baccalaureate in Germany, Julius envisioned a platform of video knowledge focused on helping IB students around the world. Our 60-second interview focuses on what IB Your Tutor aims to achieve and how Julius brought the concept to life.

Could you briefly describe what IB Your Tutor is about to our readers?

http://www.ib-your-tutor.com is first and foremost the largest IB video library worldwide. In 8-12 minute short study videos that cover topics of the IB along the courses’ syllabi, IB alumni explain what they knew and what they wish they had known for their exams – in a an easy-to-remember way. We want to tell our students about IB specific tips and solve hard problems from past papers. But we also want to provide them with hundreds of tests, past papers and an answer service to make the learning experience more efficient.

How did you came up with this idea?

Sitting in one of my maths classes at my IB school in Germany I realised how difficult it was be to find a tutor who helps clarify missed topics in class. While you probably won’t find someone who can teach you Georg Mendel’s rules of Genetics or how to work through complex differentiations with trig equations – in English – in the South of Germany, you might have the same problems in Marseille, Cancun or Jakarta. 100,000 other IB students all learn along the same syllabi to take identical exams. I wanted to create something that allows anyone to study anywhere in the world. Something to help those who are not as fortunate with their teachers or cannot afford a conventional tutor for 50 pounds per hour to have the same chances as those at top IB schools.

What makes this platform unique?

IB Your Tutor is unique because we are a small team of tutors who want to do something big: make excellent education affordable. We work hard to produce eventually over thousands of videos and, to use a cliché, we want to change the way IB students learn. We are the first to base our teaching on what we believe is the most effective learning medium; videos.

How do you create your videos?

We use three different approaches. The first and ‘classic’ IB Your Tutor way to teach is our so-called White Board approach, where viewers look over the tutor’s shoulders to see what she/he does on the whiteboard. We also use screen capture software to produce videos and have been supported by the university to try out new technology, which enables us to work more efficiently.

Who are working on this project?

For now, we are mainly a group of motivated tutors form different degrees who want to teach a large audience online. We have about 30 tutors who are currently learning how to tutor online and about 10 who have been producing videos. We are always looking for further tutors from all backgrounds and are also looking for motivated students with an entrepreneurial interest to help with the launch of our sales efforts and the recruitment process.

Is there anything that our viewers can do to help you out?

Thanks for asking 🙂 There’s one thing viewers can help out with: spread the word to interested tutors, IB students, and even better, their former IB school. And to keep an eye on us from the new academic year on, because we will launch a bunch of cool new features that make the IB prep a lot easier.

Thanks for your time Julius.