Outlier.org, a Brooklyn-based startup that aims to make higher education more accessible and affordable with its virtual courses, announced Thursday it closed on a $30 million Series B. The round was led by GV, with participation from Unusual Ventures, Gaingels and others, bringing the three-year-old company’s total funding raised to $46 million.
For $400 (about one-sixth of the cost of a traditional college course), Outlier gives students a selection of six online courses including calculus I, microeconomics and astronomy. Lectures are taught by several prominent academic figures, including instructors from Yale, Harvard and MIT, and coupled with things like proctored assessments and one-on-one tutoring. The company says these courses are designed using “cutting edge learning techniques” taken from educational psychology research and game design in order to keep students engaged and learning, even in a remote environment.
Outlier’s courses are meant to replace the prerequisites many colleges and universities require their freshmen to take, which founder and CEO Aaron Rasmussen says account for about $50 billion in student spending a year. To make it even cheaper for students, the company recently partnered up with Swedish fintech company Klarna. Now, with a monthly financing option from Klarna, users can take a full semester of college on Outlier for just $89 a month over 18 months at no interest.
The last time Built In caught up with Outlier was when it closed on its $11.7 million Series A at the very beginning of 2020. At the time, the company was offering two entry-level courses, and had just partnered with the University of Pittsburgh to offer users credits that could be transferred to other colleges.
Since then the world has changed, especially when it comes to online education. The COVID-19 pandemic forced schools all over the world to shut down and go remote and, while many of these schools have gone back to some in-person learning again, some virtual elements remain. This hybrid model will likely be a permanent fixture in education (at least for the foreseeable future), which Rasmussen says has prompted an ongoing conversation around its efficacy and where it still needs improvements.
“Universities are definitely putting more support behind their online learning tools. The increase in spending on online learning means that its effectiveness is going to dramatically improve, and students are going to become more attracted to it as a result,” Rasmussen told Built In via email, adding that the company’s own data found that its classes result in student outcomes that match or surpass those of in-person classes.
“Post-pandemic,” Rasmussen continued, “Outlier.org will continue to be an ally to both students and higher education institutions — we’re not a replacement for faculty or universities, by any stretch. We will succeed when we find the right use cases where we can help both universities and students.”
In the meantime, Outlier plans to use this fresh funding to add 14 more courses to its catalog by next year. Although he couldn’t disclose what these courses will be specifically, Rasmussen says that the goal is to provide enough resources that students can use Outlier to complete their first two years of college for a fraction of the typical cost. The company is hiring as well, with more than a dozen open tech positions available now.
Outlier wants to expand its network of higher education partners too. The company currently has a five-year contract with Pitt and its satellite campus in Johnstown, and has brought on Anjuli Gupta, the former director of university partnerships at Coursera, as its new head of partnerships to find other schools to work with.
“Big picture, our goal is to continue testing a variety of approaches both to support our students with new courses and different ways of paying to reduce the cost barrier,” Rasmussen said. “Our goal is to provide a high-quality, affordable and flexible option that makes education accessible for everyone, and we’re now one step closer to doing that having completed this funding round.”
