CollegeIGo
I've been tutoring for many years now, both privately as well as through various programs, like Kumon, my high school, and ggtutors.com.
After getting admitted to colleges in my senior spring of high school, a few friends and I decided to approach the "college admissions space," it was initially proposed to me by a friend, and eventually became a "startup" (I say with air-quotes because it failed miserably, as most startups do).
We approached CollegeIGo with the intention of adding an additional dimension to a high school students understanding of a college. College students would be able to sign up on our platform and would input all their applicable admissions information, as well as inputting their available times/connecting their calendars to be able to get booked for times.
High school students would then be able to browse different admitted college student profiles and be able to book times with them.
The intention was to allow high school students to:
- Gain real insight into the day-to-day life at a college, something that is hidden by layers of "deception" -- i.e. campus tours don't really shed light into the school culture + experience
- Provide helpful info on opportunities/extracurriculars available
These goals reflected what we felt we wanted when we were applying to schools.
But CollegeIGo never ended up going anywhere, 1) because none of us were experienced with running a business, 2) our motivations shifted as we entered college.
If you're interested in the technical specifications of CollegeIGo: Built with Next.js, Postgres, Clerk, Stripe, Cal.com Platform plan for bookings, tailwindcss + shadcn.
The main lesson it's taught me is that an entrepreneur can't just be a SWE, marketing and sales are equally (if not more) important.