I recently had the honor of interviewing Steli Efti, the founder of Supercool School.
Steli is 24, born and raised in Germany. He left school at 18 to pursue his passion: to become an entrepreneur. I really like the concept behind Supercool School and I love the design of the site. I think we will be seeing great things from Steli and his crew in the very near future.
Me: So tell me about Supercool School’ in three sentences:
Steli: Think Wikipedia for live & interactive education. Supercool School is a learning community where people can educate people for free; anyone can offer a class online. It is a place where education has no limits.
Me: So, how did you come up with this idea?
Steli: It was a dream. Believe it or not, one night I was in a very deep sleep when I jumped up to my chair, took a pencil and wrote something down on a piece of paper. The next morning I wasn’t sure if I really had written anything down, or if this was just a dream. Sure enough, there were five written words on a piece of paper. Words that changed my life: ’Build a free world school’
Me: What’s your team look like? I know you outsource, so how has that worked out?
Steli: They are all crazy! Crazy enough to help Supercool School without asking for anything in return! And I mean that literally. This is not a low budget project – this is a NO budget project. Everyone involved is really in love with the dream behind Supercool and wants to contribute and help this dream come true. So far there are eleven people contributing regularly to help Supercool School. Thank you guys! I love ya!
Me: When do you think you will go live?
Steli: Supercool School will go live after I moved to San Francisco in April of this year.
Me: What classes are you most excited to offer?
Steli: It’s not so much about what I’m excited about ’“ it’s what our members will be excited about since they are the ones generating all the content. But I’m personally excited to see cross-disciplinary innovation take place. I think about the possibilities and am amazed – you could learn math AND Spanish at the same time simply by visiting a online math class held in Spanish.
Me: Any words of advice to other entrepreneurs?
Steli: Make mistakes fast. Learn. Move on.