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Yellowdig is committed in its mission of providing a student-driven social learning platform to support classrooms in any modality, and we made a lot of progress in that mission this year—amid a worldwide pandemic.
2021 has been anything but predictable, and the world of higher education and EdTech is no exception. With universities across the country facing the challenge of guaranteeing a quality education for their students in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, online courses became the new normal to keep students and teachers safe. Even though the pandemic will eventually end, online and hybrid courses will continue to be utilized in a post-pandemic world, and the value of online elements will continue to shine through for in-person courses. That is why Yellowdig will continue pushing forward to provide the best product possible for teachers and students in 2022 and beyond.
Before we dive headfirst into 2022, let's look back and celebrate the good things that happened with Yellowdig in 2021:
Our remote team has grown
2021 has been an uncertain year with many companies deciding to go back to the office—but not us. Our team grew massively in 2021 adding eleven members from all over the country solidifying our belief in remote work.
Marketing 📈
Moh'd Ghayeb - Fulbright Scholar, Associate Marketing Growth Specialist
Natalie Ramos - Sales Enablement Specialist
Daniel Butler - Social Media & Marketing Intern
Elaine Sei - Drexel Summer 2021 Co-op
Melissa Braun - Accont Expansion & Content Intern
Sales & Partnerships 🤝
Jamie Snow - Partnerships Specialist
Brian Kracke - Partnerships Specialist
Kevin Crossland - VP Sales
Todd Hall - Partnerships Specialist
Development 💻
Jeff Sells - Software Engineer
Zuff Idries - Software Engineer
Jem McElwain - Software Architect
Client Success 😄
Devendra Tiwari - Client Success Associate
Yellowdig's Key Growth Metrics
Things are looking up 📈
More people are using Yellowdig than ever before. Let's look at some stats comparing 2020 and 2021.
Yellowdig is growing. Fast.
Product updates
Our LaTeX editor got a big upgrade this year. It allows students to format equations correctly and more simply, it helps students work together to solve problems, and it allows easily moving back-and-forth between the Live Editor and Basic Editor modes.
Students best thrive when they are given the proper tools to collaborate with their peers. Yellowdig's Group Update allows more options for forming groups on Yellowdig. The most notable part of this update allows groups to be a part of the community as a whole instead of groups separated from their main community.
Yellowdig is all about social learning, so we want to build a platform that supports students in their social learning needs—that is why we made a slew of updates to Yellowdig Engage from posting, a rework of the UX, and improving the search function.
This new update notifies students when they are inactive on Yellowdig Engage, as well as allows them to customize their notifications. Our Engage platform is inherently student-driven, so sometimes they need a reminder to post and comment so they can take advantage of what Yellowdig Engage is built for—social learning.
To ensure that instructors and community facilitators are equipped with the proper resources to set up a community quickly and easily, we now have all the essential community setup steps in the form of a walkthrough. This feature will allow instructors to modify the start & end dates of their communities, as well as add and reorganize topic tags, all in one go. At the end of the walkthrough, they’ll be able to view three quick videos to help instructors get their communities started quickly and easily.
Cloud Drafts is a new feature being added to Yellowdig's Engage Platform, and it works in a similar way to how drafts work in other applications that you may be familiar with.
Cloud Drafts work by automatically saving your current work inside our Engage platform as you are writing a post or comment. If you accidentally (or purposely) close the editor without posting it to the Community feed, your draft will be safely stored for later access.
Our E-books from 2021 📖
Our e-book “Made for Humans” showcases how Yellowdig Engage is a unique online learning platform for students.
It features examples of success using Yellowdig Engage from University of Michigan, Georgetown University, and Algonquin High School. It also dives into exactly how we built Yellowdig with humanistic elements from the ground up.
Yellowdig's mission is to connect learners across modalities—whether it's an in-person, blended, or online learning environment.
Our e-book "Connect Like Never Before" showcases our commitment by sharing testimonials from professors using Yellowdig at various universities. They share their positive experiences using Yellowdig in a variety of subjects and modalities.
New additions to our advisory board
We couldn't be more happy to welcome two members to the Yellowdig advisory board: Dr. Mark Milliron and Robert Cohen. Both Mark and Robert will be working with Yellowdig as advisors to help improve the educational experience of those using Yellowdig Engage.
Dr. Mark Milliron serves as Senior Vice President and Executive Dean of the Teachers College at Western Governors University (WGU) and is an award-winning higher education leader, author, and speaker, working all across the education space. He co-founded Civitas Learning in 2011 and was the Chief Learning Officer for 7 years, and he was named one of the "Top Technology Innovators" in higher education by Chronicle of Higher Education.
Robert Cohen, founding CFO of 2U Inc., also joins Yellowdig on our advisory board. He is heavily involved in the realm of education as he serves on the Board of Directors for Stride, Straive and LearningMate. Robert is also an advisor for other EdTech companies such as Trilogy Education Services, ZyBooks, and KidzToPros.
Looking ahead to 2022
Be on the lookout for more things to come in 2022—everything from product updates, new team members, new blogs, and more. Stay up-to-date by subscribing to our email list, and following us on Twitter and Linkedin.
Check out some of our blog posts from 2021:
