Late Nite Labs Raises $1.1 Million To Bring Virtual Science Education To Campuses

Some readers may be familiar with Khan Academy, an awesome eLearning platform that offers students, self-starters and everyone in between the opportunity to learn at their own pace by watching instructive videos on subjects that range from arithmetic to physics. The non-profit startup has been growing like gangbusters of late, and now has more than 2,600 videos in its library. To date, Khan Academy has largely focused on math and science learning, but the startup plans to use new funding to expand into the humanities, and develop curricula for a blended physical and virtual academic experience.

Supplemental learning resources like Khan Academy’s stand to play a significant role in the changing educational landscape. The fact of the matter is that, while we might be in a higher education bubble, colleges and universities (public institutions, especially) face a challenging economic climate, which has led to budget cutbacks across the board. This is exacerbated by the increase in student enrollment, along with dwindling resources available to students and teachers, chief among them the limit of physical space within classrooms.

There is also (thankfully) a growing pressure to ramp up science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education on campuses across the country, but many instituions are struggling to keep pace while maintaining student engagement and quality of their courses.

One startup, like Khan Academy, has built an online platform that can become part of the solution, allowing universities to continue providing engaging curricula even when resources may not be available. Late Night Labs, a New York City-based startup, offers an web-based educational platform for distance and hybrid learning settings that lets students take biology and chemistry labs, for example, without the real-life explosions.

read more at http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/05/late-nite-labs-raises-1-1-million-to-br...