Startup of the Month: New Futuro

by Amina Elahi
December 6, 2012

Built In Chicago and Marengo Hampshire Partners would like to congratulate November’s Startup of the Month: New Futuro! This company creates a socially innovative online education community for Hispanic students across the country, helping them get into college and start their careers.

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At NewFuturo.com, students and parents can find college and career resources, as well as the country’s biggest Hispanic scholarship database, in a fully bilingual environment. This year, the “high touch, high tech” platform reached over 15 million Hispanics. Tens of thousands of new members used New Futuro to discover the right scholarships for them to pursue by signing in with their member account or Facebook.

Looking ahead, New Futuro intends to debut a Road To College module that will let educators guide students in person and online. According to New Futuro founder Pete Wilkins, this “provides [educators] tools and resources to help their students (and parents) navigate the pathway to college and beyond.” Coupled with an impending website redesign, Wilkins says these features will help users and partners better use New Futuro.

“Created in both English and Spanish, this culturally relevant website helps guide parents and students towards achieving their education and career goals,” says Wilkins. “With access anytime, anywhere members can keep moving forward on their journey to a brighter future.”

While there are plenty of college prep options available to students, there is none other that helps students and families access education information in their native language. Although Hispanic college enrollment hit an all-time high in 2011 (over 2 million, according to a Pew report), experts believe this is reflective of the growth of that population – not increased access to higher education. As this population segment continues to lag behind other ethnic groups in this area, New Futuro aims to harness the power of online and offline college prep to help Hispanic students achieve more.

According to Director of Public Affairs, Jose Muñoz it’s this ability to connect in the students’ native language both on- and offline that places New Futuro in a category unto itself. I caught up with him to learn more about his company.

HOW DID THE IDEA FOR NEW FUTURO COME ABOUT?
New Futuro was the brainchild of Pete Wilkins, a passionate social entrepreneur, and Marty Castro, an active civic and community leader. Both men saw a need; in order for our country to continue to be a global leader we needed to ensure our education levels continue to stay on par with the skills and education levels required by our nation's workforce. Considering that Hispanics are the largest and fastest growing population in the U.S., increasing Latino college education rates is key to the future prosperity of our nation. It’s not a Latino issue, it’s an American issue.

WHO HAS BEEN MOST INSTRUMENTAL IN NEW FUTURO’S SUCCESS?
Our partners have been the key to our success. By uniting hundreds of prestigious partners like Allstate, The White House, Teach for America, ACT, Lumina Foundation, Stanford University, and others around a single issue, we have created a powerful ecosystem designed to help Latino families and their students achieve their educational and career goals.

HOW HAS BEING BASED IN CHICAGO AFFECTED NEW FUTURO?
Chicago has quickly become the start-up capital of the midwest. The diversity of talent and the support from the start-up community is unmatched anywhere in the world. What's even better is that because of the city's diverse Latino community, Chicago served as the perfect test market for our national launch.

WHY DO LATINOS NEED NEW FUTURO’S SERVICES?
Although everything we do is with a focus on meeting the cultural and linguistic needs of the Latino community, anyone can benefit from the tools and resources offered by New Futuro to plan, prepare and pay for college. Studies have shown that while the majority of Latinos (97%) value higher education as the highest priority for their family, many face challenges when preparing and applying for college – 87% identify lack of resources as a barrier to their education and career growth. New Futuro offers a solution to this problem.

WHAT IS THE GREATEST CHALLENGE YOUR COMPANY FACES?
Our biggest challenge is the uniqueness of our socially innovative high-touch, high-tech model. When you're the first to do something It's always difficult to fit into any one category cleanly.

LOOKING AHEAD TO 2013, WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS?
We will enhance the resources on NewFuturo.com, offer new products for our educational partners, test our mobile strategy, and more.  

Visit New Futuro’s website, check out their BIC profile, and follow them on Twitter at @newfuturo.

Jobs at New Futuro

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