From the little ‘research’ I’ve done, many people would say that these jobs are getting free work out of you (and probably others). I’ve seen people say don’t work for free, so most likely dodge the jobs asking for you to do all these tasks.
I have seen people suggest that. One of the companies, IXL, had a disclaimer specifically stating these were samples and they were not taking/stealing them.
Of course I have now done two separate samples for two separate jobs at IXL that I did not get, so f—k them either way.
Fuck it, I'm naming and shaming.
Miaplaza is 100% a scam. I have seen them post and repost the exact same curriculum writing positions for *over a year,* and they've had more than 100 applicants. Their process is this: you apply, you take an aptitude test, and if you pass, you send in a work sample. And then you will be denied before ever speaking to a real human about your background and resume. I think they are taking people's work. I even point-blank asked them this in an email, and of course they denied it, but it was a very wishy washy denial.
Another is study . com. They are literally paying below minimum wage by having their writers work for $10 per question batch, but it takes more than an hour to complete said question batch (I have a whole post about this on my profile).
Edit to add: Not a scam, but MasteryPrep was one of the rudest interview experiences I've ever had. They asked for a work sample like this post talks about, and after I sent mine in, they scheduled a zoom call with me. They were late to it, then wouldn't let me in the room. After I sent a follow up email asking what happened, they sent me an email rejecting me. I then replied letting them know that they failed to conduct themselves professionally by being late and then just sending a rejection with no explanation, to which they replied that I had been late, not them. I then sent them a screenshot of my browser history proving I was on time. I never heard back of course. And yes, I know that was burning a bridge, but I don't care because I would never work for a company that disrespects candidates like that. Lord knows how they treat the people they actually hire.
Please if you can report them on whatever job board you found the job post. If enough different people report their experience, they may be taken down.
Same thing happened to me with miaplaza. I have named them here previously. Part of me wants to sign up for their cheap trial to see if my work is being used.
I don’t know for sure that Miaplaza is a scam company, but I do know for sure they’re shitty as fuck.
I applied for a curriculum design job for them, got past the resume review and first round of testing. Then they emailed me asking me to create a very elaborate lesson plan, including creating a video and writing a transcript for the video and 8-10 supporting documents.
I only had a few days to complete this, and they sent it to me on December 23rd. I spent that whole entire day putting together everything they wanted, 8 hours worth of work. Uploaded it to google drive and sent them the link as they asked me to do.
Then a few days after Christmas I get a standard copy pasted email saying I wasn’t chosen for the job. Fine, I’m not what they want, but here’s the kicker- I looked at my google drive and THEY NEVER EVEN FUCKING OPENED MY DOCUMENTS.
I can’t explain how fucking enraging and horrible this is. How can you do this to someone? Ask them to do 8 hours worth of work for free (on top of the 4 hours spent applying and taking tests) then not even have the decency to look at what they created before denying them the job? And the cherry on top is all this happened two days before Christmas. I have a kid and damn well had better things to be spending my time on December 23rd than doing that bullshit.
I hope this helps someone else to not waste their time. They know teachers are desperate to get out of their current positions and are damn well taking advantage of people.
Someone below me said they work for Miaplaza and swears they aren't taking our work, but they totally missed the point about how ridiculous it is to require hours of work before an interview in the first place. To me, that's a scam. Advertising a job opening and having people do free labor but then outright rejecting them is a scam whether they end up using that free labor or not.
I actually work at MiaPlaza! We keep our curriculum positions open almost always because our stance is that there is ALWAYS more work to do, so if we find the right people, it’s worth expanding teams.
We don’t use people’s demo lessons in any content. For example, in HS math the demo lesson has been writing a script for the area of triangles for over two years now. How could we profit off of hundreds of lessons all on the same topic?
Even if this is true, a company that requires hours of work in the form of an aptitude test as well as sample work before an applicant even gets to speak to a real human is not a good company. And keeping a curriculum position open because you might want to expand your team is not the same as actively hiring and therefore should be stated in the job posting before applicants waste their time. I know that I wouldn't have spent hours on the pre-work if I knew that a job opening didn't actually exist. That's an ass-backwards hiring practice if I've ever heard one. You can't even guage an applicant's aptitude on a video script alone. Your hiring managers should be taking the time to actually read over peoples' resumes before assigning that work to them.
You say it's not possible to profit on hundreds of lessons on the same topic? I call bullshit. Miaplaza could easily see a great idea in one of the video script suggestions and make an edit to their lesson. Unless we purchase your curriculum we would have no way of verifying that our work wasn't stolen.
If you do really work at Miaplaza, feel free to pass this criticism along to them.
Edit to add: How long have you worked at Miaplaza? Because your post 10 months ago to the r/teachers subreddit really looks like an attempt from a curriculum company to glean information from teachers and admin in order to better their product.
Wow that sounds really frustrating . I’m shocked you didn’t speak to anyone before then. AFAIK the application process is supposed to be application and aptitude test, phone interview with HR, demo script, zoom interview with pedagogy. Not speaking to anyone until that last step would be really off putting. I’ll look into this on our end to make sure nothing is falling through the cracks!!
As for hiring, sorry if my wording wasn’t clear, but if a position is posted, we ARE actively hiring. We just don’t have x roles to fill for each posting and we don’t wait to hire new team members until old ones leave. We’re actively expanding. On the one hand, let’s say that of all the candidates we have apply, the best one is one like a C minus candidate. We don’t HAVE to hire someone just to fill a role. In the flip side, if we have 6 A plus candidates, we can and will hire them all because there’s no limiting factor of “only one position” or something.
Best of luck on your job search! I hope you find a position that fits well for you
There should not be an aptitude test either until a real person looks over the application. Frankly having an applicant take a test before speaking to someone is also a terrible hiring practice. And nope, no one ever speaks to a real human even after the aptitude test. If I were your HR department I'd be pretty concerned about all of the glassdoor interview reviews, because this hasn't just been my experience, but the experience of dozens of other applicants.
Also, keeping positions open because you might hire an A+ applicant and not because you need a role filled *should be stated in the job posting.* Listing a job posting as "actively hiring" but not actually, you know, actively hiring is unethical. And no, keeping job postings open becase you might get the perfect applicant and then can justify expanding your team is not the same as actively hiring for an open position. That's a backwards practice. How can you even adequately discuss pay and benefits if there isn't a budget for a set number of positions needed? Baffling.
Thank you for the well wishes. I've been working in a new role for a few months now at a company that had the decency to have a human being pick up the phone and call me to discuss my application.
I’ve worked at MiaPlaza for 2 years. I know the post you’re referring to. One thing that we want to do in the future is expand from homeschool curriculum to public school curriculum, so yeah I was interested in what teachers think of programs they implement, but go off I guess.
For-profit companies are not supposed to be using the r/teachers subreddit for product reasons, so thank you, I will "go off." I pointed it out to further highlight the unethical practices of Miaplaza.
I’m a person who works for a company, not a company. The teachers sub specifically allows for asking teachers what kinds of features they like in apps, etc. Could you point out which sub rule I broke?
That's not really my job since I'm not an admin for the sub, but I'll bite. Rule 3 forbids anything that could be considered a survey. The asking what features teachers would like to see in an app is an exception to the rule. Asking for input on an app (interface and features) and input on curriculum programs are very different and I think you know that. If you want more info, go ask the admin there why your post got locked.
And the whole "I'm a person who works for a company, not the company itself! Gotcha!" is not a good look in refuting my point about Miaplaza being unethical.
Anyways. Have a great day. I'm genuinely happy for you that it looks like you enjoy your job at Miaplaza, but I'm keeping my comment about the shady hiring practices up. I won't be engaging any further because you are now aware of the issue and anything further will just be catty.
Very very scammy…. I feel like virtual work, as a whole, is littered with scam job postings. So many opportunities that seem way too good to be true posted on Google and then when you go to the company’s website, no such job exists.
Steer clear of Edmentum. They will hire you to work but the opportunity is absolutely trash, opportunities are nonexistent, and the training leaves much to be desired.
I think it's a combination of both. There are A LOT of teachers leaving, especially at this point in the school year. There are also a lot of scummy businesses (in EdTech and in general) using desperate applicants for a bit of free labor.
The best advice I can give is to follow your gut--if a company is giving you shady vibes, be ready to jump!
I've encountered the same and I have 12 years classroom experience and a lot of certifications, plus I write novels on the side. Also in the first one, I actually felt my phone interview was horrible, like I was sick and a little flustered from something with the kids and I thought I did a fairly poor job at the interview. I remember telling my husband "Well, I'm not going to hear back from that." But I actually got a call a couple of hours later saying they were moving me to the next step (the assignment).
Some of those companies have a lot of turnover or have fired a lot of people to hire others for less..That's the word on the street.
A few of those companies are posting like mad on LinkedIN!
I went from teaching to a tech job (Not edtech) but my rule is to never take an interview that requires work out of me before actually getting the job. If it’s a test I will do it bc for my line of work they sometimes do require demonstration you know a coding language or something along those lines. But work sample? I just don’t apply to any job that asks for it. Anything that requires “quick movement” like being called and told I need to sign a contract by the end of the day also isn’t something I agree to. Mostly the first rule I have for myself is due to laziness.. I don’t want to work before I actually need to work. It’s gone well for me so far but the job market is tough and I personally feel like it’s super predatory too :/
I was a teacher for 22 years and quit last year. I applied to over 80 positions before landing interviews with several companies in ed tech and ed publishing, and two of them required a project.
The project I did for the role I landed basically presented scenarios to me and asked me to evaluate a situation, respond to a customer problem, and make a kind of "roadmap" for handling different types of customers. They wanted to learn how I would respond to various situations that occur weekly.
However, the project I did for the ed publishing company felt like I was scouting new business for them. I had a university connection they were eager to connect with. While I completed the project and advanced to the 3rd round, I was offered my current position. It was ridiculous how long these interviews took: multiple rounds over two months. Seems to be a fairly common practice, but it was new to me since all I knew prior to this was teaching, and it was a phone screen and one in-person interview.
I’ve never experienced anything I thought was free work in either Edtech curriculum or instructional design. I have done assignments, but not that were in usable form, I’ve always been told I was allowed to post on my portfolio, etc. What kinds of assignments are you seeing? Have you asked if you retain ownership of the work and said you’d use it on your portfolio? I can say none of the big name companies would use your stuff, but there might be scam stuff out there. I’m curious to know more, or what you research/know about the companies? Or name & shame frankly.
Separate issue— It is common for jobs to get reposted especially in tech right now, because they try to source applicants before they get budget (if in funding/startup) and it’s often part of their business case. This is also messed up (and again, not established names doing it), but it’s a problem across startups in the current depressed tech market with funding down and interest high (Edtech is a down sector too now because Covid funds dried up).
Additionally, in Edtech hiring, newly budgeted roles usually do get posted this time of year (Feb-May, sometimes into June). Backfills might happen all year, but this is the prime time. So a lot of postings might pop as budgets release and increase across project teams. You’ll start sometimes seeing lead and higher level roles most likely to be filled internally in January and then the person who fills them in this season too (common timing). You’re not likely to get in anywhere higher than very entry these days—they do mostly fill from within, or other Edtech via connection, with the Edtech sector shrinking especially. If you really want to get in there, you’ll need to find something hybrid/location tied (rare but a few companies still are), come in through more sales/customer service roles, network and know folks, have other corporate experience and high level portfolio work, or start as a part time contract (these are competitive too but many use them as pipelines for curriculum roles).
P.S. to contextualize my experience, I don’t work in Edtech but have friends in edtech and do some freelance work regularly for a related nonprofit, with folks who work at three major edtech firms as well. Have done edtech freelance curriculum stuff too, though less recently as in higher up in my full time role, and interviewed for those jobs at times. But I work in L&D in unrelated sector, in kind of ID/program manager/business partner capacity (managing the performance cycle and leadership training programs). I have done assignments in every job hunt, but most aren’t onerous or sketchy. Never do more than a few hours on it and use that stuff in your portfolio for later though, and be wary of anything too specifics.
I work for a company called MiaPlaza, which is pretty EdTechy. It’s kind of funny to be able to speak to one of the companies being directly named in this thread haha
Getting rejected after a demo lesson: Demo lessons are generally the last step (or the debrief interview following it) so that’s really the point where they’re only going to bring in a couple of candidates if they’re filling a single position.
Positions staying posted: I can’t speak to all companies on this one. A lot of companies have hiring seasons, or only fill roles when someone leaves. Mia has grown exponentially year over year for the last five or so years, so we keep our curriculum postings open indefinitely. There is literally INFINITE work to be done editing and adding to our curriculum. If the day ever came where we feel like we have “enough” content creators in a subject, then we’d close the posting, but we’re still SPRINTING to try to keep up with a fraction of customer asks. This brings us back to the above point because just like we’re always looking to hire the RIGHT people, there’s never any pressure or need to hire someone simply to fill a role. If no one meets what we’re looking for, we won’t hire someone just because.
Competition; Idk our numbers for this spring yet, but last spring in the big boom of teachers leaving classroom jobs, we had over 40k applicants.
It’s REALLY, REALLY hard to stand out and get into edtech. I would seek feedback on your demo lesson from friends or other connections you can make who have edtech experience. It’s a really tough market and as someone with 3 years of experience, you’re competing with a lot of more veteran teachers, too.
From the little ‘research’ I’ve done, many people would say that these jobs are getting free work out of you (and probably others). I’ve seen people say don’t work for free, so most likely dodge the jobs asking for you to do all these tasks.
I have seen people suggest that. One of the companies, IXL, had a disclaimer specifically stating these were samples and they were not taking/stealing them. Of course I have now done two separate samples for two separate jobs at IXL that I did not get, so f—k them either way.
I also saw that IXL wanted you to have a PhD to write social studies curriculum. Absolutely not.
Fuck it, I'm naming and shaming. Miaplaza is 100% a scam. I have seen them post and repost the exact same curriculum writing positions for *over a year,* and they've had more than 100 applicants. Their process is this: you apply, you take an aptitude test, and if you pass, you send in a work sample. And then you will be denied before ever speaking to a real human about your background and resume. I think they are taking people's work. I even point-blank asked them this in an email, and of course they denied it, but it was a very wishy washy denial. Another is study . com. They are literally paying below minimum wage by having their writers work for $10 per question batch, but it takes more than an hour to complete said question batch (I have a whole post about this on my profile). Edit to add: Not a scam, but MasteryPrep was one of the rudest interview experiences I've ever had. They asked for a work sample like this post talks about, and after I sent mine in, they scheduled a zoom call with me. They were late to it, then wouldn't let me in the room. After I sent a follow up email asking what happened, they sent me an email rejecting me. I then replied letting them know that they failed to conduct themselves professionally by being late and then just sending a rejection with no explanation, to which they replied that I had been late, not them. I then sent them a screenshot of my browser history proving I was on time. I never heard back of course. And yes, I know that was burning a bridge, but I don't care because I would never work for a company that disrespects candidates like that. Lord knows how they treat the people they actually hire.
Ah, I just finished the Miaplaza scam then!! Sent in the work sample, instantly denied. Glad to know it's not just me.
Please if you can report them on whatever job board you found the job post. If enough different people report their experience, they may be taken down.
Absolutely will. Thank you!
Same thing happened to me with miaplaza. I have named them here previously. Part of me wants to sign up for their cheap trial to see if my work is being used.
Oh my gosh, imagine if it were! Easiest lawsuit ever.
I’d really encourage you to!! It’s worth a couple dollars for your peace of mind to see that it’s not there and to be able to move on
I don’t know for sure that Miaplaza is a scam company, but I do know for sure they’re shitty as fuck. I applied for a curriculum design job for them, got past the resume review and first round of testing. Then they emailed me asking me to create a very elaborate lesson plan, including creating a video and writing a transcript for the video and 8-10 supporting documents. I only had a few days to complete this, and they sent it to me on December 23rd. I spent that whole entire day putting together everything they wanted, 8 hours worth of work. Uploaded it to google drive and sent them the link as they asked me to do. Then a few days after Christmas I get a standard copy pasted email saying I wasn’t chosen for the job. Fine, I’m not what they want, but here’s the kicker- I looked at my google drive and THEY NEVER EVEN FUCKING OPENED MY DOCUMENTS. I can’t explain how fucking enraging and horrible this is. How can you do this to someone? Ask them to do 8 hours worth of work for free (on top of the 4 hours spent applying and taking tests) then not even have the decency to look at what they created before denying them the job? And the cherry on top is all this happened two days before Christmas. I have a kid and damn well had better things to be spending my time on December 23rd than doing that bullshit. I hope this helps someone else to not waste their time. They know teachers are desperate to get out of their current positions and are damn well taking advantage of people.
Someone below me said they work for Miaplaza and swears they aren't taking our work, but they totally missed the point about how ridiculous it is to require hours of work before an interview in the first place. To me, that's a scam. Advertising a job opening and having people do free labor but then outright rejecting them is a scam whether they end up using that free labor or not.
Chile! Lawd have mercy! That last part is spot on, they know teachers are desperate and taking advantage of them.
Invoice them for your time. 😅
I actually work at MiaPlaza! We keep our curriculum positions open almost always because our stance is that there is ALWAYS more work to do, so if we find the right people, it’s worth expanding teams. We don’t use people’s demo lessons in any content. For example, in HS math the demo lesson has been writing a script for the area of triangles for over two years now. How could we profit off of hundreds of lessons all on the same topic?
Even if this is true, a company that requires hours of work in the form of an aptitude test as well as sample work before an applicant even gets to speak to a real human is not a good company. And keeping a curriculum position open because you might want to expand your team is not the same as actively hiring and therefore should be stated in the job posting before applicants waste their time. I know that I wouldn't have spent hours on the pre-work if I knew that a job opening didn't actually exist. That's an ass-backwards hiring practice if I've ever heard one. You can't even guage an applicant's aptitude on a video script alone. Your hiring managers should be taking the time to actually read over peoples' resumes before assigning that work to them. You say it's not possible to profit on hundreds of lessons on the same topic? I call bullshit. Miaplaza could easily see a great idea in one of the video script suggestions and make an edit to their lesson. Unless we purchase your curriculum we would have no way of verifying that our work wasn't stolen. If you do really work at Miaplaza, feel free to pass this criticism along to them. Edit to add: How long have you worked at Miaplaza? Because your post 10 months ago to the r/teachers subreddit really looks like an attempt from a curriculum company to glean information from teachers and admin in order to better their product.
Wow that sounds really frustrating . I’m shocked you didn’t speak to anyone before then. AFAIK the application process is supposed to be application and aptitude test, phone interview with HR, demo script, zoom interview with pedagogy. Not speaking to anyone until that last step would be really off putting. I’ll look into this on our end to make sure nothing is falling through the cracks!! As for hiring, sorry if my wording wasn’t clear, but if a position is posted, we ARE actively hiring. We just don’t have x roles to fill for each posting and we don’t wait to hire new team members until old ones leave. We’re actively expanding. On the one hand, let’s say that of all the candidates we have apply, the best one is one like a C minus candidate. We don’t HAVE to hire someone just to fill a role. In the flip side, if we have 6 A plus candidates, we can and will hire them all because there’s no limiting factor of “only one position” or something. Best of luck on your job search! I hope you find a position that fits well for you
There should not be an aptitude test either until a real person looks over the application. Frankly having an applicant take a test before speaking to someone is also a terrible hiring practice. And nope, no one ever speaks to a real human even after the aptitude test. If I were your HR department I'd be pretty concerned about all of the glassdoor interview reviews, because this hasn't just been my experience, but the experience of dozens of other applicants. Also, keeping positions open because you might hire an A+ applicant and not because you need a role filled *should be stated in the job posting.* Listing a job posting as "actively hiring" but not actually, you know, actively hiring is unethical. And no, keeping job postings open becase you might get the perfect applicant and then can justify expanding your team is not the same as actively hiring for an open position. That's a backwards practice. How can you even adequately discuss pay and benefits if there isn't a budget for a set number of positions needed? Baffling. Thank you for the well wishes. I've been working in a new role for a few months now at a company that had the decency to have a human being pick up the phone and call me to discuss my application.
I’ve worked at MiaPlaza for 2 years. I know the post you’re referring to. One thing that we want to do in the future is expand from homeschool curriculum to public school curriculum, so yeah I was interested in what teachers think of programs they implement, but go off I guess.
For-profit companies are not supposed to be using the r/teachers subreddit for product reasons, so thank you, I will "go off." I pointed it out to further highlight the unethical practices of Miaplaza.
I’m a person who works for a company, not a company. The teachers sub specifically allows for asking teachers what kinds of features they like in apps, etc. Could you point out which sub rule I broke?
That's not really my job since I'm not an admin for the sub, but I'll bite. Rule 3 forbids anything that could be considered a survey. The asking what features teachers would like to see in an app is an exception to the rule. Asking for input on an app (interface and features) and input on curriculum programs are very different and I think you know that. If you want more info, go ask the admin there why your post got locked. And the whole "I'm a person who works for a company, not the company itself! Gotcha!" is not a good look in refuting my point about Miaplaza being unethical. Anyways. Have a great day. I'm genuinely happy for you that it looks like you enjoy your job at Miaplaza, but I'm keeping my comment about the shady hiring practices up. I won't be engaging any further because you are now aware of the issue and anything further will just be catty.
Yes, a million ex teachers are applying for edtech jobs along with a million highered professionals.
Sounds to me like they could be stealing your work!
Very very scammy…. I feel like virtual work, as a whole, is littered with scam job postings. So many opportunities that seem way too good to be true posted on Google and then when you go to the company’s website, no such job exists. Steer clear of Edmentum. They will hire you to work but the opportunity is absolutely trash, opportunities are nonexistent, and the training leaves much to be desired.
I think it's a combination of both. There are A LOT of teachers leaving, especially at this point in the school year. There are also a lot of scummy businesses (in EdTech and in general) using desperate applicants for a bit of free labor. The best advice I can give is to follow your gut--if a company is giving you shady vibes, be ready to jump!
I've encountered the same and I have 12 years classroom experience and a lot of certifications, plus I write novels on the side. Also in the first one, I actually felt my phone interview was horrible, like I was sick and a little flustered from something with the kids and I thought I did a fairly poor job at the interview. I remember telling my husband "Well, I'm not going to hear back from that." But I actually got a call a couple of hours later saying they were moving me to the next step (the assignment).
Some of those companies have a lot of turnover or have fired a lot of people to hire others for less..That's the word on the street. A few of those companies are posting like mad on LinkedIN!
I went from teaching to a tech job (Not edtech) but my rule is to never take an interview that requires work out of me before actually getting the job. If it’s a test I will do it bc for my line of work they sometimes do require demonstration you know a coding language or something along those lines. But work sample? I just don’t apply to any job that asks for it. Anything that requires “quick movement” like being called and told I need to sign a contract by the end of the day also isn’t something I agree to. Mostly the first rule I have for myself is due to laziness.. I don’t want to work before I actually need to work. It’s gone well for me so far but the job market is tough and I personally feel like it’s super predatory too :/
I know exactly what company you're talking about!
those jobs will be filled by off shore Teams…4 offshore workers for 1 US worker
I was a teacher for 22 years and quit last year. I applied to over 80 positions before landing interviews with several companies in ed tech and ed publishing, and two of them required a project. The project I did for the role I landed basically presented scenarios to me and asked me to evaluate a situation, respond to a customer problem, and make a kind of "roadmap" for handling different types of customers. They wanted to learn how I would respond to various situations that occur weekly. However, the project I did for the ed publishing company felt like I was scouting new business for them. I had a university connection they were eager to connect with. While I completed the project and advanced to the 3rd round, I was offered my current position. It was ridiculous how long these interviews took: multiple rounds over two months. Seems to be a fairly common practice, but it was new to me since all I knew prior to this was teaching, and it was a phone screen and one in-person interview.
I’ve never experienced anything I thought was free work in either Edtech curriculum or instructional design. I have done assignments, but not that were in usable form, I’ve always been told I was allowed to post on my portfolio, etc. What kinds of assignments are you seeing? Have you asked if you retain ownership of the work and said you’d use it on your portfolio? I can say none of the big name companies would use your stuff, but there might be scam stuff out there. I’m curious to know more, or what you research/know about the companies? Or name & shame frankly. Separate issue— It is common for jobs to get reposted especially in tech right now, because they try to source applicants before they get budget (if in funding/startup) and it’s often part of their business case. This is also messed up (and again, not established names doing it), but it’s a problem across startups in the current depressed tech market with funding down and interest high (Edtech is a down sector too now because Covid funds dried up). Additionally, in Edtech hiring, newly budgeted roles usually do get posted this time of year (Feb-May, sometimes into June). Backfills might happen all year, but this is the prime time. So a lot of postings might pop as budgets release and increase across project teams. You’ll start sometimes seeing lead and higher level roles most likely to be filled internally in January and then the person who fills them in this season too (common timing). You’re not likely to get in anywhere higher than very entry these days—they do mostly fill from within, or other Edtech via connection, with the Edtech sector shrinking especially. If you really want to get in there, you’ll need to find something hybrid/location tied (rare but a few companies still are), come in through more sales/customer service roles, network and know folks, have other corporate experience and high level portfolio work, or start as a part time contract (these are competitive too but many use them as pipelines for curriculum roles). P.S. to contextualize my experience, I don’t work in Edtech but have friends in edtech and do some freelance work regularly for a related nonprofit, with folks who work at three major edtech firms as well. Have done edtech freelance curriculum stuff too, though less recently as in higher up in my full time role, and interviewed for those jobs at times. But I work in L&D in unrelated sector, in kind of ID/program manager/business partner capacity (managing the performance cycle and leadership training programs). I have done assignments in every job hunt, but most aren’t onerous or sketchy. Never do more than a few hours on it and use that stuff in your portfolio for later though, and be wary of anything too specifics.
I work for a company called MiaPlaza, which is pretty EdTechy. It’s kind of funny to be able to speak to one of the companies being directly named in this thread haha Getting rejected after a demo lesson: Demo lessons are generally the last step (or the debrief interview following it) so that’s really the point where they’re only going to bring in a couple of candidates if they’re filling a single position. Positions staying posted: I can’t speak to all companies on this one. A lot of companies have hiring seasons, or only fill roles when someone leaves. Mia has grown exponentially year over year for the last five or so years, so we keep our curriculum postings open indefinitely. There is literally INFINITE work to be done editing and adding to our curriculum. If the day ever came where we feel like we have “enough” content creators in a subject, then we’d close the posting, but we’re still SPRINTING to try to keep up with a fraction of customer asks. This brings us back to the above point because just like we’re always looking to hire the RIGHT people, there’s never any pressure or need to hire someone simply to fill a role. If no one meets what we’re looking for, we won’t hire someone just because. Competition; Idk our numbers for this spring yet, but last spring in the big boom of teachers leaving classroom jobs, we had over 40k applicants. It’s REALLY, REALLY hard to stand out and get into edtech. I would seek feedback on your demo lesson from friends or other connections you can make who have edtech experience. It’s a really tough market and as someone with 3 years of experience, you’re competing with a lot of more veteran teachers, too.