249: What It’s Like To Be a Serial Education Technology Entrepreneur w/ John Katzman, The Noodle Companies  [Main T4C episode]

John Katzman is an American entrepreneur and education evangelist.  He founded The Noodle Companies in 2012 with the mission of increasing transparency and efficiency across the education landscape and with the goal of lowering the cost of online college tuition. For almost 40 years, John has been a pioneer of innovation in the American educational system. In 1981, he founded and ran The Princeton Review which began as a college admission services company offering test preparation services, tutoring and admissions resources, online courses. In 2008, Katzman founded 2U (NASDAQ: TWOU), an educational tech or EdTech company that builds and runs high-quality online degree programs for leading nonprofit colleges and universities. Under his lead, 2U was named among the “10 Start-Ups Changing the World” by Forbes and is now a $4 billion firm. Katzman serves on several boards of directors, including Renaissance Learning, the Woodrow Wilson Foundation and the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools. He has authored many articles and five books, including including Cracking the SAT, a New York Times bestseller.  WHAT YOU’LL LEARN ABOUT IN THIS EPISODE:  Why John started The Princeton Review right out of college  What an OPM or Online Program Management is and the profound impact it’s having on the price of college tuition  What ed tech or educational technology is  How OPM’s can benefit professors and students How it’s easier than you may think it is to get into college today What John’s newest business, known as The Noodle Companies, was founded to do and how it’s seeking to significantly cut the cost of online college tuition  Why universities are not as selective as you think