NeeKids: Neurodidactics and AI as Support for Children in Times of Covid 19

We talked to Carla Leal Vega, CEO at NeeKids about encouraging learning by recommending educational resources and programs based on Neurodidactic profiles and this is what she said about it.

First of all, how are you and your family doing in these COVID-19 times? 

Carla Leal Vega: Thank you for your concern, our family is in good health, fortunately, we haven’t had any COVID cases at the moment. We are isolated and working.

Tell us about you, your career, how you founded Neekids.

Carla Leal Vega: I am a graduate in psychopedagogy and early childhood education with studies in neurodidactics, cognitive neuroscience, and special educational needs. Since I was young, I have always enjoyed creating educational content. As a recent graduate in education working with children, I found myself in the need to create my own materials for my classes. I was able to recognize this same need in other educators abroad, so I started selling my educational materials online on different platforms such as (amazon, teacherspayteachers), and they started buying my products from Europe, Asia, and Latam, that’s how my e-commerce of Maestra Lumbrera developed.

After the growth of Maestra Lumbrera’s e-commerce, in 2019 with my partner, we created NeeKids our SAAS, because many parents go through stress when they see that children lower their school grades and not know how to reinforce them, thus NeeKids was born a recommendation system of educational resources adapted to your neurodidactic profile.

How does NeeKids innovate? 

Carla Leal Vega: NeeKids is our neurodidactic recommendation system. Basically, it is a software that performs psycho-pedagogical and neurocognitive tests, from which data is obtained to create a neurodidactic profile, and recommend using machine learning algorithms to the best educational resource adapted to the special educational needs of the child.

Our idea of innovation which we focus on are:

• Neurodidactic profiles that are built on the basis of automated tests.
• Educational programs built around the special educational needs of children. Which also makes us a channel that creates specialized content.
• The recommendation algorithms that relate and unite the previous two: The best educational program based on the results of the neurodidactic profile, guarantees the best educational performance result for the child.

Working with special educational needs takes a lot of time, effort, and resources because the processes are not automated, making it cost-prohibitive to dedicate time to children with SEN.

How the coronavirus pandemic affects your business and how are you coping?

Carla Leal Vega: The pandemic has not affected us much, what we have done is reduce costs in the technology that is expensive to maintain, and many times to achieve results it was necessary to learn to handle design software, social media management, as well as business issues such as customer development, design thinking, and sales.

Our goal is to leverage technology and digital transformation to be global, if we spend $ 100 to serve 1 child, we still seek to spend $ 100 to serve 5000 children. In this way, thanks to technology, our fixed costs are maintained, but the customer community grows and expands.

Did you have to make difficult choices and what are the lessons learned?

Carla Leal Vega: Yes, we have delayed many family trips, focusing only on our work while the national and international contingency comes under relative control.

What specific tools, software, and management skills are you using to navigate this crisis?

Carla Leal Vega: We are a small team, but the tools for managing objectives and structuring the work have been very important. For example, slack and other Project management tools, additionally, timers and software to measure working hours keep us motivated.

Who are your competitors? And how do you plan to stay in the game?

Carla Leal Vega: Our competitors are large companies, but as a small company, we focus on delivering, with our neurodidactic profile, personalized recommendations for educational resources adapted to the needs of children who need to enhance their learning at home, due to the circumstances of the covid.

Your final thoughts?

Carla Leal Vega: Follow your passion, start creating, writing, be self-taught. Along the way, you are going to make many mistakes, but all that is learning to be resilient. Work hard and you will see successful results in your career. Do not let a stone in the way prevent you from advancing to your objectives and goals.

Your website?

https://www.neekids.com/

https://maestralumbrera.com/