ASU student startup tackles self-education problem; steps out of beta

Dec. 24, 2012 - PRLog -- On January 12, 2013, during a year which has been projected to be the biggest year for e-learning, six ASU students will make history.

They’ll be launching the newest online learning solution: Onvard.com, a website designed for taking the guesswork out of trying to learn a new skill for beginners. The website hopes to make self-learning easier by answering the questions every beginning learner asks – Where do I start? How do I begin? Which resources are the best to use?

Onvard provides a starting point that no other e-learning solution currently provides, drawing from the experiences of the team members’ own problems with finding quality resources. The site’s users will finally have a step-by-step collection of resources, known as a “Track” and curated by experts, which will give learners all the resources to become an expert in almost anything.

Simply put, users will spend more time learning and less time trying to navigate the expansive world wide web.

Keith Ryu, the site’s founder and a current finance and computer information systems major at Arizona State University, started building the site with his two friends, after growing frustrated trying to learn the Ruby programming language. “There was no way for us to distinguish the good resources from the bad. Even when we knew what to look for, we were forced to pick the first resources off irrelevant criteria.” Ryu elaborated.

It certainly can be a challenge to improve in any skill, but that's a challenge that shouldn't be passed up. “Online education should be free and easily accessible to everyone,” Ryu said. “Onvard bridges that gap between beginning learners and existing educational content.”

Since its beta launch in February 2012, Onvard.com has had 250 signups and generated 30 tracks, offering the best online resources in Photoshop to basketball.