Shop Small Shop KP: A History of a Super Small Business with a Loud Bark
Did you know KP Education Systems is a very small business?
KP was completely bootstrapped with no outside investors, allowing us to make decisions that benefit our audience, the students, and teachers. We were founded based on our ideals to create something outside of the box and to continue innovating as the technology landscape changes. Using the latest research in learning, motivation, and cognitive retention, KP was born.
Birth of a New Idea
Not many know this but KP started in 1997 by 3 crazy guys. An industry trained chef educator and trainer, a restaurateur with the crazy idea that people can learn cooking from computers, and a geek who wanted to get out of his family’s Chinese restaurant business but ended up in the same industry! How ironic is that? You end up in an area you know best!
We started because we thought we could produce something better than what was currently being produced by big publishers and VHS videos with a focus on education quality. Hence KP was born.
10 Years of Production
KP was an overnight success, I WISH! It was actually a marathon that took many years, lots of blood, sweat and tears, personal sacrifice, and corn dogs (just ask Denise Baxter about that story). We incrementally grew the content and technology over time as we grew our customer base.
Early Years, 1999-2003
Our first version of the program was called The Sous Chef (because we are your Sous Chef, here to help you). It was such a huge and powerful program we were shipping all orders with a computer and a monitor from 1999 - 2003 because back then why would a FACS/Culinary program need a computer, all they need are stoves! LOL. Those were interesting times. Buy the software, get a PC, what a deal! We were the most innovative idea in education at the time.
A Focus on the Student Experience: Building our own LcMS
Our early days we were an in-class resource that helped teachers but as we grew our focus shifted to the student. Looking at the vast landscape of Learning Management Systems we recognized a fundamental flaw in all of them, they were all teacher-centric, the end-user focused on making the teacher’s lives easier sacrificing the student experience. You probably experienced this yourself in college.
Since there wasn’t any existing technology that fit our desire we did the next best thing, we created our own. By creating a LcMS, Learning Content Management System, from the ground up, we were allowed to make decisions that affect our end user, the student. After 3 years of development, KP Compass was born.
KP Are All Gamers
Yes, in addition to being programmers we are all avid video gamers. I would say that I probably have a Ph.D. in video games considering how much time I spent playing games in my life. We asked ourselves how can we make curriculum more engaging but not create a video game. The key is to not create a video game for many reasons but the most important is that if you do, it would be compared to other video games and deemed corny. What we did was create a challenging and engaging mastery system that adapts to each student using AI. Using the psychological cues that make video games addicting, we can simulate much of that.
I go into an in-depth analysis in the talks I give at conferences. If you are interested in learning more, watch this engaging and fun hour-long talk I gave at SREB. This will help you understand your students/children.
Looking to the Future: Relentless Innovation
KP is a new small business with big dreams. Have you ever purchased something with the feeling that it was created 20 years ago and hasn’t been improved? We never stop innovating, we are never satisfied with what we have and we will continue to push the envelope and challenge learning. As we grow our customers, serving hundreds of thousands of students, we will make learning more engaging and relevant. This summer we will be rolling out some amazing new features to help enhance online and hybrid/blended learning models for this fall.
Embrace the Crazy
As usual, if you have a crazy idea, we are all ears, we embrace crazy. Share your idea no matter how ridiculous it is, believe me, we’ve created some awesome innovations from a crazy idea.
Reimagining Math Education: A Really Crazy Idea
Did you know KP recently got into math education? Why would a culinary company get into math? Why would anyone get into math education since it’s already saturated with every gimmick out there with very little gain, that’s the truth, learning math using computers is only marginally more effective than traditional education (believe me I read dozens of papers), which is not the definition of innovation. It gets worse, the gains are only seen in students who are already good at math, leaving the 70% who aren’t good showing a decline in grades. It starts during the formidable years, 1st through 4th grade where your academic identity is defined.
Why now? Well someone came up with a crazy idea to turn math into a team exercise. The results are showing that at-risk youths anywhere from 4th -12 are getting to standard in 1 YEAR! Yes, you heard correctly, we can get kids who gave up on math to standard in 1 academic year. This is done using multiple research theories that motivate students to practice and answer over 300 problems correctly in 15 minutes. Want to learn more, check out our website www.fluintcy.com
If you really want to learn the science behind Fluintcy here’s our 1-hour presentation on the phenomena. https://youtu.be/QiRxrw2p6bU You will stand and cheer at the end!
Support Innovation
Thank you again for your patronage and support. Know that your contributions will help further education technology. We wouldn't be here without the support we have had over the past 2 decades and we are looking forward to another 20 years of changing the landscape of education.
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