A revolutionary new tech college, Make School, is offering students the option of free tuition and $1,500 a month living expenses on the condition that they sign an Income Share Agreement. Under the ISA students will pay for their tuition only after they are hired. This business model creates a culture where the school has a vested interest in the student succeeding in the real world as quickly as possible.
Since this is a business and not a charity, there is a huge potential upside for Make School if the student does well. Under the ISA the student agrees to pay back as much as 20% of their gross salary for up to five years.
Jeremy Rossmann, co-founder of Make School, discussed the institutions’ unique student success focused business model on Fox Business:
School Transfers Risk Away From Student to Make School
A lot of it is about transferring the risk away from the student into us to hold the institution accountable. It’s the right thing to do and it’s really good for our culture. It keeps us focused on student success and making sure that students are getting the careers they want after graduation.
We monetize it because our students are successful. We do a great job of preparing them for hiring in careers in tech and they go on to work in jobs that pay them good salaries and they pay us back. We had a student just this week get a job offer from Google actually.
Companies Across Sectors Are Hiring Software Engineers
We’re seeing hiring with the usual suspects of course; Facebook, Google, Apple, Tesla. They’ve hired out of our program. A lot of medium and small startups have as well. The common trend that we are seeing is that all companies are becoming tech companies. Companies need to have a digital presence. They need to have digital products to accompany offerings.
Companies across sectors are hiring software engineers. Those software engineers are being sought after to create products that are ultimately the kind of products that we are training our students to build. That’s the kind of jobs we are filling and we are seeing a huge shortage of in that area and a lot of appetite for our graduates.
Our Business Model Can Absolutely Work
I think it is a business model that can absolutely work. We are not charitably funded. We are privately funded. If you do it right and your institution is delivering on the promise that it has made then this is both good for the student and offsets a lot of the risk that they are taking in traditional colleges and it’s good for the school.
The school can actually be sustainable with this model. We’ve seen that play out as the students have gotten employed. I don’t think it has to be a charitable model. It absolutely can be done with a good return on investment for both the school and the student and the investors.