What Empowered does

Empowered (legally Youth Entrepreneurs, Inc.) is a Wichita, Kansas-based nonprofit founded in 1991 that provides free educational resources, training, and community support to K-12 educators. The organization serves an installed base of more than 55,000 educators across the United States, including teachers in traditional public and private schools, charter and magnet schools, micro schools, homeschool settings, and community-based youth programs, with 19,000+ active members on its Empowered Hub platform. Its core pedagogical offering is the PMM (Principles + Markets = Mindset) framework, an experiential methodology that combines eight Foundational Principles with Real-World Markets concepts to develop growth mindset and student engagement.

The company's product portfolio is delivered through the Empowered Hub, a cloud-based platform that bundles a library of 180+ hands-on activities (categorized as Bell Ringers, Skills Development, and Capstone Projects) with the Activity Creator AI™ generative tool — built on OpenAI's ChatGPT technology — and supporting classroom management resources including Empowered Currency, Start-Up Kits, posters, and Micro Grants of up to $500 per registered educator per year. All digital resources and physical Start-Up Kits are provided at no cost to teachers. The organization also operates a collaborative teacher community (Teacher Talk), 1:1 support sessions with former-educator staff, and promotes partner programs such as PERTS Elevate (Stanford-affiliated) and the DeBruce Foundation's Agilities Framework.

Empowered's business model is donation-driven: as a 501(c)-style nonprofit and member of the Stand Together Community network, it is funded through charitable contributions routed via raisedonors.com rather than product sales or subscriptions. Go-to-market is exclusively self-serve via teachempowered.org and empoweredhub.org, with no paid acquisition channels; growth is driven by word-of-mouth referrals among teachers, organic social media (Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn), an education blog, and email newsletters. The organization has 11-50 employees and operates without a parent company, public listing, or disclosed revenue.

Name

Empowered

Legal name

Youth Entrepreneurs, Inc.

Website

https://teachempowered.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

1994

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Empowered (Youth Entrepreneurs, Inc.) is a Wichita-based nonprofit that provides free K-12 educators with a cloud platform offering 180+ experiential activities, an AI-powered lesson generator built on OpenAI, classroom tools, and a 55,000+ member teacher community, funded by donations via the Stand Together Community.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

K-12 Educational Platform

NAICS

Educational Services (611), Educational Support Services (611710), Professional and Management Development Training (611430), Elementary and Secondary Schools (6111)

SIC

Services-Educational Services (8200), Services-Prepackaged Software (7372), Miscellaneous Publishing (2741)

akta.pro primary industry

Entrepreneurship Foundations & Startup Basics (EDAMAHAA)

akta.pro secondary industries

Marketing, Branding & Sales Skills (EDAMAHAG), Financial Literacy, Budgeting & Personal Finance (EDAMAHAE), Business Planning, Pitching & Competitions (Pitch Decks, Demo Days) (EDAMAHAB)

Keywords

• K-12 teacher resources
• Experiential learning activities
• Classroom management tools
• AI lesson planning
• Nonprofit education platform

Headquarters

HQ city

Wichita

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure, Supply Chain

Revenue model

1. Donations and Charitable Support: As a nonprofit organization, Empowered is funded through donations and charitable support. The organization is a member of the Stand Together Community and accepts donations through their website (raisedonors.com/standtogether/empowered-partnership). All resources are provided to teachers at no financial cost.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion3 records

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels7 records

Core offering

Empowered (legally Youth Entrepreneurs, Inc.) is a nonprofit organization that provides K-12 teachers with a free, integrated suite of classroom resources through its Empowered Hub digital platform. Its core offerings include a library of 180+ hands-on experiential learning activities, an AI-powered Activity Creator tool built on OpenAI technology, and classroom management tools such as Empowered Currency and Start-Up Kits. All resources are unified by the proprietary PMM (Principles + Markets = Mindset) methodology and are provided at no cost to educators.

Product overview

Empowered is a nonprofit teacher support network offering a unified platform of free educational resources designed to transform K-12 classrooms through experiential, principle-based learning. The core offering centers on the Empowered Hub platform, which provides integrated access to three main product categories: (1) an Activity Library of 180+ hands-on activities categorized as Bell Ringers, Skills Development, and Capstone Projects; (2) the Activity Creator AI™ tool powered by OpenAI that generates custom lesson plans and classroom materials; and (3) Classroom Tools including Empowered Currency, Start-Up Kits, Micro Grants, and supporting resources. These are unified by the PMM (Principles + Markets = Mindset) methodology—a growth mindset approach combining eight Foundational Principles with real-world market concepts. Empowered also provides community features (55,000+ teacher community), 1:1 support sessions, and partners with PERTS for the Elevate program. All resources are provided free of charge to educators.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Empowered Hub: The primary digital platform providing free access to 180+ activities, classroom tools, AI-powered activity creator, and educator community resources.
• Activity Creator AI™

Products and services

• Activity Library
• Activity Creator AI A free AI-powered tool that instantly creates or enhances classroom learning experiences. Teachers input prompts (subject, learner level, class size, time, student needs) and receive custom lesson plans, activities, and supplemental materials. Built on OpenAI (ChatGPT) technology and used 1,000+ times by educators since launch.
• Empowered Hub A centralized online platform providing no-cost access to all Empowered resources including the activity library (180+ activities), Activity Creator AI, classroom tools, teacher resources, and community features (Teacher Talk with 19,000+ active educators). Free registration at empoweredhub.org.
• Start-Up Kits Physical resource boxes sent to registered Empowered educators containing materials and goodies to help get started with Empowered activities in the classroom. Shipped free of charge.
• Micro Grants Funding of up to $500/year available to registered Empowered educators to increase experiential learning opportunities for their students.
• 1:1 Support Sessions Personal support sessions with Empowered staff (many former educators) available via phone, text, or email. Staff help teachers with getting started, going deeper with PMM strategy, or finding specific resources. Free of charge.
• Teacher Community (Teacher Talk) A collaborative community of 55,000+ educators representing every subject and grade level across various learning environments. Teachers share ideas, inspiration, resources, and support through the Empowered Hub and social channels.
• Free Substitute Teacher Folder Free grab-and-go activities to help students stay engaged and build life skills when the regular teacher is away. Available by email subscription as an incentive.

Quantifiable outcome

• 55,000+ educators using Empowered's instructional strategy and tools
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers10 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration1 record

AI capability2 records

Feature5 records

Partnerships

Four partnerships are on record, tiered core and secondary.

• PERTS (Project for Educational Research That Scales)coreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2024PERTS, created at Stanford University in 2010, partners with Empowered to offer Elevate program helping teachers in grades 6-12 create learning conditions that boost student engagement. During 2023-24 school year, Elevate was implemented by 2,300 educators and 63,000 students in 271 schools across 94 districts. Empowered promotes PERTS resources to their educator community.
• Stand Together CommunitycoreOthersEmpowered is a proud member of the Stand Together Community, a network of organizations working to empower individuals and strengthen communities. Stand Together provides organizational support, infrastructure, and shared values around personal empowerment and opportunity creation.
• DeBruce FoundationsecondaryStrategic or Co-development PartnerDeBruce Foundation offers the Agilities Framework and Agile Work Profiler tools which Empowered promotes to teachers as complementary resources for exploring student opportunity paths. This partnership extends Empowered's ability to help students with self-awareness and career preparation.
• OpenAIcoreTechnology or IntegrationEmpowered's Activity Creator AI tool is built on OpenAI's ChatGPT technology. Teachers using the tool are subject to OpenAI's Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. OpenAI provides the underlying AI capabilities that power the activity generation feature.

Scale indicators6 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights6 records

Direct peers

• Curriki: Nonprofit providing free, peer-reviewed K-12 open educational resources and a teacher community. Comparable nonprofit model and free OER content library for educators.
• Nearpod: K-12 engagement platform with interactive lessons, activities, and AI authoring tools. Comparable in delivering classroom-ready activities and teacher lesson-creation tooling.
• Newsela: K-12 instructional content platform with leveled texts and teacher tools. Comparable to Empowered's content library and teacher workflow orientation, with a freemium/school-license model.
• Edutopia (George Lucas Educational Foundation): Nonprofit publishing free K-12 teaching strategies, lesson ideas, and educator community content. Directly comparable to Empowered's experiential-learning content and community-driven model.
• DonorsChoose: Nonprofit funding K-12 teacher classroom resource requests. Comparable to Empowered in connecting donations to free teacher resources and serving the same K-12 educator segment.
• Khan Academy: Nonprofit providing free K-12 educational content and AI-powered tutoring/lesson tools (Khanmigo). Closest comparable to Empowered's free model, AI-driven teacher support, and broad K-12 educator reach.
• Common Sense Education: Nonprofit providing free K-12 digital citizenship, SEL, and edtech review resources to teachers. Comparable nonprofit positioning and free teacher resource distribution approach.

Broad incumbents

• PBS LearningMedia: Free K-12 digital media resources for educators from PBS. Comparable as a free, well-funded nonprofit providing K-12 instructional content and tools to teachers.
• ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education): Established nonprofit serving K-12 educators with professional development, standards, and a community network. Comparable in serving the K-12 educator professional development and community segment.

Emerging players

• MagicSchool AI: AI platform for K-12 teachers to generate lesson plans, activities, and assessments. Closest emerging competitor in the AI-powered teacher lesson-creation category that Empowered's Activity Creator AI occupies.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/teachempowered
• Facebookfacebook.com/TeachersEmpowered
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/teach-empowered
• Instagraminstagram.com/teachersempowered

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Empowered