What ExcellenceK12 does

ExcellenceK12 is a privately held, founder-led professional services firm headquartered in Blue Springs, Missouri, that delivers survey research, strategic planning, communications, and perception management services to K-12 public school districts, primarily in Kansas, Missouri, and the broader Midwest. The firm is built around a small six-person team led by founder Rick Nobles (45 years of communications experience, including 17 years with public school districts) and President Jaret Tomlinson, EdD (20+ years as a Missouri school district administrator who passed four bond/levy elections and procured over $100M in facility upgrades), positioning the company as a practitioner-led alternative to generalist political and communications consultancies.

The core technology stack combines traditional statistically reliable telephone survey methodologies with a suite of digital delivery tools: interactive Survey Digital Dashboards that replace 50-150 page written reports with filterable visualizations, the Virtual Citizens Advisory Committee (VCAC) for bimonthly online stakeholder engagement, a cascading online survey methodology for strategic planning that reaches staff, students, parents, and the general population, and the Perception Management Dashboard that rates sentiment of Facebook and Twitter posts about districts and delivers weekly communication adjustment recommendations. Survey instruments are anchored to questions developed with the American Institutes for Research for the Department of Education.

The business model is professional services delivered through direct sales to superintendents and school boards, with pricing ranging from inexpensive State-of-the-District pulse surveys on a sliding scale, to $5,000-$35,000 strategic planning engagements priced on student enrollment, to outcome-based contingency marketing plans where the firm is paid only as a small percentage of new tax dollars if a client bond election passes. Reported performance metrics include a 97% ballot-passage success rate for clients that follow recommendations, 96%+ predictive accuracy on ballot outcomes, and over $7 billion raised for K-12 clients across the team's history. Distribution is regional and relationship-driven, supported by content marketing (blog, LinkedIn, newsletter) and conference presence, with no external venture or private equity capital and no disclosed expansion beyond the Midwest.

Name

ExcellenceK12

Legal name

ExcellenceK12

Website

https://excellencek12.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2019

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

ExcellenceK12 provides survey research, strategic planning, communications, and perception management services to K-12 public school districts, primarily in Kansas, Missouri, and the broader Midwest, led by a six-person practitioner team.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

K-12 Education Consulting

NAICS

Educational Support Services (611710), Educational Services (611)

SIC

Services-Educational Services (8200), Services-Engineering, Accounting, Research, Management (8700)

akta.pro primary industry

Assessment, Testing & Analytics Platforms (Formative/Summative) (EDAJAMAC)

Keywords

• K12 education research
• School district surveys
• Bond election consulting
• Strategic planning services
• Perception management

Headquarters

HQ city

Blue Springs

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Survey Services: Pre-election surveys, post-loss election surveys, climate and culture studies, exit surveys, annual community surveys, state-of-the-district surveys. Revenue generated through per-project fees for survey design, deployment, and analysis.
2. Strategic Planning Services: Virtual strategic planning engagements using cascading online surveys to involve stakeholders. Costs on sliding scale based on student enrollment, ranging from $5,000 to $35,000.
3. Contingency Marketing Plan: Full-service campaign where ExcellenceK12 only receives payment if the bond election passes. Takes small percentage of new tax dollars when client wins.
4. Communications Services: Communications audits, messaging strategy, campaign materials development, ongoing advisory services.
5. Training Services: Training programs for school district staff on perception management and communications.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels5 records

Core offering

ExcellenceK12 provides survey research, strategic planning, communications, and leadership training services to K-12 public school districts. Core offerings include phone and online surveys (pre-election, post-loss, climate and culture, exit, community, state-of-the-district), virtual strategic planning engagements, contingency-based bond campaign support, communications audits, and proprietary digital dashboards that translate stakeholder perception data into actionable insight for superintendents and school boards.

Product overview

ExcellenceK12 is a survey and perception management services company offering a comprehensive suite of research-based products for K-12 school districts. The core offerings include various survey types (Phone/Online Surveys, Pre-election Surveys, Post-loss Election Surveys, Climate/Culture Studies, Exit Surveys, Annual Community Surveys, and State-of-the-District Surveys) combined with strategic planning and communications services. Key modules include the Perception Management Dashboard for social media sentiment tracking, Survey Digital Dashboards for data visualization, Virtual Citizens Advisory Committee (VCAC) for ongoing patron engagement, and the Contingency Marketing Plan for guaranteed bond issue support. All services are delivered as professional consulting engagements rather than a self-service software platform.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Phone and Online Surveys Data collection services using statistically reliable telephone surveys and online surveys for school districts to gather stakeholder insights about district perceptions.
• Pre-election Survey Telephone survey helping districts understand patron perceptions, ballot proposal preferences, and tax tolerance before going to the ballot box.
• Post-loss Election Survey Telephone survey of voters conducted after a failed election to analyze why the election was lost and determine next steps.
• Climate and Culture Study Deep-dive survey assessing leadership performance, staff performance, building atmosphere, substance abuse, discipline, technology and more, consisting of four separate surveys for staff, students, parents, and community.
• Exit Survey Survey for departing employees to gather data on their experiences and provide benchmarking indexes comparing districts to similar institutions.
• Annual Community Survey Yearly survey allowing districts to collect longitudinal data revealing trends in patron perception, including grading sections, statement exercises, and communications questions.
• State-of-the-District (SOTD) Survey Quick pulse-check survey using a grading approach for four audiences (community, parents, staff, high school students) with up to 20 questions addressing various district topics.
• Contingency Marketing Plan Win-now-pay-later service guaranteeing bond issue passage, including phone survey, online surveys, campaign execution, and materials printing, with payment contingent on success.
• Strategic Planning Virtual strategic planning using cascading online surveys to reach various target audiences, designed to create a user-friendly roadmap for district direction over five years.
• Virtual Citizens Advisory Committee (VCAC) Bimonthly online surveys deployed to interested participants during the school year, providing ongoing communication and feedback for superintendents.
• Communications Audit Assessment including telephone interviews with key opinion leaders, one-on-one interviews with district leaders, online surveys for stakeholders, and content review to determine communications effectiveness.
• Training Services Training programs for school district staff on perception management and communications.

Quantifiable outcome

• 97% success rate at ballot box when clients follow recommended steps
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers12 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Four partnerships are on record, tiered minor.

• St. Jude Children's Research HospitalminorOthersExcellenceK12 supports St. Jude Children's Research Hospital as part of their corporate charitable giving. The hospital leads the fight against childhood cancer and other life-threatening diseases.
• Junior Achievement of Greater Kansas CityminorOthersExcellenceK12 supports Junior Achievement of Greater Kansas City, which inspires and prepares young people for economic success through programs in financial literacy, work readiness, and entrepreneurship.
• American Diabetes AssociationminorOthersExcellenceK12 supports the American Diabetes Association which fights to prevent and cure diabetes and improve lives through research, education, advocacy, and community programs.
• American Cancer SocietyminorOthersExcellenceK12 supports the American Cancer Society which works to end cancer through research funding, patient support, prevention promotion, and advocacy.

Scale indicators10 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Studer Education: Studer Education partners with K-12 districts on organizational improvement, leadership pipelines, and strategic execution — overlapping with ExcellenceK12's strategic planning, leadership training, and superintendent-facing advisory engagements.
• ECRA Group: ECRA Group provides data analytics, assessment, and growth/research services specifically for K-12 districts, including longitudinal data and benchmarking — comparable to ExcellenceK12's survey-based analytics, exit-survey benchmarking indexes, and longitudinal community tracking.
• McREL International: McREL International provides K-12 research, evaluation, and consulting services to districts and state education agencies — directly comparable to ExcellenceK12's survey research, climate/culture studies, and strategic-planning engagements serving superintendent and board buyers.
• K12 Insight: K12 Insight provides K-12-specific perception research, community surveys, and stakeholder engagement services for school districts — directly overlapping with ExcellenceK12's phone/online surveys, climate studies, and patron-perception dashboards, serving the same superintendent/board buyer.

Others

• Marzano Resources: Marzano Resources delivers K-12 professional development, training, and instructional leadership programs — adjacent to ExcellenceK12's training services and leadership-development offerings for district staff, though focused on pedagogy rather than perception.
• Solution Tree: Solution Tree provides K-12 professional learning, books, and conferences on school improvement and leadership — thematically adjacent to ExcellenceK12's training and strategic planning work, and addressing a similar district-level buyer though via PD rather than perception research.

Emerging players

• Smore: Smore provides district- and teacher-facing newsletter and communications tools adopted by many K-12 schools — an emerging player that overlaps with ExcellenceK12's communications audit and messaging strategy work, though focused on tactical communications rather than perception research.

Broad incumbents

• Frontline Education: Frontline Education is a large K-12 administration software platform spanning HR, student information systems, and district operations — a broader incumbent that intersects ExcellenceK12's territory on district-level strategic planning, communications, and administrative workflow tooling.
• Hanover Research: Hanover Research is a large subscription research provider serving education (including K-12), government, and healthcare clients with custom surveys, benchmarking, and strategic insights — a broader incumbent that competes for district research budgets with overlapping survey and strategic-planning offerings.
• SchoolMessenger (Intrado): SchoolMessenger, part of Intrado, is a large-scale K-12 parent communications, messaging, and notification platform — comparable to ExcellenceK12's communications services and perception management offerings but at significantly greater scale and as a broader incumbent.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/excellencek12

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles6 records

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 ExcellenceK12