Success stories

Polina Hlushchenko, 21, from Ukraine, was frustrated with her choice of IT course of study and decided to re-qualify as a teacher and exam coach. After working for several years, she decided to start her own education business online. Polina had the idea to combine the benefits of online courses with the current skills in her Skills for Future school when the lockdown started and everyone went online. According to Polina, her school will be run as an online platform (a website and an application for mobile devices distributed through Play Market and AppStore). The school's focus is on IT, as the demand for IT education is constantly growing, while the supply is not enough. Neringa Narsaite-Pitkauskiene, is an experienced entrepreneur who focuses on start-ups and international projects and has extensive experience in media and advertising. She was the perfect match for Polina, whose main problem was marketing research and planning. They decided to build an exchange together to trade useful skills and knowledge. 

Polina and Neringa worked together for almost 2 months. Their collaboration started at Surf Camp (Klaipeda), where Polina was invited by Neringa. It was a great opportunity to learn more about startups, meet entrepreneurs working in education and refine the business plan with the help of the host entrepreneur. Polina was then able to conduct market research, develop her product and design the advertising campaign. Polina explains that thanks to the exchange she was able to improve her business strategy, gained an understanding of what proper market research is and how it can help develop an advertising campaign, and gained valuable insights that she will use in developing her education business. Neringa comments that participating as a host entrepreneur has allowed her to develop her mentoring skills, see how her business can benefit from digital innovation and gain interesting insights into education services.

Polina's company is still in development, but she has no plans to stop. Thanks to the exchange, which was really fruitful and productive, she now has a clear idea of how to achieve her goals. Participating in the Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs programme has brought Polina even more than she had originally planned, as she has had the opportunity to meet many business experts, interact with educational start-up teams and be mentored by a very attentive and determined host entrepreneur. Moreover, Polina and Neringa believe that they could have some joint projects in the future.