LONDON, October 17, 2014 /PRNewswire/ --

TES Global - the largest network of teachers in the world with over six million registered teachers - has launched a new online community where teachers and start-ups can develop effective edtech products together. TES Labs (http://www.tes.co.uk/labs) will enable the most important people in education - teachers - to share their ideas and expertise with entrepreneurs, so that they can build more effective and relevant learning technologies.

On the site, start-ups ask teachers from all over the world for feedback on their products and usage through short weekly surveys, which are automatically matched up to registered teachers based on their profiles. The start-ups will then be able to act on the advice they are given, while teachers will be entered into regular TES Labs prize draws - which more active teachers are more likely to win.

Initially, TES Labs will comprise nine start-ups working in partnership with our incubator partners Emerge Education (http://emerge.education) in the UK and the Education Design Studio (EDSi - http://nestcentral.org/edsi) in Pennsylvania.

Company Quotes and Insights 

"We believe that there is a missing link in the development of education technology" said Louise Rogers, CEO of TES Global. "Many edtech start-ups fail to gain traction for one key reason - they don't ask teachers what they think. TES Labs is a place where start-ups can completely engage with their most important audience, teachers, and ask for their honest opinions. As a result, not only will start-ups save time, but they will be able to focus on the real value of what they are building - while teachers will have a hand in the development of products that they really want to use."

About TES Global 

TES Global's story is an extraordinary one: its digital community on TES Connect is one of the fastest growing of any profession globally, and it boasts a 100-year heritage at the centre of the teaching and education community with offices in London, Washington, San Francisco and Sydney. Today, TES Global's online platforms host the largest network of teachers in the world with over six million teacher members in 197 countries across the globe. Nearly 5 million resources are downloaded from the site every week, at an average of 7 every second. Last year over 800,000 registered users from the UK downloaded at least one teaching resource. For more information, visit: http://www.tesconnect.com/

SOURCE TES Global