Microsoft Gets In The Tutoring Biz, Too

You can tell that something is trending in education land when the Big Guns go out and buy themselves a seat for that trend. Last fall, with little fanfare, Microsoft bought itself a little edu-biz called TakeLessons, which gives Microsoft a place in the online tutoring and education brokerage game.

TakeLessons was reportedly founded way back in 2006 in San Diego and has raised somewhere in the $20 million neighborhood in investments since. The model is something like Outschool, Brainly, and GoStudent. Like Outschool, TakeLessons serves as a sort of broker. Tutors sign up and students sift through the available "course options" to find something they like. "Teach what you love" says the teacher entrance page. "Flexible, affordable learning with top-rated instructors," says the main entrance page. 

Who exactly us rating these teachers? Well, that's kind of unclear. The lessons are largely focused on music, languages, and the performing arts, with some other odds and ends thrown in, including academic tutoring and culinary lessons (though the site boasts 300+ subjects to choose from). It is based in many major cities, and offers a variety of methods-- you can learn via video, online instruction, group or solo lessons, or even set up in person learning.

TakeLessons has some enthusiastic boosters and a whole bunch of unhappy former customers/gig workers (see here, here, and here), though many of those date back to the pre-Microsoft days. The complaints include trouble with a persistent link to TakeLessons on the Microsoft Edge "just opened" screen. Synergy, baby.

Microsoft has been a bit slow to seize the pandemic distance learning and tutoring wave, though LinkedIN is also trying to do a learning thing combined with what they incorporated when they acquired Lynda.com (did you forget that LinkedIN was also owned by Microsoft). There's teams, which some schools used to get through the pandemess. Folks see possibilities here.

The TakeLessons acquisition bolsters Microsoft's reach in edtech. While the company has not disclosed a specific plan for the acquisition, the synergies between Teams, which was used by 100 million students during the pandemic, and lesson provider TakeLessons are difficult to ignore.

For example, TakeLessons could provide custom learning solutions for school districts or other customers. "This acquisition is in response to the growing demand on personalized hybrid opportunities and expands our product offerings to TakeLessons consumers, a leading online learning platform," a senior executive told CNBC in an email.

Of course, that was last September when these dreams were being touted, and as yet, TakeLessons doesn't seem to be positioned to take on the high quality tutoring universe right now, and one never knows when talking about the company that brought us both Microsoft Office tools and the Zune. Lord knows we need a few more players in the tutoring biz.