Dear Friends,
We are excited to share with you that Sterling Partners’ Education Opportunity Fund (EOF) has invested in Reading Plus®, an adaptive literacy intervention and practice tool for grades 3-12. Our partnership will enable Reading Plus to expand its best-in-class customer success operations, explore technology enhancements, and further develop its sales and marketing functions. You can read more about the partnership here.
This marks EOF’s sixth investment for the fund. Our team is deliberate about the companies and leaders we partner with to advance learning and career opportunities. We are excited to work with company founder Mark Taylor and his team to ensure their best-in-class product reaches its full potential for growth and impact in the United States and abroad.
Mark developed the product with guidance from a team of leading reading researchers. The Reading Plus assessment and instructional model improve reading comprehension, reading efficiency, as well as student motivation for reading. It is the first—and only—program to assess and address all three domains of reading proficiency.
With the close of the partnership, Mark will move to the new role of Executive Chairman of the Board, where he will continue to provide counsel on strategy. Steven Guttentag, Ph.D., will assume the role of Chief Executive Officer. Dr. Guttentag, who has extensive experience as an educator, school administrator, and operator in the K12 space, was most recently President of Pearson’s Online and Blended Learning Division. Previously, he was the co-founder of Connections Academy, which was sold to Pearson.
Please direct any interesting investment opportunities to the EOF deal team.