The Tools Competition is an open funding opportunity that supports cutting-edge technology solutions for the most pressing challenges facing learners. The competition is now in its fourth year and was created by The Learning Agency and Georgia State University with core support from Schmidt Futures.

For the 2023–24 competition, Calbright, a community college in California, and Axim Collaborative jointly launched a postsecondary track. This track will focus on solutions that target adult learners in need of innovative alternatives to residential full-time programs so that they can benefit from a credential or degree that improves their social and economic mobility. Axim aims to catalyze new ideas and organizations that uniquely focus on the pressing needs of these underserved learners.

The Tools Competition attracts hundreds of applications and connects technology innovators with researcher partners and institutions. All applicants, not just the winning teams, receive feedback and access to learning opportunities that help them further develop their solutions, track their impact, and prepare for scale. In addition, Calbright will offer teams an opportunity to test their solutions in the context of an online community college, and Axim will look for opportunities to connect innovators with the Open edX platform and broad access institutions who could most benefit.

The competition will generate a large number of new solutions, expand Axim’s network of partners working with AI, and will direct funding towards solutions that best address the pressing needs of broad access institutions and their learners. Axim and Calbright will work together to ensure the focus of solutions on equitable student outcomes.