Transforming the way we learn languages with Culturestride
During a university exchange in Shanghai, Michael became business-proficient in Mandarin in just 10 months. Inspired by the experience, he sought to replicate the model with his new startup, Culturestride.
Culturestride is a platform that provides 1:1 access to top language teachers who are native speakers in China. Founded on principles of authenticity and cultural immersion, Culturestride enhances language learning by contextualising the concepts taught in Chinese culture.
We had a chat with Michael about his experience in building Culturestride. Stick to the end to access an exclusive offer as part of our readership!
What led you to start Culturestride?
I’ve always had a strong interest in learning Chinese, having studied the language for 5 years throughout high school. For those unfamiliar, HSK is an international standardised Chinese language test that measures the ability of non-native Chinese speakers to speak Chinese, ranking proficiency from HSK 1 ‘Beginner’ to 6 as ‘Advanced.’
In those 5 years, I managed to reach HSK 2. This wasn’t a great outcome considering the time I spent learning Chinese. In comparison, I was able to reach business-level proficiency in Chinese during my 10-month exchange in Shanghai. It spurred me to start thinking about the opportunity to improve the language learning process more broadly.
There were two key insights I recognised that supercharged my learning experience:
- Having a native Chinese speaker as a teacher who knows the ins and outs of the language and demonstrates how it operates within Chinese culture and context made the learning experience more enjoyable.
- Language relies on talking to people. 1:1 sessions provide more opportunity to practice as opposed to learning in larger groups.
These insights are what led me to launch this company alongside my co-founder, who was my Chinese teacher in Shanghai!
What were some key challenges in launching Culturestride?
It wasn’t until the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic that I decided to take a leap of faith and pursue Culturestride full-time.
While the company is still relatively young, I found that the most difficult part of the journey was starting. I initially spent 3–4 hours a week building Culturestride, fearing to take the extra step to fully commit to its success. I believe a lot of people overestimate the downside of startups and pursuing your own ideas, when realistically our worst-case scenario isn’t all that bad. I considered my worst-case scenario of possible failure and realised that it was to continue living at home with my parents. I even did an experiment where I tried to live on as little money as possible and discovered that my cost of living could be dropped down to $400 a month whilst maintaining some standard of life. That made me realise that my runway to bring this idea to success was much longer than I thought.
Do you have any advice for students looking to start their own entrepreneurial venture?
It sounds corny, but my advice would be to just get started. As a student, you have two important tools under your belt. One is time, the second is a heightened ability to harbour more risk than any other period in your life.
When contemplating the cons, you might consider the loss of time and a bit of capital, but it doesn’t nearly outweigh the learnings you’ll gain. Lessons of understanding on your working style, improving your business acumen, how to sell and a larger network — all of which are upsides to the experience that differentiate you as a professional.
What does the future of Culturestride look like?
Right now, our top priority is to iterate and perfect our product. We strive to provide as many users as possible the ability to learn Chinese by being immersed in its culture. This entire learning experience will continue to be supported by high-quality teaching with native teachers.
More than ever, the argument for learning language to break down cultural barriers and build empathy is extremely compelling. This could bridge the gap between our misconceptions of different backgrounds, eliminate racism and promote diversity and inclusion amongst all.
- Keep up with Michael here.
- Interested in learning more about Culturestride? As a valued Textbook Ventures reader, Culturestride is offering a 10% off lifetime fee reduction for every new sign up — click here to redeem this offer.
Check out more stories like this at Textbook Ventures’ Medium publication.
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