North Kansas City School District Adopts NextTier Education Platform to Boost College Readiness

CHICAGO, IL--(Marketwired - Oct 25, 2016) - NextTier Education Inc. today announced it has finalized an agreement with the North Kansas City School District to provide its high schools with an advanced web- and mobile-based platform that redefines how school counselors, students and their parents navigate the college planning, search and application process.

NextTier Education is a postsecondary readiness platform that delivers critical information on every two- and four-year college in the U.S. The first platform of its kind, NextTier provides each student with a comprehensive college application plan, including a detailed list of every school's required tasks, step-by-step guidance and deadlines for completing each task in the process. The NextTier platform enables real-time, active collaboration between students, educators and parents. NextTier's database also includes information on more than 20,000 scholarships and grants, and helps students to successfully research and identify the right financial support opportunities.

Under the agreement, the NextTier cloud platform will serve approximately 6,000 students at North Kansas City, Staley, Oak Park and Winnetonka high schools. Administered by school faculty members, NextTier delivers an easy-to-follow plan for each student and allow counselors to quickly track every student's progress and provide active coaching for maximum postsecondary acceptance. NextTier enables school counselors to quickly view every student's to-do list, deadlines and status in the application process, as well as communicate directly with individual students and groups via mobile texts and email to keep them engaged, motivated and on schedule.

"North Kansas City Schools believes in the power of equipping all students to have a successful postsecondary experience," said Dr. Daniel Clemens, superintendent. "The NextTier platform is of tremendous assistance in accomplishing this goal, as it provides detailed information on all U.S. colleges and their requirements, an extensive database of scholarships and other financial support opportunities, all delivered via mobile and web technology that is most desired by today's tech savvy students. At the end of the day, NextTier will enable North Kansas City to help more students successfully find the right academic fit and secure a higher education," he said.

Dr. Clemens added that cloud-based NextTier Education requires no hardware or software investment by the school district and could be easily customized to integrate with existing technology platforms and meet the district's other unique needs.

"The complexities of preparing and applying for college acceptance can easily bog down students, their parents and even school counselors who are often hampered by high student-to-counselor ratios," said Justin Shiffman, founder and CEO of NextTier Education. "We created NextTier to provide all the information needed for all parties involved. North Kansas City can now simplify and manage the entire workflow and provide centralized communication that allows students, educators and parents to stay informed and participate throughout the process."

Following a year of in-school trials with more than 100,000 students, NextTier Education is now being actively used by school districts across the U.S. More than 80 percent of students using NextTier stated the platform is easy to use and helped them to better take ownership of the college planning and application process. The company is in discussion with multiple other school districts and expects to finalize additional agreements in the coming months.

About NextTier Education
Founded in 2014, Chicago-based Next Tier Education, Inc. is the first postsecondary readiness solution with user engagement as its top priority. NextTier helps students find the right-fit schools, navigate the process to plan and apply to schools, and identify ways to finance their investments. Additional information is available at www.nexttier.com or by calling 312.690.9996.