Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired • Hacker News Board

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#21

Post by kevintxwu » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 6:52 PM UTC

CameronBanga wrote: post #19

kevintxwu wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. In the contract, students agree to something called a Tax Information Authorization ( https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/about-form-8821-tax-informati... ) to allow us to view their tax information to verify payments if necessary. This is fairly standard practice for income share agreements. 2. Same answer as question 1. Also, just to add to this, most students are pretty honest since we're likely to be friends at the…

For #4, are you taking 7% of the students total income, or total income received from the job you got them hired to?

If they have side income, we currently write them some custom terms to exclude it so it's only for the actual job.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#22

Post by lev99 » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 6:52 PM UTC

marclave wrote: post #4

Cool idea, my university has a stellar co-op program for Engineering and Computer Science students, and other universities in Canada do as well (Waterloo, UBC, etc.) and I am curious as to what differs you from universities that have these co-op programs because co-op is mandatory at UVic and Waterloo and has helped fund my way alongside many other engineering students ways through their degree. Also 7% of first year…

> Also 7% of first year salary seems steep

The real long term benefit is if using the service results in a better entry level position. A person starting a career developing on Win32 will have a significantly different career than someone starting a career in React Native. If Pathrise leads to an increase in job offers (quantity of offers) and an increase in the type of job offers (diversity of projects types) than they can be worth the 7% even if the initial pay is equal because it will give the recent grad more options in choosing their path.

There is a lack of job hunting skills among recent CS and CE students, and there is a potential customer base. If I were looking to invest in Pathrise I would specifically be interested in how they plan on targeting students that have tried and failed in the job market and filtering which students failed because of a lack of job hunting skills and which failed because of a lack of technical skills. Graduates they have tried and failed in the job market are the ones that should see the most benefit from this service.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#23

Post by radix07 » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 6:53 PM UTC

I really like this concept for college tuition or for funding people who haven't already gotten a degree. However if just focusing on soon-to-be/recent graduates, I don't get why a student would be motivated enough to use your service with a non-trivial fee over going to a university provided one that they have already essentially paid for.

Even going to a state college, the schools are still quite driven to have very high job placement statistics, and the career services offered were quite helpful if you took the effort to go.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#24

Post by _m8fo » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 6:54 PM UTC

kevintxwu wrote: post #20

_m8fo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. In the contract, students agree to something called a Tax Information Authorization ( https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/about-form-8821-tax-informati... ) to allow us to view their tax information to verify payments if necessary. This is fairly standard practice for income share agreements. 2. Same answer as question 1. Also, just to add to this, most students are pretty honest since we're likely to be friends at the…

Though an income share agreement is not a loan. It will still affect a student's credit adversely if they default on it. We're actually transferring the management of the income share agreements to a third party company that's built a software platform for this that directly uses ACH. So with that combination, hopefully we never have to sue anybody ever about anything! Seems like a terrible experience.

> We're actually transferring the management of the income share agreements to a third party company that's built a software platform for this that directly uses ACH.

Care to share the third party?

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#25

Post by austenallred » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 6:55 PM UTC

radix07 wrote: post #23

I really like this concept for college tuition or for funding people who haven't already gotten a degree. However if just focusing on soon-to-be/recent graduates, I don't get why a student would be motivated enough to use your service with a non-trivial fee over going to a university provided one that they have already essentially paid for. Even going to a state college, the schools are still quite driven to have ver…

> I really like this concept for college tuition or for funding people who haven't already gotten a degree

Something like https://lambdaschool.com? (YC S17)

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#26

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 6:57 PM UTC

kevintxwu wrote: post #20

_m8fo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. In the contract, students agree to something called a Tax Information Authorization ( https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/about-form-8821-tax-informati... ) to allow us to view their tax information to verify payments if necessary. This is fairly standard practice for income share agreements. 2. Same answer as question 1. Also, just to add to this, most students are pretty honest since we're likely to be friends at the…

Though an income share agreement is not a loan. It will still affect a student's credit adversely if they default on it. We're actually transferring the management of the income share agreements to a third party company that's built a software platform for this that directly uses ACH. So with that combination, hopefully we never have to sue anybody ever about anything! Seems like a terrible experience.

[deleted]

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#27

Post by kevintxwu » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 6:57 PM UTC

_m8fo wrote: post #24

kevintxwu wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Though an income share agreement is not a loan. It will still affect a student's credit adversely if they default on it. We're actually transferring the management of the income share agreements to a third party company that's built a software platform for this that directly uses ACH. So with that combination, hopefully we never have to sue anybody ever about anything! Seems like a terrible experience.

> We're actually transferring the management of the income share agreements to a third party company that's built a software platform for this that directly uses ACH. Care to share the third party?

Here ya go: https://leif.org/

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#28

Post by austenallred » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 7:04 PM UTC

_m8fo wrote: post #24

kevintxwu wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Though an income share agreement is not a loan. It will still affect a student's credit adversely if they default on it. We're actually transferring the management of the income share agreements to a third party company that's built a software platform for this that directly uses ACH. So with that combination, hopefully we never have to sue anybody ever about anything! Seems like a terrible experience.

> We're actually transferring the management of the income share agreements to a third party company that's built a software platform for this that directly uses ACH. Care to share the third party?

Vemo is another popular vendor in the income share agreement space

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#29

Post by ISL » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 7:10 PM UTC

kevintxwu wrote: post #18

robocat wrote: post #11

> because we have aligned incentives [with our students] - we only make money if they do. If you sign up all students and do nothing further, you still get your 7%. That is not aligned. To align incentives you would have to align the students payments with how much you improved their outcomes - much harder to do of course. I think your model has the same risks as real estate commissions where the selling agent is hig…

I think that you have some good points here that we've actually debated internally quite a bit. First, I would say the program is designed so that we commit a specific amount of time and resources per student, so we're motivated to work on their behalf to recover that investment that we make for free. As for the risk of trying to sell quickly rather than looking for quality, I think the most effective way we can tack…

Students are generally informed in writing about the impacts of student loans, but they sometimes regard loan providers as predatory once the loans come due.

There is a chance here for both the student and Pathrise to benefit from working together, but the social interaction (and understanding that students sometimes make life-choices that they later regret) must be navigated with a deft touch.

An up-front payment for Pathrise's services, assuming that they work, would appear to avoid any future sadness; the student could finance the interaction with an outside financier. Coupling the financing directly to the service may cast an unwarranted shadow upon an effective job-placement service.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#30

Post by kevintxwu » Wed, Mar 14, 2018, 7:26 PM UTC

ISL wrote: post #29

kevintxwu wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that you have some good points here that we've actually debated internally quite a bit. First, I would say the program is designed so that we commit a specific amount of time and resources per student, so we're motivated to work on their behalf to recover that investment that we make for free. As for the risk of trying to sell quickly rather than looking for quality, I think the most effective way we can tack…

Students are generally informed in writing about the impacts of student loans, but they sometimes regard loan providers as predatory once the loans come due. There is a chance here for both the student and Pathrise to benefit from working together, but the social interaction (and understanding that students sometimes make life-choices that they later regret) must be navigated with a deft touch. An up-front payment fo…

Yea, we definitely have to be sensitive about offering financing options directly to students.

One of the ways we handle this now is we actually ask the students to consult their family before signing anything. We also allow the students to still drop out of the program at no liability within the first two weeks.

The problem with upfront payment is that we are no longer held accountable by aligned incentives. The most predatory thing about student loans is that you still owe the same amount of money regardless of your outcome. I think our income share agreement is designed to be much safer since in almost every case where you pay anything you are also capable of paying it.

For students in exceptional situations, we'll even waive their dues or retro-actively offer financial aid since we didn't design the program to be a future burden. The way we see it, helping out a student in need in any way pays back tenfold in terms of reputation later.