Parsimony
Parsimony helps small businesses and organizations make better use of their data to improve efficiency, increase profits, and drive growth.
Tell us the story of how and why you started your company.
After getting his Ph.D. in Educational Psychology at the University of Minnesota, Amanuel Medhanie began his career working in the Research, Evaluation, and Assessment department at Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS). There he discovered that K-12 educational institutions are under increased pressure to do more with less. But with a complex web of tutoring services, after school programs, community based programs, computer assisted learning software, and other programs students are exposed to, how do they know which resources are actually moving the needle? School districts like MPS have the internal capacity to evaluate many of their programs. However, a typical district lacks this internal capacity, so they either don't evaluate their programs or they hire external evaluators, which can be expensive and time consuming. That's why Parsimony set out to provide an inexpensive and quick alternative for school districts so that they can make informed decisions about how to use their limited resources to make the biggest possible impact on their students.
What's your most recent success or milestone hit?
Parsimony double it's staff in May of 2018 (from one to two people) when it hired Jordan Baker, another data scientist who shares Parsimony's vision for helping school districts navigate the complex world of using data to inform their practices.
Where do you see your startup in 1 year?
Within a year, Parsimony plans to serve five school districts by providing them with accurate and timely insights into the impact that their various initiatives are having on student outcomes.
