Kamkalima has raised $1.9M in total. We talked with Siroun Shamigian, its CEO.
PetaCrunch: How would you describe Kamkalima in a single tweet?
Siroun Shamigian: Describing Kamkalima in 280 characters? I can do that in 48: We help schools teach Arabic for tomorrow, today
PC: How did it all start and why?
SS: To keep it short, after having spent 20 years in classrooms teaching science and biology (mostly), I was assigned the position of EdTech Coordinator, where my main duty was to get the teaching staff excited to use technology in their teaching and learning, in addition to finding resources and training them. Sessions were designed based on need ranging from: “how to create my first email?” to “how to use Twitter to engage my students?”
It was during that time that I realized that there are literally zero Arabic software that teachers could use, and almost non-existent resources. So Kamkalima was conceived during one of those frustrating sessions with some of my colleagues from the Arabic Department.
And now I will shamelessly plug our most recent video, but this link will tell you all about it ? Note: It is in Arabic
PC: What have you achieved so far?
SS: We’ve tripled our team in a year’s time (from 6 to 18 members), are continuously updating and improving our product, and have grown to 8 countries offering our service to over 20,000 students and 500 teachers.
PC: What do you plan to achieve in the next 2-3 years?
SS: We want to keep growing, building a better and stronger platform for our Arabic teachers, so they can teach better, and their students can learn better. We want to be the “go-to” platform for anyone who wants to learn or improve their Arabic, regardless of where they live and how old they are.
