Sometimes, you have to spice up your pitch to get your tunes to truly hum.
That’s what Karyn Scott thought as she was operating her nonprofit, Kids in a New Groove. The former Travis County prosecutor had spent time in felony court, working criminal cases, including murder, and she found her own song in juvenile court working with children in foster care.
That experience encouraged her to become a CASA volunteer, in addition to her side hustle managing bands around Austin. Ultimately, she combined those passions when she started Kids in a New Groove, helping kids in foster care get one-on-one mentoring through private music instruction. The accomplishments were there -- Kids in the program had a 100 percent graduation rate. But there was something missing, mainly that the program could not expand out of Texas.
"I became more and more frustrated with nonprofit model,” Scott said. “Nonprofits aren’t built to scale, and I wanted to try and find a scalable solution to make an impact on these kids.”
Enter Care2Rock, a new way to learn music online.
The platform itself recruits musicians from all over the country to teach music to paying customers. In exchange for their work teaching, these teachers agree to volunteer on a long-term basis for children in foster care.
Scott spent years trying to figure out a way to perfect the platform, and it starts with the technology.
“Lots of our competitors use Skype, which can make giving lessons a bit difficult,” Scott said. “We use TokBox, a platform designed for seamless browser-to-browser technology. It has both audio and video capabilities, and people in Europe use it for medical purposes.”
Scott and her technology team also designed a custom interface for music lessons.
“With this interface, you’re able to learn how to play music faster,” she said. “The interface has custom screen views where you can actually see where to properly place your fingers if you’re playing the piano."
With the new platform, Scott has seen immediate growth outside of Texas, with over 150 teachers signed up to teach. Many teachers are from musical hotbeds like Nashville and Los Angeles, and some with serious musical bonafides. She mentioned one artist had toured with Bruce Springsteen, while another collaborated on a song with Beyonce.
Not forgetting her roots, Care2Rock has partnered with Texas CASA on the launch of a new program called Computers for CASA. Foster children in the program are allotted a free computer, and Care2Rock is offering free lessons to those children who have a computer.
The company officially launched on Thursday, and Scott viewed it as a way to bring people together in support of the company and the cause.
“We are not a profit-centered company,” she said. “We about connecting communities to music in a certain way. Customers don’t have access to teachers, teachers aren’t paid in the right way. By choosing Care2Rock, we are combining the best of everything, providing students with top teachers, teachers with a steady income, and foster children with incredible musical mentors that will help their own development."
