Everything you need to teach on Outschool

OUTreach Referral Update: New Offer for Families

The OUTreach referral offer has changed. When a new family uses your referral link or code, they can now get:

• Up to $50 off their first class, or
• $20 off their first month of membership

This replaces the previous membership offer of 50% off the first three months. If that old offer is written into your class descriptions, profile, website, or social posts, take a minute to update it.

One other change worth knowing: existing families are no longer eligible for the promotion. Previously they could apply a referral code when enrolling in their first membership, and that's no longer the case. Referral rewards now apply to new families only.‍

Get Your Referral Link

🎓 New: Public Funding Programs Hub

We're excited to introduce the new Public Funding Programs Hub in your Educator Dashboard!

This new hub gives you a personalized view of your eligibility for all 19 public funding programs on Outschool and helps you understand what steps you can take to unlock additional earning opportunities.

Here's what you'll find:

✅ Your current eligibility status for each public funding program

✅ Clear next steps if you're missing any eligibility requirements

✅ Guidance on requirements like teaching certificates, bachelor's degrees, and more—as well as programs that don't require these credentials

✅ An estimate of the additional earning opportunities available through public funding

Families using ESAs, tax credit scholarships, microgrants, and other publicly funded education programs often spend significantly more on Outschool than the average family. The Public Funding Programs Hub makes it easy to see where you stand and identify opportunities to reach more of these learners.

Visit the Public Funding Programs Hub today:

👩 Individual educators

🏢 Seller organization admins

We're excited to help connect you with even more public funding opportunities on Outschool.

Coming soon: Your experience, more visible on class cards

In the coming weeks, we’re updating class cards to give families more specific information while they browse. Class cards will highlight relevant educator credentials, along with clearer class-size and state-funding information. 

As part of this update, the Star Educator, Popular Educator, and Rising Star badges will no longer appear on class cards. We recognize that retiring badges educators have earned may feel disappointing. This change doesn’t take away from the work or accomplishments the badges represented, but instead, it allows the limited space on each card to show families information that is specific to both the educator and the class.  

For each class, you’ll be able to choose one credential to display on the card and two additional credentials to display when a family views more information. Your other credentials will remain available on the class detail page.You won’t need to update every class unless you want to. Each class will begin with a default credential order:

1. Teaching certifications
2. Graduate degrees
3. Other degrees
4. Years of experience

If you run an organization: Organizations will set one credential order that applies across their teachers. Organization administrators may want to confirm that teachers’ credentials are up to date before the change takes effect.

To prepare now: review or add your degrees, certifications, and work experience here:

Add Your Credentials Here

For a preview of the updated class cards, Matt from our product team put together a walkthrough for you. 

Preview New Class Cards

We know credentials are only one part of what makes an educator stand out. We’ll continue exploring ways to help families better understand the knowledge, experience, and teaching strengths educators bring to their classes.

Back-to-school season means fund drop season for a lot of the families you teach. We just shipped an update that makes it a lot easier for them to find and use public funding — ESAs, micro-grants, and scholarships — on Outschool.

Browsing eligible classes now takes seconds, not a login. Families can select their state or funding program right from search or a class listing page and immediately see what's eligible. No account required to start looking, and their selection now sticks as they browse, filter, and come back later.

Eligibility is personal to each kid. Funding information used to live at the account level. Now it's tied to each learner, so a family with two kids on two different programs sees accurate, specific eligibility for each one, instead of one blended answer.

Clearer signals, less guesswork. Class cards and search results now show eligibility more plainly, and families can adjust or clear an incorrect state selection themselves.

What this means for you: fewer confused messages about whether a class qualifies, and a more direct path from a family finding your class to actually booking it, right when funding season is top of mind.

Log in and take a look at how your own listings show up for funded families.

See It In Action

California charter schools have updated their requirements for educators. If you teach—or would like to teach—California charter school learners, you can now complete the required California Mandated Reporter Training and upload your completion certificates directly to your Outschool educator profile.

To complete your credential:

• Complete both required California Mandated Reporter Training modules.
• Download your completion certificate for each course (total of two certificates, one for each course).
• Upload both certificates to your California Mandated Reporter Training credential in Outschool.
  • Upload your credential certificate(s)

📘 Need help getting started? We've created a step-by-step guide with screenshots that walks you through creating your account, finding the correct trainings, completing the courses, and uploading your certificates.

Getting Started Guide

Important information

• This training is intended for educators who teach—or want to teach—California charter school learners.
• The required training is provided by an external organization. The training provider charges approximately $7–$8 per required module for a completion certificate (about $14–$16 total for both required modules). These fees are the responsibility of the educator.
• Your credential will not be considered complete until both required certificates have been uploaded.
• Your California Mandated Reporter Training credential must be renewed annually.
• Your credential will not be considered complete until both required certificates have been uploaded.

Create your Account to Begin the Training

We postponed launch of this feature last week due to some bugs, but the new version will be gradually released to teachers this week.

This update brings all your messages together in one place. You can now manage conversations, self-paced classroom messages, and assignment submissions from your “Conversations” tab. Parent messages are also grouped into one ongoing conversation, making it easier to keep track of communication. Notification bubbles and special filters will help you keep track of what needs attention and make sure nothing gets missed.

Learn More

While the transition is still planned, Stripe onboarding has not started yet. We’ve heard questions about creating Stripe accounts, so we want to clarify that no action is required at this time.

Here’s what to expect:

• Your payouts will continue through PayPal as usual for now.
• You do not need to create a Stripe account independently.
• When onboarding becomes available, you’ll receive clear instructions directly from Outschool on how to set up your Stripe account through your Outschool dashboard.
• We’ll provide advance notice before any payout changes take effect to help ensure a smooth transition with no interruption to payouts.

Thanks for your patience as we work through this transition. We’ll continue sharing updates as we get closer to rollout.

Did you know Outschool now partners with 19 ESA, tax credit scholarship, microgrant, and publicly funded education programs across the country? These programs help funded families enroll in Outschool classes — creating even more enrollment opportunities for educators.

Because eligibility requirements vary by state and program, there are a few simple steps you can take to maximize your visibility with funded families and unlock additional funded enrollments.

Upload Your Teaching Credential: Teaching certifications can help unlock access to programs including Texas Education Freedom Account (TEFA), Texas PDSES, New Hampshire EFA, Georgia Promise, and more.

Upload your Teaching Credential

Upload Your College Degree: Bachelor’s degrees or higher can expand eligibility for programs like Alabama CHOOSE, North Carolina ESA+, and South Carolina ESTF.

Upload your College Degree

Apply for Florida SUFS Approval through EMA: Interested in reaching funded learners in Florida? Apply for SUFS approval to access programs like FES-EO, FES-UA, and FTC-PEP.

Apply for SUFS Approval

Already Eligible for Additional Programs

Outschool educators are automatically eligible for funded enrollments through several programs, including Arizona ESA, Colorado My Spark, Louisiana GATOR, Utah Fits All, West Virginia HOPE Scholarship, and more. (Please note that some programs may still include subject-area or keyword restrictions for eligible classes.)

Thanks to all of you who have quickly adopted our new v2 self-paced classroom! For those who haven’t, check out the video walkthrough in the article below to see how easy it is to migrate classes. Get your classes in now for a chance to be a part of upcoming v2 marketing!

Click here for the video walkthrough

Next week, we will be releasing a self-paced classroom preview feature for families. Families will be able to enter the classroom preview from self-paced class description pages (CDPs). Once in the preview, they will be able to see all of the self-paced class's lesson titles and preview the first minute of the class's first video. You will be able to decide whether you want to allow families to preview your self-paced classes. If you do not want to allow families to preview a class, you will be able to turn the preview feature off in the “Classroom” tab for that class. 

We’ll share an update soon with more details about how this will work for you and families when it launches. This will be a gradual rollout to learn more about how self-paced classroom previews support families, so it may only be visible to some parent accounts.

We hope this new feature helps families find the right class for them and helps you bring more families into your classes!

You can now use our new migration tool to move your existing self-paced classes into the updated experience—while reviewing and editing everything in draft before publishing.

For step-by-step guidance (including a video walkthrough), check out our help article.

Transition your self-paced classes

We're excited to share a major milestone: new Arizona ESA marketplace data shows that Outschool is the #1 learning provider by family spending, ranking behind only Amazon and Apple in overall spend.

This milestone wouldn't have been possible without our incredible educator community. Every class you teach, every learner you inspire, and every family you support has helped make Outschool the trusted destination for Arizona families.

Thank you for helping Arizona families build learning journeys that fit their unique needs. This milestone belongs to you.

‍