Congress last week passed a bill that makes it easier for startup companies to raise capital and go public, two oft-cited barriers for new ventures looking to enter the education market.

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A ‘New Resource’

Formal and informal mechanisms are already in place for early-stage companies to raise money. In education, the NewSchools Venture Fund, based in San Francisco, for instance, invests in companies that may be too risky for venture capitalists. It is financed by a wide range of private donors. The organization recently announced the creation of an educational technology seed fund that aims to help ed-tech startups find early-stage funding.

For example, three years ago, NewSchools invested in BetterLesson, a Boston-based company that allows educators to use the Web to share and catalog lesson plans, after NewSchools recognized the need for such a tool in the education community. BetterLesson is quickly gaining traction among educators and, although NewSchools continues to contribute funding to the company, in its latest round of funding last August, most investments came from elsewhere, including traditional venture-capital firms.

[Read the full article at Education Week]