We connect the dots.

GoEducate "connects the dots" between learners, programs and employers. We've built and operationalized the first-ever modern cloud-based education-to-employment data ecosystem, capable of connecting and scaling individuals, colleges, and employers locally, regionally and nationally.

Our Company

GoEducate is an Austin, TX - based education technology company redefining the way people make education decisions and how companies find relevant talent.

Our company and platform were created to ensure everyone has equal access to education and life-changing career opportunities.

The GoEducate team has decades of combined success building and scaling businesses and education technology, with deep experience in platform development, engineering and product marketing in consumer, institution and government agency verticals.

Our Mission

To fundamentally transform the way students, adult learners and professionals make education, training and career-focused decisions.

For institutions, agencies and employers, we are addressing the disconnect between job candidates, and the specified training and education needed for employment success.

Our Leadership

Eric Kmiec

Founder and CEO

Eric is a seasoned Silicon Valley entrepreneur with over three decades of experience in bringing to the global marketplace large scale telecommunications infrastructure and next-generation Internet technologies that have translated into several innovative products and solutions.

Eric has held key leadership roles at various multinational telecommunications and data networking equipment manufacturers. He spent the majority of his technical career advancing the wireless communications industry, where he introduced several state-of-the-art communications platforms to the world, including the launch of the first GSM digital cellular network and made the first digital cellular mobile call within the United States. In addition, he spearheaded the product development and deployment of a highly-scalable digital communications platform supporting an entire wireless network in a single enclosure, primarily aimed at international rural markets in developing regions, and specialty vertical applications. His focus and work has brought wireless communications to over 75 countries and used by millions of people around the world.

Eric was the recipient of the 2013 "Innovator & Entrepreneur of the year" award by I&E Society and Modern Renaissance Corporation. The award was in recognition of an inventive mindset, ingenious design and innovative framework for ‘SONO’; a collaboration and knowledge management platform that promotes the harnessing and sharing of knowledge.

Brandon Kmiec

Technical Services Engineer

Having started his educational journey at a community college, Brandon has experienced firsthand the challenges that come with navigating the education system. This experience was oftentimes frustrating and confusing; he knew there had to be a better way. Going through this has fueled his passion to help others have a better experience obtaining their degree.

At GoEducate, Brandon ensures all technical requirements meet business needs and all issues are addressed before the system goes live. Brandon has a BS degree in Business Management from Sacramento State University

Jeff McKenzie

Technology Director

Jeff is an accomplished senior manager and software engineer. Jeff has been building and deploying complex cloud-based systems for over 20 years. Jeff is the technical director for the GoEducate platform and has led the development and coordination with the overseas technical team utilizing Jira and Agile Project Management to coordinate the system development and delivery. Jeff managed and developed the GoHubbs.com collaboration system which enhances the GoPathways platform to allow users to enhance their learning journey by sharing information and ideas.

Jeff has a BS degree in Computer Science Engineering from Arizona State University.

Gordon Freedman

President

Gordon Freedman helped evolve the fields of education technology and online learning and is now an advocate for broad-based change across the K-to-Career spectrum. Freedman is President of the National Laboratory for Education Transformation (www.NLET.org), a California-based research and development nonprofit committed to transformational change in K12 and workforce development. Freedman is also managing director of Knowledge Base, LLC, a consulting firm established in 1998 to provide services to institutions, publishers and education technology start-ups.

Freedman formerly served as Vice President Global Education Strategy, Blackboard Inc, during its growth from 100 million dollar in annual revenue, to going public, to its exit at 1.4 billion dollars. During his tenure, Freedman traveled to 19 countries examining learning models and policy strategies, launched the Blackboard Institute and provided thought leadership for the company globally. He was part of the start-up of California State University Monterey Bay, the dot-com portal HungryMinds, the Prometheus Learning Management System at George Washington University, and recently the Precision Institute at National University. Freedman’s early career was in government, media and film.

Tim Johnson

Chief Marketing Officer

Tim Johnson is a marketing, design and creative strategist who built his career in Seoul, South Korea. Through continuous learning, listening and leaning into the needs of the Asian market, Tim led award-winning marketing, brand and global advertising initiatives for brands including Samsung, Hyundai, Google, YouTube Red, Porsche, HP, Microsoft, Gore-Tex and Oakley.

Prior to joining GoEducate, Tim served as the Creative Operations Director for Compass, real estate’s premier and tech-focused brokerage that recently went public in June 2021.

Stephanie Caruso

Operations Manager

Stephanie Caruso manages the business office for GoEducate, Inc. Stephanie is assisting Go Educate with the state organization processes and contracts as the business grows. With a background in accounting and financial management in the application development, non-profit education, real estate development and retail sectors, she manages the back office for GoEducate, Inc. as it grows into a global business.

Prior positions included National Account Director at Brooks Fiber and Services Marketing Specialist at IBM, both quite rewarding as they were developing new markets and services nationwide. Stephanie also enjoyed a change in direction to implement Blackbaud at in a private school where the financial side of education was balanced with the rewards of helping students in need succeed.

As owner and operator of Caruso Family Vineyards, Stephanie has a passion for growth of the family business as well as small business. Current additional ventures include Caruso Consulting and managing commercial office space.

Rodney Johnson

Board Member

Rod Johnson through RBJohnson Investments has been the primary venture capitalist for the founding and product development of the GoEducate brand and products. Rod serves on the Board of Directors and provides direction and advice as GoEducate navigates the challenges of a new company and product launching.

Rod is committed to propelling GoEducate to the educational “frontlines” offering K-12 and post-secondary students and educational institutions the tools to propel students into the job marketplace.

Rod’s interest in post-secondary student success was the connection point with GoEducate’s founder, Eric Kmiec in 2015. Together they discussed how educational trends were not meeting the needs of the student. In particular, how the education process was leaving many students disillusioned resulting in low graduation rates and low upward mobility success rates. Rod offered the start-up company office space and became the primary investor.

Rod Johnson, now retired, had been involved in commercial property development for over 30 years and participated in the development of over ten million square feet of commercial projects and land development throughout the United States.

Rod co-founded Capital Partner Development Company, LLC. Capital Partners developed over six million square feet of commercial, office and industrial projects.

Rod received his BA and MBA from California State University, Chico and was a licensed CPA and California Real Estate Broker.

A. Kanish

Advisor and Consultant

A. Kanish is a tech entrepreneur, writer and speaker.

Kanish is Founder & CYO of Clapself, a media technology startup company. Earlier, Kanish co-founded and led multiple ventures offering innovative software solutions including a patented technology that was acquired by Google. His last venture offered a patent-pending software testing automation solution that was acquired by a software services company in 2016. Recently, Kanish published his debut book, You Are The Source.

Kanish serves GoEducate as Advisor and Consultant guiding the company as it transitions from early stage to growth stage.

Yustina Saleh

Strategic Consultant, Data Scientist

Yustina has been on a quest for connecting people with opportunity for over 20 years. Her life goal is to help people and organizations unlock their unique niches and then find and be found by their perfect matches. Yustina’s journey started in 2006 when she became the Labor Market Information Director for the New Jersey Department of Labor overseeing all federally mandated employment, unemployment, and census programs. Yustina spearheaded the rapid reemployment response efforts for the NJ Department of Labor.

Realizing that traditional labor market information would not provide answers on where the jobs are and where regional workforce agencies could focus their training and workforce resources, Yustina created and deployed the first real time labor demand/supply tool in USA, called NJ Real Time Jobs in Demand. Later, she became an advisor to many other state labor market information offices to replicate the model. Yustina was then tapped to found the analytics division for Burning Glass, where she created skills, occupation, and education taxonomies, and a wide array of labor market, workforce, and education products. At Emsi, Yustina created the ‘intel chip’ of skill-based hiring, career pathing, and precision training that powered a wide array hiring, regional planning, and education analytics products. As the Chief Product and Analytics Officer for ProFinda, Yustina leads all product, tech, and R&D teams tasked to build a workforce optimization platform that aligns the mission of the business with the desires of the workforce.

Capitalizing on 15+ years experience leading government and private sector labor market analytics operations, Yustina will help build a robust methodology for connecting the fuzzy dots of learning and work and will help GoEducate build machine learning algorithms that enable a current or prospective student to find hidden pathways possibilities.