IPS Deal Gives AfterSchool HQ Chief a Chance to Give Back

Friday, May 13, 2022 12:04 PM EDT Updated: Friday, May 13, 2022 12:39 PM EDT
By Alex Brown, Assistant Managing Editor

The co-founder and CEO of Fishers-based AfterSchool HQ says the startup’s recently-announced partnership with Indianapolis Public Schools is a chance to help students find their passion the same way he did. Through the partnership, parents of IPS students will be able to use an online platform to find and register their kids for extracurricular activities. “We’re going to be deploying this to all schools in IPS, and ultimately, we hope to have that impact and be able to measure what that is in a few years,” said Darye Henry.

Henry talked about the partnership and the AfterSchool HQ platform in an interview on Inside INdiana Business with Gerry Dick.

“I was a product of IPS, and so it’s a chance for me to give back to basically give other students the opportunity to do what I did when I was at IPS,” said Henry. “I got to participate in after school programs. That’s how I found my passion of entrepreneurship [and] technology, and so this is a chance to give back with impact.”

AfterSchool HQ is a Software-as-a-Service platform that allows community organizations to promote their programs and give parents direct access to the programs and an easy way to register and pay.

Henry says Indiana is the fourth lowest state in the country for after-school participation and the goal is to get 40% of IPS students taking part in after school programs.

“What we’ve found is that wherever we deploy our software, we’ve seen an increase in registrations, and that’s because we’re just removing all the friction that’s involved and just making it really easy for parents to just know what programs are available,” he said.

Henry says after school programs are incredibly important, particularly as students return to school during the recovery from the pandemic.

“There was so much learning loss. Kids were virtual. It’s just not the optimal learning experience,” he said. “And so, IPS is investing in their students and their staff and ultimately, in their communities, and so we just want to take advantage of that and, again, give kids an opportunity to learn.”