Dan Shandler stood up in front of hundreds of people at the MYOB pitch for a spot at CreativeCubes.Co in Richmond and crushed it that night to win 12 months rent free thanks to our partners at MYOB.

Originally this startup started as a side hustle 2 years ago.

Now both cofounders, Dan & Brandon Friedman are working with 50+ schools (and growing) to deliver fun sex ed workshops around Australia.

Elephant Ed, a sex ed workshop startup helps young kids build healthy relationships with sex within themselves…. You know what… let them tell you themselves.

Enjoy todays vlog 🙂

Transcript

Dan Shandler: At the end of the day, the impact that we’re having on the young people is really what we’re trying to achieve. The more young people we can impact, I think the more we can scale.

Brandon Friedma: Elephant Ed is really sex education for young people by young people. It started out by Dan and I at Dan’s old high school that he was working at. He got thrown into teaching a sex ed class, and the response was unbelievable. I think the students just love that youth perspective to what we were doing, breaking down those barriers by being able to look up and relate to that person delivering the content, rather than it being delivered by your awkward PE teacher who is a little bit cringe-worthy talking about this type of stuff.

That’s how it all started. Fast forward to today and we’ve rolled it out now across Melbourne into many schools.

We’re hoping to be in around 50 schools by the end of this year. It’s growing really nicely. On the horizon is potentially interstate next year. That’s probably our next challenge.

Dan Shandler:  I think sex education … it’s everything. It’s how we can come to be, really. I think nowadays with access to technology and differences in pornography and consent and pleasure, these are conversations that aren’t being had. Young people are growing up not knowing the difference between what’s right and what’s wrong or what a sexual healthy relationship looks like, what a regular relationship looks like. We’re just trying to have an impact on as many young people as we possibly can.

Brandon Friedma: Yeah, it started out as a bit of a side hustle while we were both at Uni. Dan was working part time at our first school that we were in. It was our pilot school almost. I think Dan was working as a journalist and I was studying commerce law. And I think Dan slowly kept taking a leap, going from five days to four days to three days. And then eventually took the leap to go full-time at the beginning of last year. I was in a really fast-paced corporate job working crazy hours and watching Dan grow it on the side. It just got to the point where I think those embers were burning. It almost got to the point where we’re either going to have a crack at it or we’re not and-

Dan Shandler:  Jumped into the deep end.

Brandon Friedma: … I couldn’t resist and came on board. Since March I’ve been full-time and Dan since the start last of year.

Dan Shandler: Hopefully going interstate. We’re just rolling it out as far and as wide as we possibly can. At the end of the day, the impact that we’re having on the young people is really what we’re trying to achieve. The more young people we can impact, I think the more we can scale.

Yeah. We’ve got student workshops, parent seminars, and staff professional development sessions. We’ve also partnered with a few different universities to help out students that are coming to do exchange here or live on residence. All of those things combined, hopefully, are having a large-scale impact. Because at the end of the day, we don’t go into schools and say, “Hey, we’re here to replace your teachers.”

We really want to support schools and say, “Hey, sex education needs to be something that we can start, but you need to take it at home.” Parents need to have those conversations, but then also needs to continue at school once we’re gone.

Brandon Friedma: It’s all about talking about the elephant in the room. Yeah, obviously these topics have been pretty taboo in the past.We’re really trying to create a more positive, open conversation and really talk about and engage with the elephant in the room.

Dan Shandler: It’s crazy. 50% of people think it’s because the trunk looks like a penis.

Tobi:  Yeah! I was looking at the logo. I was like … I used to make the joke.

Dan Shandler: There’s no phalli resemblance whatsoever.

Brandon Friedma: Some people say because elephants never forget. We’ve been grappling with that one as well. Sex ed you never forget.

Tobi:  No, I like the theoretical spin. The elephant in the room. That’s smarter than …

Dan Shandler: However you remember it is what works for us.

Tobi: That’s great. Well we’re really proud to have you guys in this space.

Brandon Friedma: I think the students just love that youth perspective to what we were doing rather than it being delivered by your awkward PE teacher.

Dan was working part-time at our first school that we were in as our pilot school almost.

Dan Shandler: I was just a sports coach.

Brandon Friedma: Yeah, Dan was doing-

Speaker 4: You were the PE teacher?

Dan Shandler: Yeah!