It started almost three years ago.

When then-freshman Neil Jeju and his older brother, Noel, were tutoring children through the organization IntelliChoice, the two brothers realized some of the students were struggling in similar units. Instead of continuously going over those topics, they came up with a way for them to go back to and look over when they were struggling through video. The duo started their YouTube channel – SimplyEdu – to help teach fellow students about math subjects and other areas of study. 

SimplyEdu

“A lot of the time, some of the students that I would teach one week, I teach them a certain concept and then later, I teach another student the same concept,” Neil said. “I thought that it would be really helpful if I could just make videos because then I have it on the internet for them to look at more and keep it there permanently. I thought that it was definitely a great platform to use to teach children.”

The channel didn’t start out as SimplyEdu; the original name was SimplyMath. The brothers said they wanted to focus on their strengths and teach about a topic they felt they were knowledgeable about.

“We first started off as strictly math-based, but then more of the English stuff came from standardized testing,” Noel said. “My brother was a key part of that because he did pretty well on things like the ACT and the PSAT.”

The pair said they realized that they could also use their knowledge of other subjects to touch on other topics as well. They moved to give other students, such as junior Arjun Iyer, a student perspective on standardized testing topics like ACT and SAT prep. 

“At the beginning I didn’t use [SimplyEdu] for anything because [the videos] were doing mostly Algebra II stuff,” Iyer said. “But when [Neil] made an ACT video, I used it. His tips were really helpful. When he would walk through a reading section, [it was] something I really wanted to see.”

Iyer said that he first learned about the channel through Neil and that he admired his commitment to helping others, which is something Neil said he and his brother strived for when starting out SimplyEdu.

“[Our knowledge] comes from studying and learning from other people over the years,” Neil said. “It’s really a combination of me and my brother, so we talk about school and academic stuff all the time. When we are making a video, both of us come up with the ideas together – that’s how we were able to come up with a lot of things.”

The brothers said they realized that, even with the YouTube channel and content creation, there were still more opportunities for them. This led to their next endeavor: a prep book for AP pre-calculus.

The Prep Book

The two first thought of the idea of the book after AP pre-calculus course was announced by the College Board. Neil said that with their original idea being to create some videos around the content; the course was a great opportunity because it was new. 

“We thought about what our experiences were like when we took AP courses,” Neil said. “I used prep books to study for some of my AP classes. If we were to make one, we could have a chance of being successful and actually [make] a real impact. It was definitely a lot of work; the steps after that were more difficult than writing the book itself. It really goes to show how hard it is to do something like this independently.” 

The brothers said they started the process by waiting for the Course and Exam Description (CED) to be released. The CED provides the list of topics that will be covered and the formulas and information needed to be taught per topic. 

“Once we got the CED in the summer, we took all the topics and divided them up into chapters,” Noel said. “From there, we assigned and worked through all those chapters. Afterward, we also had to start making practice tests. That was harder to do. It takes a lot more thinking to make sure your problems are correct.” 

The brothers said they faced a lot of trial and error, but eventually used Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing system.

“After we made the book, we first decided that it was probably best if we had it as paper copies,” Noel said. “If it was on paper, it’d be easier for people to use it. From there, we had to reformat the book a bit from Microsoft Word and then we just published it on Kindle.”

Another key factor in making the book was getting permission from the College Board to publish. It took over two months to get permission for both the online and the paper version of the book. 

“It took a very long time to get permission from the College Board,” Neil said. “Figuring out the best way to get things done really allowed us to optimize for price and get the book to be the way that we wanted it to be.”

From there, the two made the book available on Amazon. The book is listed at $16.99, which is something the pair strived for when publishing it.

Growth

One of the most difficult things the brothers said about SimplyEdu was time management.

“I really just try to schedule everything and plan out everything I want to study,” Neil said. ”I think about how maybe I can study for a certain subject if I know if I have a test a few days in advance. It really helps me to know that, this is the day that I’ll be open,’ and then I can go work on the book or other extracurriculars on the side.”

Both brothers also said that, throughout the entire experience, they valued the relationship they had with each other.

“Our parents were very supportive,” Noel said. “They helped us every step of the way. Nothing really changed in [my brother and I’s] relationship because of the experience. If anything, our relationship made it more efficient. It made it easier to split up the work and just do it quickly and efficiently and make it as good as possible. We knew what we each excelled in and what we were not that good at.”

The pair said living in the same house helped them grow and learn. They said the experience helped them learn to manage their workloads, as well as coordinate and work with others. 

“My brother and I have always been close, we’ve always done a lot of school things together,” Neil said. “We’ve always done tutoring, whether it be as a tutor or getting tutored. It just helped us to get better to work as a team because we don’t really do a lot of school projects together. This was very fun because we got to work together on it.”