Educational game accelerator co.lab is shutting down

In a blog post on Medium today, co.lab's Esteban Sosnik announced that after 3 years of helping startups build new educational games, the accelerator would be closing its doors.

The accelerator, in partnership with Zynga and NewSchools Venture Fund, worked with entrepreneurs to help build new educational apps that could supplement educational content for parents and teachers helping students learn across the country. 

Sosnik credits the successes of co.lab to helping get 29 companies connected with developer experts from Zynga in order to build educational games rooted in lessons from social game design.

His parting note comes with some useful advice for other developers and accelerators remaining in the educational games space, urging them to value consumer-focused design over meeting school district requirements, not chasing a spot on the Apple or Google featured lists, and warnings about the distribution and discoverability struggles in trying to reach teachers and parents. 

The co.lab executive director doesn't cite a specific reason for the accelerator's closure, but says he does still see promise in the educational games field.