I often counsel start-ups, particularly technology start-ups, never to go very far down the product development path without involving your end-users. They are the ones who "feel the pain" - who know what the problems are and what's not working in the field - and (generally) have a much better handle on what features and functions will be valuable to them and which are just fluff, or worse.

Often, what you think you know about the problem you're developing a solution for is incomplete or irrelevant. Sometimes, it's simply wrong. Without end-user validation, your new venture can be walking in the minefield.

Biodiesel University's Director of Education Megean Garvin and I held two teacher focus groups this week; one for middle school science teachers and one for high school science teachers.



We had teachers from Washington, D.C., Delaware, and several counties around Maryland. Megean and I described Biodiesel University's development plans and specific components for our mobile laboratories, our curriculum and our online content. The teachers provided great feedback on what would be most useful to them and on how they would ideally like to see our school visits structured.

We were gratified by the strong interest the teachers expressed in having our program come into their schools (the response from some could easily be described as "passionate"). They told us that students are excited about renewable energy topics and hungry for experiences with real equipment. They also educated us on the difficulty they have in fitting all the science material students are required to learn into the school year. They further affirmed for us that the "curriculum bridge" approach Megean has developed, where in-class modules tie together the hands-on experiences on our mobile labs with the topics required by the state science standards, will be the way to go. And there was a recurring theme of the value of our program to teachers and students in academic areas outside of science.

We learned a lot, we were re-energized to keep plowing ahead, and we grew some great evangelists. And as hard as we looked, we didn't uncover any land mines.