Founded by Paul Bennett after his family’s experience “boatschooling” while traveling the world, Cicero Learning is built for families who want a serious education without being tied to a traditional classroom.
Although conventional schooling has its merits, some families may prefer educational alternatives that allow for greater flexibility without sacrificing quality. One such alternative is Cicero Learning, a personalized education platform that specializes in connecting learners with expert private teachers who design one-to-one courses around each child’s needs, interests, pace, and lifestyle.
Founded on Firsthand Experience
Cicero’s effectiveness as a learning platform partially stems from the principles and experiences it was founded on. Paul Bennett, a former journalist, education entrepreneur, three-time founder, and longtime world traveler, started Cicero in response to seeing how challenging it could be to teach his own children while living and working from different locations.
Though his time spent sailing around the world with his wife and three daughters was valuable, it presented some unique obstacles that he would eventually address through Cicero’s one-to-one learning model. Combined with Paul’s board and advisory experience across education, travel, sustainability, and startups, Cicero soon grew into the online learning platform it is today.
The Value of One-to-One Education
A common argument against conventional education is its inability to properly meet the unique educational requirements of each individual learner, a barrier that can sometimes lead to children either being left behind or feeling unsatisfied with the pace at which they’re learning. Cicero recognizes this barrier, noting that, because there is no “average” learner, adhering to a blanket curriculum would do those students a disservice.
As such, Cicero’s teachers create courses around each learner’s strengths, goals, interests, and learning needs. These courses are adaptive, growing alongside learners to both encourage and nurture intellectual curiosity while pursuing deep engagement rather than checklist completion.
Perhaps most important of all, however, are the relationships Cicero Learning fosters between teachers and learners. The platform positions its educators as mentors, not generic tutors, meaning each teacher is dedicated to collaborating with learners to help them learn better through trust and sustained attention.
One-to-one instruction is also valuable because it gives teachers the ability to adjust the content, pace, difficulty, and teaching method in real time, making it more responsive to individual student needs.
Flexibility Without Sacrifice
Drawing on its founder’s own experience teaching his children while traveling, Cicero was specifically designed for homeschooling, worldschooling, traveling, and location-independent families with children between the ages of 10 and 18. The platform’s ability to support remote private teaching allows learners to maintain educational continuity while traveling or following schedules that don’t fit conventional school structures.
That said, Cicero Learning’s dedication to flexibility doesn’t mean families have to lower their academic expectations. On the contrary, families can build an education around travel and real-world experiences while still preparing learners for demanding academic futures.
A Classical Model Using Modern Delivery
Mentorship and one-to-one instruction are not novel concepts, having been used for centuries when private teachers frequently helped learners grow through their relationships and education. Those models persist today, remaining successful because they enable personalization that takes each student’s needs and learning styles into account.
Today, that same classical model can be seen in Cicero, albeit with modern delivery methods that use remote learning to support flexible schedules and access to teachers beyond a family’s immediate location.
Cicero could be seen as an online tutoring service, perhaps, but it might be more accurate to describe it as a personalized education platform built around private teachers, custom courses, sustained mentorship, and the freedom to learn from anywhere.
