Stylus, a marking technology startup established by a teacher, has raised £500k in funding.

London-based startup stylus, has secured £500,000 in funding from Sure Valley Ventures to develop its AI-powered marking and feedback tool, LearnCycle. The tool aims to rid teachers of out-of-hours work associated with marking paper-based student assessments, while still providing high-quality feedback. LearnCycle uses a combination of narrowly focused and broad-scope AI strategies, which allows it to analyse and mark large volumes of papers, generating personalised student reports and presenting areas of improvement for teachers to inform future lessons. Stylus has seen positive early traction with large multi-academy trusts of both secondary and primary schools across the UK, and has attracted a growing waitlist. Founder Dominic Bristow said: “In a world of AI technologies we can finally ‘take the work out of the paperwork’ for schools that outsource their exam marking to us.”