Mascot characters from Alongside, a student mental health platform. [Image courtesy of Timely Care; Composite DI Studio]

TimelyCare, a Fort Worth-based virtual care provider for education, recently acquired Alongside, a Seattle-based AI coaching platform developed by clinicians in partnership with hundreds of schools to support students through everyday challenges.

Designed for youth and based on clinical frameworks, Alongside’s framework combines evidence-based skill-building with proprietary safety models that detect risk to help students find additional support when needed.

The acquisition signals a strategic expansion of TimelyCare’s model, moving from primarily supporting students at the point of clinical need to helping institutions offer resources to the full student population earlier and more consistently throughout the care continuum. By adding Alongside’s interactive coaching, TimelyCare said it can better support students facing everyday stress, loneliness, uncertainty, and a sense of not belonging before those challenges become bigger problems.

TimelyCare Co-Founder and CEO Luke Hejl said many students who appear to be doing fine “are quietly struggling, and they’re increasingly turning to AI for help.”

“The difference is that most tools they’re using weren’t designed with clinical input, safety protocols, or accountability. Alongside was,” he added in a statement. “It’s been built and refined alongside clinicians and school partners to help students take meaningful steps forward in everyday moments, while ensuring that more serious needs are identified and escalated appropriately.”

“By bringing this into TimelyCare,” Hejl said, “we’re extending our model beyond moments of acute need to provide continuous, clinically grounded support that helps institutions reach more students, earlier.”

Helping students get care before challenges escalate

Alongside’s platform is engineered to help students work through common challenges such as school pressure, social stress, and everyday emotional issues through evidence-based coaching and skill-building. Its model is intended for everyday support, not therapy or crisis care, and includes clear safety guardrails designed to detect potential self-harm risk, advance responses through a clinician-guided framework, and activate appropriate measures, including outreach to schools and other human intervention, when a student may need more support.

Alongside also includes the S.U.R.E. framework (Safe, Understandable, Restricted and Ethical), an evidence-informed basis for evaluating every AI interaction with students.

“Alongside was built to help students take the next right step in everyday moments of struggle,” said Jay Goyal, CEO and co-founder of Alongside. “Over the past several years, we’ve partnered with schools across the country to support student well-being, engagement, and attendance, working alongside counseling teams to ensure students get the right level of support.”

“Joining TimelyCare allows us to scale that impact through a platform that institutions already trust,” Goyal added. “We share a belief that support should begin earlier, operate within clear clinical boundaries, and connect students to the right level of care when they need more.”

Designed to support student wellbeing

TimelyCare and Alongside said they will work together to enhance how institutions support students, allowing them to address everyday challenges earlier, and to find the right level of care at the right time to prevent issues from escalating. The combined platform is expected to boost student engagement, enhance navigation toward appropriate care, and help institutions develop a more proactive, engaged approach to student well-being.

TimelyCare and Alongside said that existing partners can expect continuity as the organizations move through integration planning. Alongside school partners will continue to have access to their program and support resources. Additional integration updates will be shared directly with partners as plans are finalized, the companies said.

 Founded in 2017, TimelyCare is used by nearly 500 campuses across the U.S. to support students and educators with services that include mental health counseling, on-demand emotional support, medical care, psychiatric care, health coaching, student success coaching, basic needs assistance, faculty and staff guidance, peer support, and self-guided wellness tools.

In 2023, TimelyCare partnered with Lady Gaga’s Born This Way Foundation to support college students’ mental health across the U.S. 

Alongside, which was founded in 2022, is used by more than 200 schools nationwide, providing evidence-based support for everyday challenges while ensuring severe issues are flagged for human intervention. 

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