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Journeys

Meet some of the education innovation trailblazers who started their journeys at Stanford.

Our profiled alumni have been selected based on their industry expertise to showcase diverse career pathways in education innovation and inspire aspiring education entrepreneurs.

Photo by Ryan Zhang.

Dylan Arena

SVP, Chief Data Science & AI Officer at McGraw Hill

Dylan discovered his passion for education entrepreneurship as a Symbolic Systems undergrad, which eventually led him back to Stanford as a Learning Science and Technology Design PhD candidate. Here, he honed in on learning science research, providing the backing to his personalized and playful learning startup Kidaptive, which was eventually acquired by McGraw Hill.

Drew Bent

Co-Founder and COO, Schoolhouse

Drew grew up aware of disparities in resources and opportunities in education, which started a decade-plus journey of tutoring in underserved communities. He merged his passion for teaching with programming, founding Schoolhouse with Sal Khan in 2020 in response to the pandemic. Drew emphasizes the importance of going outside your comfort zone and exploring other perspectives at Stanford and beyond.

Shauntel Garvey

Co-Founder and General Partner, Reach Capital

Shauntel found her passion for education innovation and entrepreneurship through firsthand experiences with education inequities. Stanford equipped her with knowledge and connections, leading to her founding Reach Capital with fellow alumni Jennifer Carolan (MA Education ‘06). Looking forward, Shauntel is enthusiastic about AI’s transformative potential in career advancement. 

Kian Katanforoosh

Founder and CEO, Workera

Kian has been deeply passionate about education and human potential since childhood, inspired by his parents’ immigration experience. His hands-on learning and mentorship received at Stanford propelled him on his founder journey, building Workera. He firmly holds that we need more technologists and entrepreneurs to create solutions to advance the future of learning.

Monique Malcolm-Hay

Investor, Rethink Education

Monique discovered her passion for education innovation when she founded a social enterprise helping students from underserved communities to navigate career decisions. At Stanford, she tested three potential paths: operator, entrepreneur, and investor. Looking forward, Monique believes that AI will allow individuals to be judged on their capabilities rather than solely on traditional credentials.

Emily McGinty

Managing Director, A-Street

Emily believes that early K-12 experiences have the potential to inspire and motivate. Her own early education experience fueled her studies at Stanford GSB and her career in finance. At A-Street, Emily is able to think creatively and invest patiently in innovative education companies that leverage learning science to advance student outcomes.

Jamie Poskin

Founder and CEO, TeachFX

Jamie was inspired to master the artful mix of empathy, skills, knowledge, and relationship-building to become a better teacher. At Stanford, a research project sparked his thinking on leveraging analytics to celebrate and reinforce successful teaching moments, leading to the creation of TeachFX, which provides teachers with formative feedback to keep students engaged.

Claudio Sassaki

Co-Founder and CEO, Geekie and Entrepreneur-in-Residence, Stanford Graduate School of Education

Claudio witnessed firsthand the challenges students face in accessing quality education in Brazil and felt a calling to change the system. He put his MA in Education and MBA from Stanford to work in co-founding Geekie, a full K12 digital curriculum using AI to personalize teaching and learning. Now, Claudio is back at Stanford as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence, inspiring the next generation of founders.

Adam Sparks

Co-Founder and CEO, Short Answer

Adam, Co-Founder and CEO of Short Answer, was frustrated by students prioritizing grades over learning, and transitioned from teaching to Stanford’s Learning Design and Technology masters program, igniting his journey into edtech entrepreneurship.

Adam’s experiences reshaped his views on education’s future, including advocating for competency-based and AI-powered learning. 

Fred Swaniker

Founder, African Leadership Group and Founder and CEO, Sand Technologies

Fred’s early experience becoming a headmaster at 18 showed him just how transformative education can be. At Stanford, he wrote the business plan that would catalyze the founding of the African Leadership Academy and, subsequently, the African Leadership Group. Fred shares his vision for the future of education and insightful advice for aspiring entrepreneurs as an impactful serial founder.

Kavindya Thennakoon

Co-Founder, Tilli

Kavindya’s journey from Deraniyagala, Sri Lanka, to Stanford’s Learning Design and Technology program is driven by her passion for education innovation. She co-founded Tilli to address socio-emotional developmental gaps in children, leveraging learning science. Kavindya emphasizes ethical values in entrepreneurship and envisions a future of localized, intentional, and curiosity-driven education.

Daniel Uribe Villa

Principal, VélezReyes+

Daniel realized early on that unequal access to education opportunities hinders people’s abilities to chart their own course towards a better future. In response, he built Mentors4U Colombia, a non-profit mentorship organization. As a student in the MA/MBA program at Stanford, he leveraged education entrepreneurship classes and co-curricular activities to build a venture philanthropy platform. He is now catalyzing the growth of LatAm’s education entrepreneurship ecosystem.

Aditya Vishwanath

Co-Founder and CEO, Inspirit

As a learner, Aditya experienced inefficiencies in traditional educational systems that drove his interest in education innovation and entrepreneurship. At Stanford, Aditya engaged deeply with research on education and technology, leading him to co-found Inspirit. Aditya believes that technologies like VR and AR will play an outsized role in increasing immersive, personalized, and experiential learning experiences that will allow students to thrive.

Catalin Voss

Co-Founder and CTO, Ello

Catalin is on a mission to eradicate childhood illiteracy by leveraging artificial intelligence. As a co-terminal Computer Science student at Stanford, Catalin developed learning aids for children with autism. Here, he also met his eventual co-founder Tom Sayer (MA Education + MBA ‘14). Catalin’s journey exemplifies the intersection of technology and social good, driven by his desire to democratize learning opportunities.