I sometimes get the chance to be on stage and talk about our mission to empower learning for those who are excluded and underestimated by our educational system.
Few things make me as proud as using a big stage to raise awareness of this, and this time around, the stage doesn't get much bigger.
I presented Atlas Primer in Stockholm last month at TECHARENA, now Scandinavia's biggest tech conference. We were selected from hundreds of candidates to represent the Top 40 most promising startups, and after presenting in the semi-finals, a panel of esteemed investors selected us as part of the Top 4 finalist who would go on to present on the big stage the following day.
It was a delightful event and tremendously impactful. Earlier on that stage we had heard an emotional speech by Al Gore, and right after we presented the Top 4, Steve Wozniak took stage and gave us some fascinating insights into the early days of Apple.
But the definite highlight for me personally came after my presentation when I roamed the arena and connected with numerous students, parents, teachers, and school principals who identified with the problems I had talked about. They were eager to support our mission and conveyed sincere encouragement.
Atlas Primer didn't win the pitch competition, but that almost seems irrelevant now given how inspired I was after encountering so many amazing and inspiring people.