early-education
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The Ad Agency That Sends Its Research Department to the Sidewalk
Vera Creative makes campaigns for people who may distrust the campaign-maker. Its answer is disarmingly practical: hire from the community, listen at street level, and let those conversations change the work.
Tatiane Vita Learned Global Growth From the Shop Floor
She started behind a Chilli Beans counter while studying journalism. Two decades later, Tatiane Vita is applying a field-tested playbook for international growth to schools, founders and a public conversation about who gets chosen to lead.
SplashLearn
SplashLearn (operated by StudyPad, Inc.) is a game-based learning platform for children in preschool through Grade 5, focused on math and reading. Founded in 2010 by four friends who saw the iPad as a natural learning device for kids, it now serves more than 40 million learners across 150+ countries and is used by hundreds of thousands of teachers and schools. The platform pairs an adaptive, curriculum-aligned library of 6,500+ games and activities with live small-group classes, aiming to turn children into confident, self-motivated learners.
brightwheel
Brightwheel is the all-in-one operating platform for early education centers, combining billing, attendance, family communication, enrollment, lesson planning, and compliance reporting into a single product. Founded in 2014 by Dave Vasen and backed by $88.8M in funding, it serves 150,000+ childcare programs and 2.2 million monthly active users across 50+ countries, holding over 53% market share in childcare management software.
Dave Vasen
Dave Vasen is the founder and CEO of brightwheel, the leading all-in-one software platform for early education that serves thousands of childcare centers and preschools across the US. A Stanford and Wharton graduate, Vasen left AltSchool in 2014 to build brightwheel after seeing firsthand how preschool operators struggle to run both a classroom and a business simultaneously. He famously appeared on Shark Tank in 2016 where Mark Cuban and Chris Sacca fought over the deal, landing a $600K investment. Brightwheel has since raised $88.8M in total funding and reached a $700M+ valuation by 2024, with $75M in annual revenue - making it one of the most impactful companies in the early childhood education space.