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2027 Launch Event

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Tools Competition
Launch Event

September 10, 2026

Replay the Launch Event

Agenda

Special Guest Remarks

Hear special guest remarks on the evolving education landscape and the role of technology in driving impact.

Inside the Tools Competition

An introduction to the competition, the scale of its impact, and the vision for its seventh cycle.

Competition Tracks in Focus

Sponsors highlight this year’s tracks and the education challenges they’re calling on competitors to address.

Winner Showcase

Past winners take the stage to share what they’ve built and the impact they’re seeing.

Speakers

Deborah Quazzo

Co-founder of the ASU+GSV Summit
and the Managing Partner of GSV Ventures

Dr. Lindsay Kuhn

Founder & CEO
Wingspans

Ursula Lavrencic

CEO
KOBI

Michele Leardo

Program Officer
Walton Family Foundation

Kumar Garg

Kumar Garg

President
Renaissance Philanthropy

Kevin Johnstun

Program Officer, Education Program
Walton Family Foundation

Torie Bates

EdTech Innovation Program Manager
Google.org

Karen Parker

Senior Program Manager
Google.org

Philipp Schmidt

VP Technology Innovation
Axim Collaborative

Daniela Giugliano

Director of Innovation
Nova Escola Association

BA Laris

Director
dfusion Inc

Nona Ullman

Founder and CEO
LessonLoop

More About the Tools Competition

Since 2020, the Tools Competition has awarded more than $24 million to 171 winning teams and surfaced over 7,100 proposals from innovators around the world. Winning tools across all competition cycles now reach more than 51 million users worldwide.

The competition supports ed tech innovation across K-12, postsecondary education, and workforce development, with participants ranging from early-stage teams to established organizations. Each annual cycle brings together competitors, funders, researchers, practitioners, and other partners around a set of tracks focused on current challenges in education.

Kumar Garg

President
Renaissance Philanthropy

Kumar has helped to shape the science and tech landscape for almost two decades. Working with Eric Schmidt, he helped design and launch moonshot initiatives in education, provided early support to game-changing ideas and pioneers, and built ongoing multi-donor and multi-sector collaboratives.

 

Prior to that, he helped set budget and policy priorities for the Obama Administration as part of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and drove progress on topics ranging from education and workforce issues, biotechnology, entrepreneurship, space, advanced manufacturing, broadband, nanotechnology, behavioral sciences, digital media, incentive prizes, and broader innovation policy.

 

In particular, he led the Obama Administration’s efforts to bolster science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education, including development of major budget and policy initiatives in the State of the Union to train 100,000 excellent STEM teachers and bring computer science to all K-12 students, development of the Educate to Innovate campaign with over $1 billion in in-kind and philanthropic investment, and creation of iconic events such as the White House Science Fair.

 

Prior to his time in government, Kumar worked on behalf of parents and children seeking educational reform as an education lawyer and advocate. Kumar received a B.A. from Dartmouth College and a law degree from Yale Law School.

Kevin Johnstun

Program Officer

Walton Family Foundation

Kevin is a program officer for Walton Family Foundation’s Education Program. The Foundation’s Education Program supports all children in finding their unique path to a life of opportunity and purpose. Before joining the Foundation, he worked at the U.S. Department of Education, where he advised leaders across government on strategies for leveraging educational technology, especially AI, to improve student outcomes. He previously worked on staff supporting the President’s Council of Advisors for Science and Technology at the White House. He began his career in education as a 7th and 8th grade English teacher in Oklahoma City. He holds a B.A. in Philosophy and a masters in Instructional Psychology and Technology from Brigham Young University.

Torie Bates

EdTech Innovation Program Manager

Google.org

Torie Bates serves as an EdTech Innovation Program Manager at Google.org, where she is currently dedicated to transforming the future of learning and work by leveraging the power of AI. As a veteran Googler with over 13 years of experience at the company, Torie’s professional work centers on the postsecondary and workforce development ecosystems. Within these sectors, she specializes in seeding, incubating, and validating transformative learning solutions that address critical educational gaps. She brings a product-focused lens to philanthropy, actively seeking out interventions that are not only novel but also scalable, sustainable, and effective for broad social impact.

 

Driven by a deep passion to close the digital divide, Torie is committed to identifying innovative tools that apply cutting-edge technology and learning science to unlock educational and economic opportunity for all learners. Her strategic vision has led to significant accomplishments, including leading large-scale digital skilling Google EdTech products and establishing a multi-million dollar investment portfolio. Torie holds a degree from Stanford University and hails from Chicago, Illinois, where she also contributes to her local community through youth-mentorship and motivational speaking.

Karen Parker

Senior Program Manager

Google.org

Karen Parker is a Program Manager with Google.org where she helps advance innovation in technical solutions to transform teaching and learning. Prior to her work in Google.org Karen built products and programs that advanced the professional practice of k-12 Computer Science teachers. Before Google, Karen served as Director of Disaster Services for the American Red Cross in Silicon Valley, managing emergency response operations, volunteer training, and ensuring community readiness. Karen earned her Bachelor’s degree in Sociology from John Carroll University and completed advanced project management studies at Stanford University.

Philipp Schmidt

VP Technology Innovation

Axim Collaborative

Philipp Schmidt is CTO of Axim Collaborative, a non-profit organization founded by MIT and Harvard to address systemic equity gaps in higher-education. He is also a research scientist at MIT and advisor for digital credentials. Prior to joining Axim, Philipp was the Director of Digital Learning at the MIT Media Lab. He has extensive experience developing technology-enabled programs that increase opportunities for learning and education. Philipp founded Peer 2 Peer University (P2PU), a non-profit that provides wrap-around support for online courses through a network of public libraries, serves on the board of College Unbound, a college designed from the ground up to serve adult students, and was a founding board member of the OpenCourseWare Consortium. He co-authored the Cape Town Open Education Declaration and has developed a number of open standards for digital academic credentials including Mozilla Open Badges. He has received Shuttleworth and Ashoka fellowships, and came to MIT as a Media Lab Director’s fellow. Before moving to the US, he lived and worked in South Africa. He holds a CS degree from FH Furtwangen in Germany and an MBA from MIT.

Daniela Giugliano

Director of Innovation

Nova Escola Association

With a degree in Business Administration and over 15 years of experience in driving business solutions and managing technology-driven products, Daniela Giugliano leads the development of new solutions and the improvement of existing ones at Nova Escola. She ensures these initiatives align with the organization’s strategic goals while addressing the evolving needs of educators. Daniela is dedicated to leveraging technology to transform education, fostering scalable and impactful solutions that boost teacher engagement and educational practices.

BA Laris

Director

dfusion Inc

B.A. Laris, MPH, has spent over 30 years bringing excitement and passion to transforming ideas and information into accessible and engaging practices in education and public health. She loves building new and innovative approaches to reach people where they are with the information they need to succeed. As the Principal Investigator on SkillFlix AYA + SocialWise, she is excited to bring SkillFlix for Autistic Young Adults to the community with new more accessible features.

Nona Ullman

Founder and CEO

LessonLoop

Nona Ullman is the Founder and CEO of Improve LLC (est. 2005) and LessonLoop (est. 2020). A seasoned educator, district administrator, and management consultant, she has dedicated her career to transforming teaching and learning through data-driven innovation. Over the past 30 years, she has partnered with more than 50 educational agencies across 23 states, bringing deep expertise in data analytics, application of generative AI, program evaluation, and professional learning.


Her recent work includes leading high-impact projects with the Rhode Island Department of Education to develop Generative AI guidance for 300,000 K–12 stakeholders; collaborating with the Grossmont Union High School District to provide AI literacy training for 17,000 students and employees; and advising the Wake County Public School System on applying generative AI to streamline district operations.


Driven by her passion for amplifying student voice, Ms. Ullman founded LessonLoop (a 2024 Tools Competition Winner) to help teachers increase student engagement and accelerate learning. The platform harnesses a research-based measure of student engagement, evidence-based instructional strategies authored by Teachers College, Columbia University, and AI-powered differentiation to deliver personalized professional development tailored to classroom needs. LessonLoop is proud to be working with three districts in the States of New York and Illinois.


Before founding her companies, Ms. Ullman served as Managing Director and National K–12 Practice Lead at BearingPoint/KPMG Consulting. Today, she is a sought-after speaker at national conferences and on podcasts, where she shares strategies on leveraging AI to elevate student engagement, strengthen academic outcomes, and empower educators and district leaders. Ms. Ullman graduated from Cornell University with a B.S. in Industrial and Labor Relations and holds a M.B.A. from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.