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Among the most devastating impacts of COVID-19: the lasting havoc it's wreaked in our schools.

As founder and executive director of the National Student Support Accelerator (NSSA), Susanna Loeb believes that “high-impact tutoring”—a novel approach that emphasizes intensive, individualized instruction in sessions of 5 to 10 minutes—may be a low-cost way to help reduce education disparities. 

Loeb and NSSA researchers evaluated a tutoring program that embedded part-time tutors into classrooms to provide frequent "short bursts" of instruction, which minimized class disruptions and accommodated short attention spans.

“High-impact tutoring is not a luxury—it’s a necessity,” she says. “It’s a tool with the power to reshape the trajectory of countless lives.”

Alexander Ramlie was hoodwinked. As a Boston University undergrad, he discovered that his education in Singapore had taught him how to memorize information and take tests, but not how to think critically. 

Now a CEO, Ramlie is passionate about curricula that prepare students to “navigate complex, real-world issues.” That’s why he loves COLLEGE—enough to make a generous commitment to Stanford to support the program as well as undergraduate scholarships. 

“Education today focuses too much on vocational training and career and financial success and not enough on edifying students on what it means to become engaged citizens,” he says.

As a girl, Caitlyn Miller watched her stepfather deal with the devastating side effects of cancer treatments. There must be a better way, she thought.

As a PhD student at Stanford, Miller began prototyping therapies that target tumor cells, while keeping healthy tissues intact. She went on to demonstrate a proof of concept for multiple types of cancer, as entrepreneur-in-residence with the Innovative Medicines Accelerator.

In March 2024, her team received funding to launch TwoStep Therapeutics, in order to bring the technology to market.

“Therapies are not cheap to develop, so I felt really fortunate to be able to join the IMA and get a boost to entrepreneurship,” Miller said.