As parents with two young kids, aged 6 and 2, our biggest hope is that they manage to be themselves in a world built upon standardization and scale. Each child is unique, so it is logical that their learning needs and journeys are unique as well. The optimal education is a personalized education. However, our education system has not evolved much to meet this need. Rooted in the industrial age mandate of mass education, traditional schools are not built for personalized learning. Further, the more asynchronous the development of a child is, the more personalization is needed, and the harder a traditional school can serve the child’s intellectual, social and emotional needs.
We run our own investment company YH2 Capital Inc, and we invest in technology companies around the world. Our investment focus has been on technology platforms that scale globally, and in the past decade we have witnessed the power and spectacular success of many such platforms. A large part of the platforms’ success comes from their abilities to scale and standardize. However, technology can also be used for personalization not previously achievable, especially in personalized medicine and personalized education, two areas most in need of transformation for the most profound impacts. We have set up Citrin Foundation, a non-profit medical research foundation that adopts a personalized medicine approach for rare diseases. This is also why we are setting up Cresconova Academy, a non-profit education platform that provides personalized education for learners around the world who want more than what a traditional school setting can offer.
We believe that time is ripe now to fully harness the power of technology to create truly personalized education for each learner, just like the genetic revolution is ushering the age of personalized medicine. However, while technology helps us rethink and reconfigure learning, they don’t replace teachers; far from it. We believe that the best education happens when the best teachers are empowered with technological tools that enable them to conduct much smaller classes with responsive curriculum, to give timely and personalized feedback, and to stimulate collaborative learning and creativity amongst like-minded students. Our dedicated Learning Consultants also provide parents with direct one-on-one support and holistic guide to a student’s learning journey. There is no substitute for a talented teacher’s nurturing, compassion, and inspiration.
This is the beginning. We founded Cresconova for our two children and other learners around the world who yearn for a truly personalized education, and we will tirelessly and ceaselessly improve Cresconova. We believe that we are creating a better education for the next generation and would like to invite you to join us on this journey.