How Do Startups Address the World’s Most Pressing Problems? The Case for Future-Proofing Education

This is the third piece in our Pressing Problems series where we objectively rank global issues according to the ITN (Importance, Tractability, Neglect) framework to find out where we should be focusing our limited time and resources. In this article, we’ll dive into the enormous problems with getting education right today, and identify some key areas of investment we believe will change the face of education in the next decade.

Author: Angela Yao

What is The Problem?

Classrooms today have barely changed from those of a hundred years ago. It’s the same desks, board, and lecture-first model. Step outside and nearly everything else has transformed from cloud software, to AI, to knowledge work that now drives the economy. This mismatch creates a widening gap in what is being taught and what skills are actually valued in the labor market.

This problem is bigger than most of us realize. One U.S. survey shows student engagement drops sharply from fifth to 12th grade, with the largest declines in feeling interested and challenged. Educators feel it too. They are under-resourced and low on time. They are busy managing behavior, paperwork, and tests, leaving little bandwidth to reimagine learning for a digital era.

Meanwhile, the age of AI enables careers that will soon span multiple identities from tradesperson, to entrepreneur, to creative, often within a single decade. Yet our systems offer little in the way of continuous, stackable upskilling. By 2027, six in ten workers will need re-training, roughly 2.2 billion people worldwide, but clear, affordable pathways to reskill are still the exception, not the rule.

How Can VCs Transform Education?

Fortunately, the technology to transform learning is mostly already here, and what lags is adoption. That gap is an enormous opening for venture to drive change and win.

Our ITN assessment highlights that future-proofing education is likely one of the greatest issues of our time, vastly neglected, and something that venture can make a meaningful difference in.

The problem is that most capital props up legacy models rather than backing truly transformative approaches.

If VCs fund products that personalize to each learner, adapt rapidly to industry needs, and make learning genuinely engaging, the result is better mastery, placement, and wage gains for learners of all ages.

How Might the Future of Education Look?

The dominance of AI is growing by the day. To give students the best chance of success, we must rethink both what we teach and how we teach it. This requires us to treat AI not as a threat to be gatekept, but as a tool to be integrated. When used thoughtfully, AI can help students think more critically, learn more efficiently, and connect more meaningfully with one another.

Draper has continuously invested in companies building exactly that future. We spoke with a few to hear how they envision the future of education and work. Here are the ideas we’re most excited by:

The Vision According to StayQrious:

StayQrious is building remote, project-based classrooms with STEM and AI at the core, starting in India, with global ambitions. The model centers on live learning coaches, small groups, and real-world projects that build emotional resilience, problem-solving, and collaboration alongside hard skills. Rather than banning AI in classrooms, StayQrious embraces it, creating their own models to help students prepare for a world where AI usage is the norm.

Cofounders Aanand Srinivas and Shankar Ram imagine technology that amplifies every child’s growth: “It knows what your aspirations are and what your psychological makeup is, giving every child the power of multiple personal coaches in one.” In that world, a student acting out isn’t an isolated incident. A coach can trace it to last week’s conflict with a friend and guide better regulation and focus.

Teachers remain central. On fears that AI erodes critical thinking, Aanand cites MIT research showing that AI when used thoughtfully can demand even deeper reasoning than that brought about by textbooks. For him, the question isn’t whether to use AI, but how to use it more effectively.

The Vision According to Stemuli:

Stemuli turns learning into an immersive, AI-powered game where students follow personalized quests, practice math and physics, and simulate career paths long before they enter the workforce. The learning adapts through AI-generated prompts that meet each learner where they are.

Their next phase is moving towards a lifelong learning companion that’s knowledgeable, funny, and ever-present, creating games and dialogues uniquely tailored to the learner. As founder & CEO Taylor Shead puts it, “it’ll be way more engaging than any of us have ever experienced— it’ll truly be taking place anywhere and everywhere that we are.” This isn’t about more screen time, it’s about learning with you in the flow of daily life.

The Vision According to Forte:

Breakthrough learning technologies won’t matter if huge swaths of the world can’t access them. Forte tackles this by asking society to pay for results, not inputs. In this model, private investors fund education upfront, and governments repay from a share of the increased tax revenue generated when learners land better jobs. Incentives align around outcomes, enabling real opportunity for everyone.

Founder & CEO Nat Ware notes that in most cases, “the total benefits of education far exceed the total costs,” and Forte’s model converts that surplus into broad access. As technology speeds up job change, Forte also enables adults to reskill continuously, lowering the barrier to pivot from one role to another, so more people can reach their potential, and economies can get the talent they need.

What Is the Largest Barrier Standing in the Way of These Visions?

Despite the ambitions of startups and the growing urgency felt by parents, the education system remains stubbornly resistant to change.

In countries like the U.S., bureaucracy means even minor curriculum updates can take months or years. In the global south, infrastructure gaps make consistent access to education a distant dream. Meanwhile, many investors remain jaded by past edtech false starts.

For most, long sales cycles and cautious funders might be dealbreakers. But for companies like StayQrious, Stemuli, and Forte, these are simply challenges to solve.

StayQrious is scaling in India, where uneven public education has led to a thriving private market and a parent base already willing to pay for better outcomes. And Stemuli and Forte sell directly to workforce-driven buyers such as ministries and state governments, who recognize the looming talent gaps and are prepared to pay for measurable results.

Where VCs Can Move the Needle Now

The founders shaping the future of education are focused, evidence-driven, and building with AI at the core. They are creating models that deliver real gains in engagement, mastery, and lifelong earning power.

Venture capital is key in helping them prove what works. By starting with buyers who move faster— parents, adult learners, and workforce-driven institutions, these companies build momentum that slow-moving school systems cannot ignore. Bureaucratic systems will soon feel the pressure to adapt.

This is not about marginal improvements in education. It is about embracing AI to rethink how people learn, grow, and thrive at scale. The opportunity is large, the timing is right, and the impact extends far beyond returns.

The future of education is already being built. It's time to fund it.

Also Read:

How Can VCs Identify the Most Pressing Problems (and Biggest Opportunities) of Our Time?

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