Brikap

Creating a Path Back to Education for Adults Left Behind

For many adults, leaving school does not mean leaving the need for education behind. Brikap was created around the belief that adults who have had limited access to formal education should still have a path to continue learning, build essential skills, and improve their opportunities.

For Juliana Velez, that belief took shape through the story of Paola, a teenage mother who left school to provide for her daughters and spent 22 years trying to complete her education, eventually succeeding at age 37. Juliana met Paola while working at Red Bull and spent two years supporting her development. Following Paola’s learning journey gave Juliana a firsthand understanding of the barriers and daily challenges faced by adults who have spent years outside the education system.

What stood out to Juliana was that Paola was not an isolated case. In Latin America, 83% of mothers have secondary school as their highest level of education. That number underscored the scale of a problem Juliana felt could no longer be overlooked.

Brikap focuses on adults with limited formal education, providing self-paced learning designed to remove access barriers and address the educational gaps left by years outside the system. The venture is also studying how its students learn and progress, using that information to refine its methodology and better understand how to serve this population.

For Juliana, the opportunity is to extend education to people who have already been left behind by the traditional system, helping them continue learning while building skills that can open new opportunities for work and beyond.