Hi, I’m Almar, a sophomore at UATX and an Alpha Fellow.

My journey began in music while learning at a Classical School up in WA. I mastered violin, oboe, and bass guitar while immersing myself in philosophy, logic, and rhetoric, disciplines that sharpened my analytical thinking, strengthened my problem-solving abilities, and instilled a deep sense of discipline and work ethic.

During high school, I also served as a violin instructor at the school’s conservatory, teaching six students at a time. That experience introduced me to the fundamentals of teaching, how to communicate clearly, adapt to different learning styles, and cultivate both skill and confidence in students while making it fun.

At UATX, I joined the professional world and began building real-world projects. I initially entered real estate, but my path eventually led me to EdTech. Through research and conversations with multiple educators, I identified two consistent challenges: teachers are often expected to operate like CEOs, managing operations, curriculum, and outcomes, without much support or compensation (60 hr work weeks sometimes), and an increasing amount of reading and writing instruction is being offloaded to AI. Seeing how I myself could easily delegate most of my cognitive work to AI, I found concern about the growing student reliance on these tools and the long-term consequences for critical thinking, and humanity itself.

That concern led me to found Reading Rooms with my friend Max.

Sponsored as an Alpha Fellow, I am currently developing a web-app designed to significantly reduce teacher workload while helping students excel in reading and writing through structured debate. We have spoken with over 30 teachers and have actively implemented their feedback, built a strong advisory board, and are in discussions with a large school to pilot the platform with a large possibility of securing a long-term partnership.