Kumon Student Empowerment Event

New England Area Kumon Students Attended One-of- a-Kind Student Forum Panel of High-Achieving Kumon Program Completers Inspire Local Youth to Reach their Highest Potential.

Lexington, MA. (October 18, 2017) – On Saturday October 14, 2017, Kumon, the world’s largest after-school math and reading program, hosted a special forum for high achieving Kumon Students in the New England area. The forum is designed to motivate and inspire students to continue the path of advanced study and featured a panel of Kumon Program completers. This private event was held at The Scottish Rite Masonic Heritage Museum from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm. Students in attendance heard about the panel’s journey through the Kumon Program, their achievements outside of the classroom and advice on excelling in extracurricular activities.
“We’re excited to bring such a unique opportunity to Kumon Students in the New England area,” said Mari
Okazaki, Boston branch manager for Kumon North America. “Our panelists provided a fun and engaging space for students and their parents to learn how current academic efforts connect to future goals.”
Kumon, the world’s largest after-school math and reading program, understands the importance of advanced
study and discovering the true potential of children. Research shows that students reading above grade level in the third grade are more likely to graduate from high school at higher rates and students who take advanced math courses are more likely to attend and graduate from college. As a learning program based on ability rather than age or grade, it is common to see children in Kumon Centers studying math and/or reading material two to three years above their school grade level.
Kumon Student Forum Panelists:
Students heard from Pooja Chandrashekar and Mayank Dubey. Pooja is a dual completer from Washington, D.C. and has just begun her senior year at Harvard University. She is the founder and CEO at ProjectCSGirls, a non-profit organization working to close the gender gap in computer science and technology through running a national computer science competition for middle school girls and hosting workshops around the country.
ProjectCSGirls is completely youth-driven by high school and college-aged students. Pooja has done extensive
research in biochemistry and neuroscience including developing a new way to diagnose concussions with up to 90% accuracy and developing an app that helps diagnose patients with Parkinson’s disease with up to 96%
accuracy. She is also a lover of English and literature. She is currently studying biomedical engineering at Harvard.
(Pooja applied to eight Ivy League schools and was accepted to all of them).
In May 2017, Mayank graduated from Duke University with a double major in mechanical engineering and
economics. Recently, he started working at Raytheon in Andover, MA, as a member of their Operations
Engineering Leadership Development Program. This program is designed to develop high-potential, early-career talent for impactful individual contributor roles and leadership positions within Raytheon’s Integrated Defense Systems. Mayank has been an active member of the entrepreneurship communities in Boston and at Duke. He has competed and won in multiple startup competitions, and hopes to make a positive impact on the world through his engagement in Entrepreneurship.

Few students from the Kumon Math and Reading in Framingham attended the event one who finished the REading program in 5th grade and currently working on Trignometric Functions in 7th grade. The other student is working on Algebra II in 5th grade and one other who is working on fractions in 2nd grade. Congratulations to all students.