About us
Why we exist.
Exponential Scholars is a North Carolina nonprofit, founded in 2025. We help high-potential students in underserved communities reach outcomes that once felt out of reach — no matter what community they call home. Everything we do is free.
Our philosophy
We bet on potential and talent
We don’t focus on the résumé: the schools, the scores, and the connections a young person already has. We look at potential: how fast they’re growing and how far they could go.
Give the right young person the right chance at the right moment, and the whole path changes — for good. We call those moments inflection points, and creating them is the heart of what we do.
Opportunity that’s out of reach is potential wasted.
Luck is not a valid system. Brilliance can be found everywhere, and too many young people have their futures constrained by circumstances they did not choose.
Unblocking extraordinary talent creates extraordinary ripples across families, communities and institutions.
North Carolina is a microcosm of America. Our diversity, dynamism, and disparities make it an urgent place to act and an ideal place to build a model for the country.
Our team
The people behind the work
Holly grew up in rural North Carolina. A teacher spotted her potential, and a private school with full financial aid changed the arc of her story. That kind of luck should not be required.
Holly founded Exponential Scholars to build a system for finding highly talented young people in overlooked communities. She previously had a successful career in business and technology companies where she focused on building teams, cultures, and systems to attract, retain and grow highly talented professionals. She holds degrees from Harvard and Stanford.
Arvind has spent his career on a version of the same problem: talented kids, uneven opportunity. He invested in affordable private schools across Africa, Asia, and Latin America at Pearson, was the first North American hire at International Schools Partnership and grew the region from zero to eight schools, and most recently launched a new school model nationally with GT School. Along the way he has seen firsthand that the kids with the most capacity often have the fewest people around them who can see it and do something about it.
As co-founder and COO, Arvind runs the operating side of Exponential Scholars and owns delivery of its programs, from the NC Idea Challenge to what comes after it. He believes every kid deserves a healthy dose of ambition and that the job is to give them evidence of what is possible. He is doing this work in North Carolina because this is home and where he’s raising his family. He holds degrees from Yale and MIT Sloan.
Get involved
How you can get involved
We’re forming two founding groups of people who help shape what we do — light effort, big impact, with just a few calls or emails a year.
Founding Advisory Council
A founding group of about a dozen advisors — college-age and beyond — with roots in North Carolina, an “exponential arc” of their own, or deep expertise in education.
Learn more →Founding Teacher Network
A founding group of about a dozen teachers and school-based educators who help us decide what to build and tell us what's really happening in classrooms.
Learn more →