Empathy, Belonging, and Student Voice | Dieumerci Christel

This episode of the Learning Can't Wait podcast features entrepreneur and EnlightApp founder Dieumerci Christel, a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree whose journey runs from a refugee camp in Tanzania to building an empathy-centered edtech company in the U.S. He shares how his father started the first school in the Nyarugusu refugee camp, how multilingual refugee youth’s talents were often overlooked, and how culturally responsive educators in North Dakota unlocked his potential by seeing his assets and pushing him beyond labels like “ELL” or “C student.” These experiences fuel his mission to translate empathy and student voice into actionable data for teachers, so they can build ongoing, deeply relational classrooms where students feel they belong and can differentiate themselves in an AI-driven world.​