UCL startup ZNotes wins Global EdTech award at QS Reimagine Education 2024

UCL alumnus Zubair Junjunia received the award, sponsored by Amazon Web Services (AWS), in recognition for his startup’s work to address educational inequalities.

His tech and social impact business, ZNotes, which he scaled during the second year of his master’s in mathematics at UCL, has now evolved into a global force. 

The business has grown into an online platform that now impacts over six million students with its free educational resources.

From informal beginnings to a global movement

Zubair started ZNotes over a decade ago, when he witnessed educational inequality himself at school. 

A tech enthusiast, diligent student and copious notetaker, he decided to build a website to post his class notes on for anyone to access freely. 

Since then, the ZNotes platform has developed into a global community giving millions of students across the world unrestricted access to high-quality educational content. 

Zubair said: "I was still a student at UCL when I attended my first QS conference, and ZNotes was evolving into a startup supported by UCL Innovation & Enterprise. 

“Back then, we had a reach of 2.5 million students. Over the next few years, we continued to develop our platform and received invaluable support from mentors and advisors in the UCL Hatchery. Today, our reach has grown by 140% to impact 6 million learners in over 190 countries."

Supporting students to grow their skills and ideas

Zubair has taken part in several UCL entrepreneurship programmes to help develop his venture. ZNotes was also part of the Hatchery incubator at BaseKX, UCL’s dedicated entrepreneurship hub, managed by UCL Innovation & Enterprise. Here Zubair received equity free office space, was matched with mentors and received tailored business support to grow his startup.

To win this prestigious award underlines ZNotes’ incredible efforts to level the education playing field through its community-driven online platform. It also highlights UCL's extracurricular support and commitment to help students develop their skills and ventures.  

Executive Director, UCL Innovation & Enterprise, Kathryn Walsh, said: “Congratulations to Zubair and team for this significant achievement. We're deeply proud to have been able to support Zubair with his vision and help him turn that vision into something which is now helping millions of students around the world.”

This year’s QS Reimagine Education awards attracted over 1,300 submissions across 18 award categories. The submissions were evaluated by a panel of more than 1,300 international judges and a Grand Jury of 50 global experts. 

UCL Provost talks about how to navigate disagreement successfully

UCL President & Provost, Dr Michael Spence, was also speaking at the event. He talked about the challenge of disagreeing well on university campuses and highlighted the proactive work UCL is doing in this space. 

Dr Spence discussed how UCL’s Disagreeing Well campaign is supporting students to make sense of a world in which not everyone thinks in the same way as them. 

Following his speech, Dr Spence took part in a panel event on the future of universities. The discussion centred on the challenge higher education institutions face in the context of changing funding models and economic pressures. 

A big part of how universities need to adapt, explained Dr Spence, will centre on how well we can provide students with the skills they need for the modern world.

ZNotes’ win shows that UCL’s support is helping students build the skills and confidence they need for real impact in the world.

Links

Find out more about:

• Entrepreneurship support for UCL students and graduates
• Znotes
• UCL Provost: We must learn to navigate disagreement successfully
• UCL startup ZNotes helps millions of students globally

Photo © Zubair Junjunia