Lucio Hightower-Rojas Wants to Solve Students’ Scholarship Struggles
As a high school senior, Lucio Hightower-Rojas (pictured above) is no stranger to tests, quizzes, essays and research. After all, he’s spent countless hours in his Los Angeles, California, high school putting quality time into all of the work. But when he began a year or so ago to search for scholarships to help him pay for college, he was kind of blown away by the time commitment and difficulty of navigating the process. And so was born Scholar Brilliance, the software business that he is launching with the help of his older brother and his mom to provide guidance and AI support to students seeking scholarship money for college. “We believe every student deserves a chance to achieve their academic dreams without the burden of debt,” says Lucio, who won the 2024 Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship National Entrepreneurship Challenge.
Wharton Global Youth caught up with Lucio a few months before graduation to learn more about Scholar Brilliance and his path toward future business leadership.
Be sure to click on the arrow above to listen to our podcast conversation. An edited transcript appears below.
Wharton Global Youth: Hello and welcome to Future of the Business World. I’m Diana Drake, managing editor of the Wharton Global Youth Program at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Each month on this podcast, I get to speak with innovative high school students from around the world. We share stories of entrepreneurship, grit, failure and discovery. It’s an exploration of the entrepreneurial mindset, and we always take away insights about business, people and purpose.
Today’s guest began building his problem-solving skills a few years back with the help of the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship. Assignments turned into a business idea, which led him deeper into the life of an entrepreneur.
Lucio Hightower-Rojas, welcome to Future of the Business World.
Lucio Hightower-Rojas: Thank you for having me, Diana.
Wharton Global Youth: Tell us about yourself. Where do you live and where do you go to school? I’ve also seen you described as a Los Angeles Urban League student. Can you tell us more about that?
Lucio: Yes. I live in northeast Los Angeles in a neighborhood called Eagle Rock and I’m going to school at Eagle Rock High School. It’s my senior year, so I’m graduating in June. Very excited for that. The Los Angeles Urban League was the program that first introduced me to entrepreneurship in Los Angeles. They taught me a lot about how to find business opportunities, how to do financials, how to pitch for businesses, and how to understand how businesses work under the hood.
Wharton Global Youth: Another description for you that I’ve often heard is that you’re a sharp entrepreneur. Let’s explore what that looks like. Our friends at the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship let us know that you were named the winner of their 2024 National Youth Entrepreneurship Challenge in October of last year. Congratulations on that big honor. The business you pitched to the judges is called Scholar Brilliance, an AI-driven platform that helps students improve their successes in the scholarship application process. Can you tell us more about Scholar Brilliance? What it is and how it works?
To clarify, a scholarship is financial support awarded to a student by governments, schools, or private organizations that’s based on academic achievement or financial need.
Lucio: Scholar Brilliance is a software I’m developing that’s main purpose is to help students find, apply to and then win scholarships. And right now, we’re focusing mainly on making it an AI coach that helps you find scholarships based on your interests, what grade levels you are in, and your grades. Then it also helps coach you through how to apply to the different scholarships, how to write the essays, and overall, just support to help you with scholarships. And that’s the main software element we’re building right now to help students with the application process.
Wharton Global Youth: When you say we, who do you mean?
Lucio: I’m building it a bit. I’m also working with my older brother, who’s a computer science major at UC (University of California) Santa Cruz, and he’s helping me a lot with coding and some of the technical stuff that I’m not completely familiar with. Then my mother is also helping me with some of the business stuff on it, and also some of the coding, as well. So, my brother, my mother and I are all focusing on building this software.
Wharton Global Youth: Lucio, you’re a senior in high school, and you’re no doubt familiar with the scholarship process. Can you talk about how your own experience helped to inform your entrepreneurial mindset around Scholar Brilliance? When did you realize students could use more guidance? What was it like with your process?
Lucio: About the fall of junior year in high school, as I was going through the process of applying for scholarships, I realized it was a lot more difficult than I thought it was originally. I was trying to find scholarships that were a lot smaller and hidden on the internet and trying to find those through different local community organizations and different schools. And then having to write a bunch of different essays, which is a whole thing on top of my current schoolwork. It was very difficult to have to research the organization, then write essays that would match what they were looking for. As I was going through that process of spending almost all Saturday and Sunday after I finished my schoolwork working on scholarships, I realized this must be a large problem for a lot of people, and this could be a great business I could start and pioneer to help students like me with the cost of college.
Wharton Global Youth: I really want to hear more about the students like you. Can you share some of your experiences that you’ve had with other high school students? Maybe you were gathering research for Scholar Brilliance to better understand the market? What have you learned about the human side of your product development?
Lucio: I’ve spoken to a lot of my friends and my older brother’s friends who he’s in college with, and a lot of it’s just trying to make it as easy and simple as possible, because a lot of students like myself, my brother, are doing a bunch of homework and essays and practice preparing for tests for school, and then having to focus on a whole new thing that’s completely foreign, which is scholarships. And there’s not really any training or any help when it comes to scholarships at most schools or public schools where I’m from. So, helping [students] learn the entire new skill set and idea behind scholarships is something I found is a large problem with a lot of students right now. [We need to educate] them on how it works. And [we want to show them] that there is hope for that future — paying for college with scholarships. The second thing is showing them how their current college essays and job applications can be transformed into scholarship essays by just tweaking a couple things, so it seems less overwhelming. Another large thing was the overwhelm that students had when it came to applying for scholarships and writing essays for them and all that extra work they felt like they had to do.
Wharton Global Youth: It sounds like all this research that you were doing validated the idea for Scholar Brilliance. Would you agree with that?
Lucio: Yeah. I I first thought it was a large problem when I was in NFTE (Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship) and they were talking about how to find problems. But then when I spoke to all my friends and my brother, I realized it was much larger and much more difficult than I originally thought it was. It would be a great business opportunity to go and help solve that massive problem for a lot of students.
Wharton Global Youth: Have you reached the point of your prototype and product development with this that students are using a platform and able to benefit from the guidance that you’re providing through Scholar Brilliance?
Lucio: We have a prototype set up on our website right now, scholarbrilliance.ai, and it’s free. We’re getting feedback from our students and our users on what they like about it, and what we need to improve. We’re also focusing on the AI side of it more data on past winning essays so it can coach students better in the future. We are [monitoring] our user experience and our success with the platform and trying to get both of those metrics. [We hope to] improve them over the next couple of months so we can eventually launch fully and help students with scholarships consistently and successfully.
Wharton Global Youth: As the winner of the Youth Entrepreneurship Challenge, you won $10,000 and a 45-minute mentorship session with Daymond John. For those who don’t know, he’s the founder and CEO of FUBU, which is a $6 billion Hip Hop apparel company, and he’s also a shark on the TV show, Shark Tank. So Lucio, what was it like to meet Daymond John? What did the two of you talk about?
Lucio: It was a crazy experience. I’m super grateful for it, and it was also shocking and hard to even believe what was happening. But it was a great experience. I learned a lot. [One] of the things we talked about was: how do startups find opportunities? A big thing was how to test different ideas. So, for Scholar, I had a couple different ideas when it came to developing the software, and it was figuring out how I should test those without spending too much money — where it put all my eggs in one basket. But also putting enough effort into it, so I could have a good idea if it was worth it and if the market would appreciate that new idea. It was about understanding what your market wants and how you can make that and fulfill that desire with a product and testing out that product-market fit. That was a large component of [our mentoring session]. He was telling me that you should focus on testing with a lot of work and talking to customers directly. Then once you have that solid base of knowing exactly what they want, then you can put more money behind it and launch a test product and see how people interact with a real product.
Wharton Global Youth: So, you took away a lot of business lessons from it, but tell me about him. I want to know more about him! I want to know about the People’s Shark. Was he a nice guy? And did you guys meet in a restaurant, or did you meet in his office? What was it like?
Lucio: Yeah, he was great to talk to. He was very positive. And he was definitely the People’s Shark. We met on a Zoom conference. And over that Zoom conference, we simply talked about [business], and I took notes during the conference. It was very good to talk to him. He was very friendly, very open, and helped me a lot. He wasn’t judgmental, just helping me along like a mentor, and it was a very helpful and positive experience overall.
Wharton Global Youth: All right, so we talked about Daymond. So, how about that $10,000 [you won]? Are you investing it back into your business? And tell me more about the future of Scholar Brilliance after high school. Do you hope with your brother to keep making this a reality?
Lucio: For the $10,000 side of it, I’ve invested some of it in learning more and improving my coding and AI skills, as that’s one of the biggest things — how to make the software behind it a lot better. [I’m looking into] AI and coding courses and figuring out how that works. My brother also is helping me with that side as well. [I’m] also investing and figuring out more about the software side of it and I saved a bit of it for college as well. I’m also saving a bit for how we can create a backend for the entire system, so it can store a bunch of user information and have accounts — all that back-end work and software.
For the future of Scholar Brilliance, I see this becoming a full product that’s a full software that we can give to schools and sell differently to students, as well.
Wharton Global Youth: I suppose as the developer and founder of Scholar Brilliance, you are its first user, right? I’d love to know where you are going to college, and if it has helped you through the process — learning all of this about the scholarships and essay writing and all of it. What’s next for you?
Lucio: I’m going to college for business at UC Berkeley, here locally in California, and I have used my own product for applying to scholarships. I have $20,000 so far in scholarship money, and then I also plan on [using it to help me] with college application essays, which is another side feature you can use it for. Personally, I’m going to study business at UC Berkeley, and then focus more on learning how to share more of the stuff I don’t know about business, the more in-depth, advanced things, and taking that to Scholar Brilliance. And then eventually, [I want to] take that to the next level by putting a full product software company behind this.
Wharton Global Youth: How has your entrepreneurship journey empowered you in different ways? Did you confront any struggles along the way, and do you feel maybe they also helped you to grow?
Lucio: It has been a bit challenging with the competition side of it. And the coding side definitely was a big thing — I was not used to coding and software and product development. So that was a big hassle of figuring out how to learn all this information so fast that you could have an actual prototype by the NFTE [Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship] National Competition in November, and that was a big push. One of the main things I learned was how to use my time and prioritize my tasks so I could learn and get things done a lot faster, especially when I had such a tight deadline between November and October. So, that was a big lesson for me: how to manage time and how to get things done efficiently. That was a very large growing moment for me.
Also, with the whole NFTE competition, being able to speak on stage to a lot of people was something I had to work on. You progress in different competitions — locally, regionally and nationally. So, I had some experience with that in the past. But I became more comfortable talking on stage to a lot of people and slowing my words down. Being more confident on stage was something that I had to develop, and that’s helped me a lot over time, as well.
Wharton Global Youth: Let’s end with our lightning-round questions. Please answer these as quickly as you can.
What is something about you that would surprise us?
Lucio: I run marathons. I’ve run six LA marathons so far.
Wharton Global Youth: What would you like people to know about your hometown of LA?
Lucio: It’s a lot friendlier, and it’s a lot nicer, and actually gets cold here sometimes as well. It’s not always warm.
Wharton Global Youth: One thing you are excited to learn that you don’t yet know?
Lucio: I’d like to learn a lot more about business financials and accounting. And all that fun stuff.
Wharton Global Youth: What is a brand that you use and appreciate?
Lucio: I use a lot of Nike gear when it comes to running and working out. So probably my most used brand is Nike.
Wharton Global Youth: When was the last time you did something for the first time?
Lucio: Ice skating with my sister on my sister’s birthday, about three or four months ago.
Wharton Global Youth: How’d it go?
Lucio: It was good. I fell a lot on the ice, and it was a bit embarrassing, but I eventually learned how to get the hang of it. So that was good.
Wharton Global Youth: You’re hosting your own business-themed talk show. Who is your first guest and what is your first question?
Lucio: My first guest would be Mark Zuckerberg, and I’d ask him how he found his first investors for the company.
Wharton Global Youth: Lucio Hightower-Rojas, thank you for joining us on Future of the Business World.
Lucio: Thank you for having me.
Conversation Starters
What financial barriers do you see preventing students from accessing higher education, and how might technology help overcome them?
If you could design an AI tool to solve a problem you’ve experienced in school, what would it be and why?
Help Lucio do his research. What pain points and positives have you personally experienced with the scholarship search and application process? Share your ideas in the comment section of this article.
Hero cover image photographed by: Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE.com)
Reading about Lucio Hightower-Rojas and his journey with Scholar Brilliance started a feeling of hope within me. A lot of the time, the path to university feels really overwhelming, almost like a never-ending maze, especially for students who don’t have as much guidance and resources. Lucio’s work isn’t just a solution, I think it is also relief and a sense of possibility. I found myself reflecting on how many talented and brilliant students might be held back and not be able to continue their education not because of a lack of potential, but because of having to navigate scholarship opportunities. What moved me the most was Lucio’s firsthand understanding of these struggles and how it fueled his determination to help children around the world. I think it is a powerful reminder for all of us that innovation comes from real experience and also genuine care. His platform is more than just a technology to help students, I think it’s like a quiet revolution that tells students that your hard work has been seen, and help has arrived. This article got me thinking about the role that we can play in removing these barriers: whether it’s technology, mentorship, or just listening to the unheard voices. Lucio’s story is inviting us to look at challenge with creativity and also compassion. He reminds me that having progress isn’t just about making new technology and creating new tools, but to lift other people as well. And I think that kind of leadership is more important than ever in our world today.
The genius lies in the AI-driven coaching. This isn’t just a search engine; it’s a strategic response to a complex problem, designed to demystify the entire application journey from finding niche scholarships to perfecting essays. This level of comprehensive support directly addresses the human element often overlooked in such processes. While the AI’s role in coaching and guiding essay writing here seems incredibly valuable, I personally have reservations about AI’s broader application in generating creative or academic content.
I totally agree! In this day and age AI is a powerful tool (if you use it right). In terms of academics, I completely agree with what you said. However, I think that Lucio intended for Scholar Brilliance to be a tool used to find and set the basic outline for some essays, not to guide the essay as a whole. Nonetheless, I personally believe that AI does not have the creative component that humans have, but they can be helped to generate ideas and such.
The restriction of higher education for talented students across the world due to financial struggles is a true loss to the entire world in general. Wasted potential is an issue that is easily surmountable, especially in this technological era, yet is still a tragedy in our daily lives that students face. I believe that technology, and especially the rise of AI, can serve as an additional eye for colleges or for any institution to look out for students with unique talents. Technology and AI could become the bridge for these institutions to find students, through the use of databases for students’ extracurricular activities, achievements, interests, ect, and will be able to highlight and flag students regardless of their background, ensuring equality in judgement and allowing more student’s talents to be fully utilized. Of course, large movements and changes such as the implementation of AI into colleges and schools take time, and trial and error. While Artificial Intelligence is not perfect, I believe that further integration of AI into the education system will prove to be a worthwhile investment for the future of the world.
I want to push back a bit regarding the idea that wasted potential is “easily surmountable,” even in this age of technology. Although technology and AI work in ways that can ultimately open access for many, I would argue that realizing human potential is not just a matter of technology. It’s a matter of context, support, and opportunity—the same things many students are missing, whether we are in a digital age or not.
Even if technology can help identify people’s talent, I do not think wasted potential is something that can be addressed shallowly with technological interventions in the short- or medium-term future. Structural barriers like multi-generational poverty, access to quality education, and connections to opportunities are not challenges that a platform or an algorithm can change. These are deeply troubling issues that require a human approach and need supportive mentors, inclusive schools, and equitable funding. While AI platforms may be able to elevate a student’s accomplishments, they can never compensate for the missed experiences of being overlooked, underrated, and/or unsupported for many years. Meaningful change will require a focus on supporting people and systems, not just technologies.
With that said, I would like to make sure I don’t miss your core point: AI can serve as a tool for change if used responsibly and paired with equity-centered design. But if we really want to fight wasted potential, we need more than AI—we need empathy, equity, and commitment.
Lucio’s account touched me! Being a Year 10 student focusing in NeuroEd and the CFA Investment Foundations, I can relate to how intimidating searching for scholarships is to me and my family. To see how Scholar Brilliance simplifies this process with AI assistance fills me with hope that students such as myself can concentrate on learning without worrying about finances.
I appreciate that Lucio’s platform goes beyond telling students what opportunities exist. It assists students with applications and in writing essays. This personal assistance reminds me of the way NeuroEd individualizes learning according to an individual’s energy and attention. It’s support for actual human needs.
My family and I need scholarships to fund college—particularly as college prices are increasing. Lucio’s project is not just intelligent—it’s personal to me. It illustrates that receiving scholarships ought not be a matter of chance or limited to some fortunate individuals. If tech can simplify the challenging journey, it can benefit numerous families.
Thank you, Lucio, for believing that every student deserves an opportunity. Your words encourage me to continue creating resources that benefit students to become better, regardless of their origin.
Having an AI tool that assists students with their scholarship applications is a significant advancement, enabling all high schoolers, including those facing financial burdens, to navigate the process more easily. Scholar Brilliance is not a great tool just because of how people can save time and money; it is a helpful software for all families due to the fact that it is developed by a high school student who understands and has gone through all the difficulties that many others have.
In my opinion, Lucio’s story is not just a real-life example of using entrepreneurship to solve a real problem; it is also a story of how an individual can develop from his or her journey. He mentioned that coding was not what he excels at, and his software is not just a product of what he wants to solve and his work, but a mix of support from his family. Lucio’s story truly inspires me to see how I can turn my hardships into a great experience. As a newcomer to the US, I moved here one year ago, and I struggled with making friends because of my fear of being judged based on my culture and anxiety about talking to people coming from a different culture than mine. Therefore, after reading the story of Lucio, the idea of one day, if I could develop an app that helps students to connect based on their interests, hobbies, and the most important thing about the software is that new students can use this app to find students who are also new the school system. It is a social version of a dating app, but rather used for socialization at schools.
Even though right now, I am only a rising junior in high school and have not gone through the college admission process yet, I could now start envisioning my own obstacles when applying for scholarships. Coming from a middle-income family, which is a lot of the times referred to as “too rich for scholarships but not enough to pay for institutions,” this financial hardship might prevent students from studying in private universities where they are accepted but require them to pay $70,000 a year. For that reason, I hope that Lucio’s software might also be able to solve this issue in some ways.
To wrap up, Lucio’s journey shows that our difficulties can lead to innovative solutions, not just for ourselves, but for others walking the same path. Many others might be in the difficulties that you are in.
Reading Lucio’s story felt like a mirror. As someone going through the pressures of college admissions and the unique world of financial aid, I found myself agreeing with every obstacle he stated. The late nights comparing deadlines, rewording personal statements for ten different scholarships, meanwhile you wonder whether all these efforts would provide an opportunity. It’s a process that will often favors the the resourced students over the resilient ones.
What makes Scholar Brilliance so interesting is not just its use of AI, but the fact that the system is built by someone who truly understands from experience. If I would want to imagine something in the next five years, I would I imagine a future where applying for scholarships is no longer a burden to overcome, but part of a student centered journey.
Beyond personal experience, Lucio’s story stays with me because it reflects the foundation of entrepreneurial thinking – finding inefficiencies in existing systems and designing applicable solutions to battle the problem. That’s the kind of innovation Wharton teaches. Scholar Brilliance doesn’t just solve an important problem – it redistributes opportunity between anyone.
Lucio reminds us that the best startups don’t only begin in dorms; like Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook, but in lived experience. His journey is a case study in how technology, when used with compassion, can standardize access to something as important as education.
As someone hoping to study business at Wharton, this article didn’t just inspire me – it reminded me of the leader I want to become: someone who listens, builds on, and elevates others through innovation.
Lucio and I are very similar.
We both are in need of scholarships.
We both are not the best at coding.
Yet, we both try to solve those issues.
As a high school sophomore going into my junior year, I’m about to start the same process Lucio went through in his junior year of high school: applying for scholarships and writing essays on top of the already heavy workload junior year has to offer. His software, Scholar Brilliance, is a tool that is revolutionary and is a tool that I will definitely be using next year. Money should not be a reason that many students in the world do not have access to the education they deserve. Lucio identified this issue that he and many students across the globe are facing, and worked towards solving it. However, his business startup has taught me something else: that no business can be done as a one-man army. Despite the great idea that Lucio has, and the incredible pitch that he gave for him to win the National Youth Entrepreneurship Challenge last year, he couldn’t have executed his business without his brother and his mother. Without his brother’s coding and technical skills, and his mother’s planning and assistance on the business, Scholar Brilliance would have never come to life.
In my marketing business called Run-On, where my friends and I advertise and promote several businesses in the NYC area to increase customer interaction, we are in the same situation. None of us knew anything about building a platform. That is, until one of their family members came in and helped us set the base for our business. As young entrepreneurs, guidance is a crucial part of the entrepreneurial pathway. Without the people helping us in one way or another, we couldn’t have done it alone.
What surprised me while listening to this podcast, however, was that Lucio ran six marathons. What surprised me even more was that Lucio was able to execute his business while being a great athlete as well. Building a business has its ups and downs. There are times when you feel like giving up, and there are times when you feel like you have the world at your fingertips. Those aspects are exactly what a marathon brings. At times, you feel like quitting. Yet, at other times, you feel like you are Eliud Kipchoge (the only person in the world who ran a marathon under 2 hours). As an entrepreneur and a marathon runner, Lucio definitely knows how far perseverance really takes you. The results speak for themselves.
At this time and age, AI is a tool that we should all use. From finding scholarships to finding the best restaurant in your city, AI is utilized in every aspect. Lucio’s Scholar Brilliance is truly an AI tool that perfectly helps students continue in their academic journey. In the near future, I hope that many entrepreneurs, including myself, start projects that help them and their own communities—in hopes of making money not a barrier for anything.
After learning about Lucio’s Scholarship Brilliance platform, I truly think it’s an inspiring, innovative solution to solving the overwhelming struggle to apply for scholarships. His personal experience of struggling to find and manage multiple scholarships is a real problem that many students face, and it impacts underprivileged individuals on an even stronger level. The fact that Lucio has already used his own platform to generate $20,000 in scholarship money displays the strong potential of Scholarship Brilliance to make a real world impact for the betterment of education. Although this platform is quite promising, there seems to be a few areas for growth and improvements. For example, there is a high chance that if multiple students rely on the same AI to write their essays, they will begin to sound generic and similar, preventing them from standing out from their competition in this process. Having an authentic perspective while writing essays is very important and crucial to achieving this goal, which is something that AI might not be able to replicate. However, I do find Lucio’s idea very inspiring, as it strives to present equitable opportunities and improve their accessibility for people of all backgrounds, regardless of their financial situation. His use of AI is very clever, and I believe there are many ways it can be implemented to better the school system. A problem that almost every student faces is maintaining a balance of tasks in group projects between each student. If an app was created to delegate tasks, provide reminders, allow communication between members, and track the progress of the overall group, AI could hold members accountable and make collaboration more efficient. Scholarship Brilliance seems to be a much needed response to the financial barrier in education and I hope it continues to contribute to the quality and fairness of education.
It’s truly striking how something that is meant to open doors, like a scholarship can quickly become an additional burden or barrier. As an international student coming from Poland, I’ve experienced myself how time consuming and challenging the process of applying for scholarships can be, especially considering that as mentioned, public schools as well as schools outside the United States can only give little to no guidance. Hearing Lucio describe how he struggled with researching opportunities and writing multiple essays while staying on top of his schoolwork, reminded me of my own experience tied to sleepless nights and uneasy reflections. Why is the system that was supposed to initially help students so inefficient?
These reflections came back to me when I heard about Scholar Brilliance. Lucio didn’t just simply improve the efficiency of applying for scholarships, but possibly empowered multiple students that were on the edge of abandoning their dreams just because they weren’t in a position to get proper guidance on how to acquire scholarships. Personally, I am truly grateful for his initiative because the system that allows young talented individuals to miss on a crucial opportunity just because they didn’t know where to look, doesn’t resonate with me.
Ultimately, I also find myself reflecting on Lucio’s future plans for his platform, as mentioned wanting to sell Scholar Brilliance to students. I fully understand the importance of a venture being sustainable, but on the other hand I’m wondering if Scholar Brilliance wouldn’t be more beneficial as a non profit, which could target students of all backgrounds across the world. My concern is deeply rooted in the fact that many unprivileged students are not able to afford any external application help, which makes me want to envision scholar brilliance as a tool which could make education more accessible and ensure equal opportunities.
I’m extremely excited to see how Lucio will balance scaling his platform with keeping it accessible to those who need it the most. Additionally, I truly hope that tools like Scholar Brilliance will be commonly treated more like a promise to every dreamer than just a product itself and I find the way how personal struggle can lead to developing a solution that goes far beyond ourselves is incredibly inspiring.
What if the biggest barrier to college isn’t how hard you work or your grades, but simply not knowing where to start? Every year, millions of dollars in scholarships aren’t claimed because many students feel lost trying to figure out the process. When I checked some scholarship websites, it felt overwhelming to see so many options with different deadlines and rules.
Lucio Hightower Rojas understood this problem and decided to create ScholarBrilliance. His software helps students by breaking the scholarship search into clear, manageable steps. Just like Duolingo makes learning a new language easier by turning lessons into small activities, ScholarBrilliance reduces choice overload, which means feeling discouraged from acting due to having too many options. It also personalizes recommendations to match each student’s interests and background, which boosts their confidence to take action.
Lucio’s story changed how I think about innovation. I used to believe that only adults with experience in big companies could build something that helps others. But Lucio proved that empathy and creative thinking can be just as important as professional experience when you want to solve a real problem.
His work also demonstrates how students can challenge systemic injustices themselves. Even with the existence of scholarship programs aimed at helping marginalized students, many still don’t apply because they feel unmotivated or overwhelmed. Therefore, ScholarBrilliance isn’t just a useful tool to simplify the scholarship application process, but it is also a model for how we can create more inclusive education.
Jeremy, I completely agree with what you said. So many students feel completely lost as they start their college journey, and you highlighted that perfectly in your first paragraph. It’s eye-opening to think about how millions of dollars in scholarships go unclaimed every year. It’s a clear reminder of just how overwhelming this whole process can be for many of us.
I find Lucio’s story incredibly inspiring! As someone who’s also trying to navigate the scholarship maze while preparing for college, I totally understand how confusing and time-consuming it can be. Scholar Brilliance seems like a real game-changer—something that’s actually built by students for students. It’s amazing how Lucio turned a personal struggle into a solution that’s already making a difference for others.
What I love about ScholarBrilliance is how it really feels like the support students need right now. The Duolingo comparison really clicked with me. Like learning a new language, understanding scholarships is a skill and breaking it into small, personalized steps helps students believe they can do it. I can’t help but wonder if future versions of ScholarBrilliance could offer things like peer-to-peer essay reviews or mentorship from past scholarship winners. That could elevate the whole experience!
Your thoughts on innovation really speaks to me. Lucio’s journey also challenges the traditional view of entrepreneurship. He shows us that you don’t need years of experience or a ton of startup capital to make a real impact. Sometimes, all it takes is the courage to tackle problems that others might overlook.
I hope ScholarBrilliance continues to grow and helps thousands—if not millions—of students navigate the scholarship process, including both of us. I’m excited to explore ScholarBrilliance and see how it can help make college more accessible, not just for me, but for so many others facing the same challenges.
This article is truly an inspiration for me. Just when I read this article, I understood that Mr. Lucio Hightower Rojas is truly shaping the world of scholarships by solving the scholarship issues faced by students.
Everyone talks about “free” scholarships, but there’s a hidden cost: energy. It’s not just the time it takes to apply. It’s the emotional exhaustion of constantly having to prove you deserve help.
That’s why Lucio’s Scholar Brilliance isn’t just impressive. It’s personal. It transforms what feels like a lonely uphill climb into something that feels more like collaboration. As someone who has worked with kids with disabilities through music, I’ve seen how support systems often matter more than talent. Most students don’t fail because they lack ability. They fail because they are alone.
Lucio’s idea helps bridge that gap. Still, I think it could go even further. What if the app helped students connect with each other through essay swap circles, peer edits, or small accountability teams? College access is not just a technology problem. It is a community problem.
Scholar Brilliance already says, “You’re not starting from scratch.” I’d love to see it also say, “You’re not doing this alone.”
To me, scholarship season is when caffeine becomes your trusty sidekick and deadlines the villain in your life story.
As the daughter of immigrants, I’ve always treated opportunities like currency—precious, hard-earned, occasionally serendipitous, and certainly not to be wasted. That’s why Scholar Brilliance excites me. It rewrites the narrative for students who aren’t just seeking funding, but recognition. Recognition that we are capable, worthy, and already doing the work—even if we don’t always have the language, connections, or confidence to package ourselves that way. We need tools that don’t just filter by criteria but recognize character.
Lucio isn’t just solving a logistical problem—he’s restoring faith in the process.
What stood out to me most in Lucio’s story wasn’t just his idea—it was his motivation. He didn’t wait for a polished success story before giving back. He built Scholar Brilliance during the struggle. That kind of innovation doesn’t trickle down from the top—it rises from the inside out.
I used to resent how hierarchical education felt—how decisions and systems were built around students, meant to serve us in theory, but rarely shaped with our input—the voices of those actually navigating them. Over time, though, I’ve realized that education is evolving. It’s becoming more democratized, more accessible—thanks to people like Lucio, who chose a passion that aligns with both his lived experience and academic interests, and used his skillset to make the scholarship process less overwhelming. He didn’t just identify a problem; he built something that speaks directly to the student experience. By applying technology with empathy, he made the process clearer, kinder, more accessible—and, most importantly, more human. His story reminded me that clarity comes from experience. And when people with lived insight create tools for others, they’re not just building solutions—they’re building futures.
Like Lucio’s experiences with the Los Angeles Urban League, my time in DECA (an international business organization for high school students) has been incredibly eye-opening. It taught me the nuts and bolts of business. I slowly learned the ropes—how to interpret data, market, and brand—but also how to craft meaningful products and personas.
I’ve stood in front of judges not just pitching products, but pitching myself—crafting a story, defining value, and learning how to turn statistics into strategy, and projects into practices of self-advocacy. The scholarship process feels eerily similar: you’re selling your story, your drive, your potential. But without a coach, it’s easy to feel like you’re failing at a game you were never taught how to play.
As a rising senior and soon-to-be first-gen college student, I often find myself at the crossroads of ambition and anxiety. I want to chase my dreams in business and entrepreneurship, but I also carry the invisible weight of navigating a system my family never had access to. The scholarship search has felt like a full-time job with no guaranteed payout.
Lucio’s story helped me see that sometimes, it’s about creating your own path when no blueprint exists. Watching Shark Tank taught me that the best entrepreneurs solve problems born from personal pain points—and Lucio embodies that mindset beautifully.
Reading about Lucio’s family-powered approach—his brother coding, their mom strategizing—reminded me that entrepreneurship is rarely a solo journey. It’s a relay race of shared dreams, cultural values, and grit. Scholar Brilliance isn’t just a tool; it’s a community-driven solution built by an entrepreneur who has lived through the struggle. And that, more than anything, gives me hope that the next generation of first-gen students won’t have to run this marathon alone.
As a rising high school junior, I’m constantly balancing homework, AP classes, SAT prep, extracurriculars, family responsibilities, and just trying to have a life. People always say “just apply for scholarships,” but honestly, the whole process feels like trying to unlock a secret level of high school no one really teaches you how to navigate. You Google things, scroll through sketchy websites, and then stare at a dozen open tabs wondering if you’re even eligible for half of them. It’s stressful, time-consuming, and way more confusing than it should be.
Reading about Lucio made me stop and think. Here’s someone who was facing the same frustrations so many of us feel — but instead of just pushing through it alone, he built something to help everyone else. Scholar Brilliance isn’t just a cool tech project. It’s a product born out of real struggle, and that’s what makes it so powerful. He took something messy and overwhelming and started to make it manageable. I especially liked how he talked about using old essays and tweaking them to fit new applications. That one tip alone would’ve saved me hours, if not days (not really).
Lucio’s story reminded me that entrepreneurship doesn’t have to be flashy or complicated. It can start with one person saying, “This shouldn’t be this hard,” and deciding to do something about it. I haven’t applied to any scholarships yet, but now I’m thinking about how I could use Scholar Brilliance when I do. More than that, I’m thinking about the other problems around me — things I’ve just accepted as “part of the process” that might actually be fixable if I put in the effort.
Lucio made me realize that business isn’t just about money or starting a company. It’s about paying attention to real problems, especially ones that affect your own community, and being brave enough to try to solve them.
Thank you for sharing this Eric. I completely understand you. As a fellow high school student maintaining school, extra curriculars, and planning for the future, I can completely relate to the feeling that no one teaches us how to beat scholarships. I appreciate how honestly you captured the struggle. Talking about the fight with scholarships is something so many of us experience but don’t always admit it to the public.
I also really enjoyed your reflection on Lucio’s journey. I agree that entrepreneurship doesn’t need to be flashy or ostentatious to get the eyes of people. Your comment allowed me to not only see this story as a tech success, but as an example of using personal struggle to create something helpful for others. Isn’t that what innovation is all about?
I’d like to add one thought. Maybe this kind of community-based problem solving is the future of business. What if more of us approached challenges like Lucio did? My favorite saying is to truly achieve something you have to desire it more than anything else, cut off all bridges behind you. Lucio had this desire that the world nowadays needs, and we could be next to follow the same footsteps.
“Dreams shouldn’t be stopped by digits.”
As a student from a small village in Punjab, I see financial barriers everywhere — costly coaching, limited exposure, and zero guidance for scholarships or global programs. Many brilliant students give up not because of talent, but due to lack of money and mentorship. It feels unfair.
If I could design an AI tool, it would be called EduBridge — a multilingual app that guides students step-by-step through scholarship opportunities, helps fill applications, gives real-time reminders, and even auto-formats resumes and SOPs. For students like me who don’t have expensive counselors, this would be a game-changer.
During my own scholarship research, I often found:
~Too many confusing websites
~ No idea which scholarships I was eligible for
~Deadlines that passed before I even heard of them
~ But I also saw hope — platforms like Wharton Global Youth that open doors for everyone.
Technology can turn confusion into clarity, and I want to be a part of building that future — where no student feels left out because they can’t afford a coach or a laptop.
“Education is the passport to the future, and tech should be the ticket.”
– Jasmeet Kaur, Class 9, Punjab, India