What Matters To Me: Henry Motte-Muñoz

Meet the man who’s making it easier for young Filipinos to apply to university

In the What Matters To Me series, a Generation T honouree describes what they do, why they do it, and why it matters.

Henry Motte Muñoz has revolutionised the business of applying to university for young Filipinos with his platform Edukasyon.ph, which connects prospective students to colleges at home and around the world. His intention is to use the platform as a springboard to create better informed, more rounded citizens. Here, he describes his work in his own words.

I started my career in finance, working in investment banking and private equity in London for Goldman Sachs. I enjoyed my time in finance, but I also itched to do something at home in the Philippines that would give back to the community. So after a couple of years in finance I took my MBA in the US, which was where I came up with the idea of doing Edukasyon in the Philippines. We started the company in 2015 and I moved back here that year. I’ve been doing it ever since.

Edukasyon.ph is a curated platform that connects students to existing opportunities and service providers in education. We help about 10 million students a year to be better informed in making decisions about their education, their career and their life choices, even in terms of understanding oneself and picking up skills like financial literacy—anything that helps you be a rounded, self aware, confident citizen who is able to get into their dream university and careers.

My dream is for a country where students don’t just get access to a quality academic education but a holistic one as well

- Henry Motte Muñoz -

We connect students to universities both at home and abroad. We’re the biggest platform for Filipino and international universities, senior high schools and technical vocation institutes. I think we have more than 10,000 institutions on the website that people can look at, and more than 500 that they can apply to online. We’re currently adding online education to our roster too. Apart from that, they can also come to us to help them look for scholarships. It’s one of the things we launched in 2018. Our dream is to get half a million scholars by 2020.

Students who are already in university can also use the platform. If you’re currently a college student, you can find everything—information like study hacks, how to manage your budget, how to look for internships, how to prepare for graduation, what other skills you could be picking up before you graduate and how to think about jobs after graduation. So there’s a lot on the site apart from getting connected to schools.

My dream is for a country where students don’t just get access to a quality academic education but a holistic one as well. Being educated is not just about getting a degree; it’s about picking up skills that prepare you for the workplace and becoming a responsible citizen who knows how to vote and pay taxes, one who cares for the environment and cares about and understands our history. It’s not something to do by ourselves; I think it takes a village to raise a child. It’s going to take a lot more than a website to elevate all those values, but we’d love to play a part in that, no matter how small.

See honourees from the Education category of the Gen.T List 2019.

Topics

Philippines Entrepreneur

Tatler Asia

What Matters To Me: Henry Motte-Muñoz