Three major Bay Area companies joined together Tuesday night at an academic pep rally to encourage students to love math.
The San Francisco 49ers and Google.org joined the Khan Academy to celebrate the start of the academy’s second annual Learn Storm.
More than 300 students, teachers and parents packed an auditorium at the Googleplex in Mountain View and listened to Google employees, educators and football players share times they struggled on the field or in school and how they succeeded.
Learn Storm is a free nine-week challenge to further students’ math skills and to teach the importance of perseverance.
.@TorreySmithWR rocking the mic at the launch of the #49ers partnership with the Khan Academy. pic.twitter.com/pzIPexj2NQ
— Joe Fann (@Joe_Fann) February 3, 2016
ALLLL the confetti at our #learnstorm Bay Area kickoff today pic.twitter.com/f5DDUkyr68
— LearnStorm (@LearnStorm2016) February 3, 2016
“You know you always imagine these football players as these kind of perfect, super strong people but when they talk about the times that they struggled, the times that they weren’t sure that they weren’t going to make it, and how they showed perseverance and grit, it makes a big impact frankly not just on the students,” said Sal Khan, founder of khan academy. “It made a big impact on me.”
The 49ers invited some of their football buddies to join them at the event. Denver Broncos safety Omar Bolden stepped away from super bowl practice to speak at Tuesday’s event.
He’ll be at Levi’s stadium for the big game, where a few weeks later the students will gather again to celebrate the end of the learn storm challenge.
