How it all began...
Taylor Gurnea and Cooper Richardson have owned and operated Boosted Learning, a private in-home tutoring company, since 2015. This private company has successfully served hundreds of students in the Washoe County area over the years. Though Boosted Learning has helped many families, they have desired a way to gain exposure and to give back to students that are considered educationally high risk. In 2018, Taylor and Cooper were approached by Washoe County Human Services Agency (WCHSA) to consider being a part of their program called Achievements Unlocked, which provides educational support to foster students that are under the care of their agency. Before the start of the school year Boosted Learning officially partnered with the WCHSA to help provide services to their students. After an incredibly successful year that nearly doubled the capacity of the program, it became clear that it was their passion to continue, and more importantly expand, their work with these amazing children.
What Comes Next...
Taylor and Cooper's involvement with providing tutoring services to the foster youth of Washoe County led to the birth of Boosted Diplomas, a 501(c)3 non-profit corporation with the mission to provide every child in the Washoe County foster system with the opportunity to excel in school and graduate with their diploma. Their goal is to expand the program until each child has access to the educational support they deserve. Boosted Diplomas will seek to ensure that each of these children are better prepared for life after high school and equipped with a plethora of opportunities to be successful in their endeavors whether they seek to enter the work world, vocational training or a college.
Meet the founders...
Taylor Gurnea
Taylor obtained a Bachelor’s in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Nevada in 2015. He is currently studying Medicine at the University of Nevada Reno School of Medicine in the class of 2021. Through years of experience in providing supplemental education to students in Northern Nevada, providing this vital educational support to students had become a personal passion. He believes that the hardest part of high school should not be getting access to supplemental resources that every student deserves. As a Co-Founder of Boosted Diplomas, he seeks to close the gap between struggling students and personalized educational support.
Cooper Richardson
Since first learning of what it meant to travel at the age of 12, Cooper was captivated by the idea of getting out and experiencing the world from other perspectives. Mid-way through his Mechanical Engineering undergrad career at the University of Nevada, he left Reno to do just that. After improving his Spanish while traveling abroad for nearly a year throughout South America, Cooper returned with a newfound appreciation of the endless possibilities that education could supply. Educational advocacy became one of his main passions, which in 2015, helped lead to the growth of his co-owned private tutoring company, Boosted Learning. In 2018, Cooper graduated with a Bachelor's Degree in Mechanical Engineering and a Minor in Spanish Language Arts from the University of Nevada. As the years passed, Cooper's involvement in the community continued to grow; co-founding Boosted Diplomas in 2019, aiming to guide and mentor foster youth of the Reno area.