Cooperation between two countries on educational AI

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Monday 25th of May , my co-founder Romana FINŽGAR stood in front of a room full of fellow educators and presented DOQENT the AI-powered teacher productivity platform we've been building together at Utrip prihodnosti 2026 (UP2026), the international education conference hosted by Šolski center Kranj.

Her talk, "Doqent: AI-podprt učiteljski pomočnik za sodobno pedagoško prakso" (Doqent: an AI-supported teacher assistant for contemporary pedagogical practice), was part of Track 3 on Active Learning and Contemporary Pedagogical Approaches.

There is something quite different about watching a product you co-built being explained by the person who actually teaches in a classroom every day. Romana didn't pitch features. She walked teachers through the five-step onboarding register, photograph your timetable, adjust settings, add the curriculum, and let the platform take over the rest in the language and rhythm of someone who knows exactly which minutes of a teacher's week are worth saving.

A few reflections from today:

→ The strongest validation for an edtech product is when a teacher presents it to other teachers, not when a founder presents it to investors.

→ Slovenia continues to punch above its weight in serious pedagogical innovation. The UP conference has been running since 2015 and the level of contribution this year was genuinely impressive.

→ Building a company across borders (Netherlands ↔ Slovenia) only works when your co-founder owns the part of the problem you genuinely cannot own yourself. Romana owns the classroom. I do not. That is exactly why this partnership works.

DOQENT is in late beta and we launch with Slovenian teachers first, with the Netherlands, DACH and the wider European market on the roadmap.

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