“I love learning. I see myself as a learning organism,” says Alvaro Fernandez, MBA ’01, MA ’02. He first came to Stanford as a student at the Graduate School of Business but when he heard about the dual degree program with the GSE, he applied right away—he wanted to learn more about learning. Seeing a disconnect between what scientists were discovering about the brain and standard practices in education and health care, Fernandez started a company called SharpBrains to help monitor developments in brain science and show how it can be applied to the real world. “The media doesn’t explain things very well. It’s always ‘new findings, new findings,’ but no one knows if it’s relevant to them or not,” he explains. He’s always excited about the prospect of learning something new. His latest challenge? He just completed his fifth cross-country skiing marathon, having only recently taken up the sport. “But maybe next year I can lower my time by 15 or 20 minutes!”