Maia Sharpley

Maia Sharpley is a longtime education executive and venture investor who has worked across the public sector, large education companies, and venture capital. She brings more than 15 years as an education operator before and alongside her investing career. In the public sector she served as Executive Director of Operations for the New York City Department of Education — the largest public school system in the U.S. — reporting directly to the Chancellor. In the corporate world she was Corporate Vice President for Strategy and Innovation at Kaplan, Inc., where she managed the company's edtech portfolio and administered Kaplan's relationship with the Techstars-Kaplan edtech accelerator in New York; she also served as Executive Vice President of Innovation and Strategic Initiatives at Charter Schools USA.

Sharpley moved into venture capital as a Partner at Learn Capital, one of the best-known education-focused VC firms, where she was noted as the only woman on the core investment team (she joined around 2018). In January 2020 she helped stand up a new fund, and in December 2020 co-founded and became Managing Partner of Juvo Ventures — a rebrand and expansion of New U Venture Partners, originally a partnership between Western Governors University and EPIC Ventures. As a minority-led fund, Juvo broadened its scope beyond higher education and workforce training into K-12, early childhood, and international markets.

Most recently, Sharpley founded and is Managing Partner of Odonata Ventures, which she publicly launched in October 2025 with "a new approach to early-stage private credit" for education companies. She is also the founder of Innovation for Equity, a nonprofit uniting education and workforce leaders to improve outcomes for Black learners, and she serves in an advisory/board capacity connected to the Education Development Center (EDC).

Sharpley is a U.S. patent holder and a Kauffman Fellow. She earned a BA in Political Science / International Relations from Trinity College (Hartford, CT) and an MBA from the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan. She is a frequent speaker at industry events including the ASU+GSV Summit, SXSW EDU, and youngStartup Ventures.

• Invests in technology-enabled education companies with the stated aim of generating significant market returns "alongside human impact"; her ASU+GSV profile cites portfolio IRRs in the 30–65%+ range.
• Discipline over hype: as a minority-led fund she and her Juvo partner pushed back on inflated valuations, emphasizing that "business models matter. Unit economics matter."
• Stage & checks (Juvo): $1M–$5M into Series A and later-stage companies; broadened scope to K-12, early childhood, higher ed, workforce training, and international markets (excluding China/India).
• New direction (Odonata): an "early-stage private credit" model — financing education and workforce companies through credit structures rather than only equity, a differentiated approach to funding the sector.
• Equity lens: her nonprofit Innovation for Equity signals a durable focus on companies improving access and outcomes for underserved and Black learners.