Santi 4 Sustainability & Sight @MIT

Vision Impaired Engineering Student Santiago
Hopes to Attend Global  Entrepreneurship Bootcamp & Solve World's Sight & Sustainability Challenges


Why We'd Love to Help Santiago

University student Santiago (Santi) Valasquez is an inspiration to us all in the university and startup scene at QUT.  

He does not see his vision impairment as a barrier to realising his dreams and, in doing so, helping others.

He's founded the startup EyeSyght which is developing technology to help vision impaired people (VIP) to better see. He also hopes to apply his engineering knowledge & innovation capabilities to address the world's sustainability challenges.

This is why we would love to help him, with any help you can offer too, to raise the necessary funds to pursue his education and accept a position at the life-changing MIT global entrepreneurship bootcamp.  

The bootcamp is perfect for Santi as it will focus on  empowering entrepreneurs and solving sustainability challenges. 

We would be most grateful, and so would Santi, for any help you can give in sharing Santi's story and/or donating.  Thank you so much!


Santi's Inspiring Story

Born vision-impaired, Santi has had to overcome great obstables, move countries to Australia, make sacrifices, learn a new language, and work harder than most of us to pursue his dreams, and study electrical engineering at university.

Santi is always finding innovative work-arounds to be able to do the things those of us with vision take for granted.  This makes him quite innovative.

Throughout his journey, Santi has continually inspired and encouraged others with his positivity, leadership, problem-solving abilities and desire to do good.

[Above: Santi (with guide dog Lockie) working with components to build an electronic circuit at a QUT engineering lab]

[Above: Santi working at a soldering station to build an electronic circuit with a fellow QUT engineering student Meg]

Santi's Passion to Help People & Planet

Santi loves studying electrical engineering and
has actively involved himself in the research, entrepreneurship and innovation communities at QUT, to develop the knowledge and skills to solve real world problems.


Santi is committed to helping the world's 285 million vision impaired people (VIP), having founded the startup EyeSyght.  

EyeSyght is developing cutting-edge technology to help VIPs better "see' visually complex information, with supporters including Vision Australia and QUT.


To assist his entrepreneurial endeavours, he's completed QUT Starters' student-run entrepreneurship course, and participated in and won challenges with, and funding from, QUT bluebox and QUT Creative Enterprise Australia.

Santi and his awesome guide dog Lockie are also both much loved members of QUT foundry - the university's hub for entrepreneurs and community.


Santi is often seen exploring the university to acquire knowledge about the latest research and technologies that might be applied to solve sight and sustainability challenges, as he pursues his parallel path as an innovative student entrepreneur.

[Above: Santi speaking with roboticist Gavin at the Australian Centre for Robotic Vision (ACRV) at QUT about robotics applications, including for sustainability in agriculture]

Global Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Sustainability

Motivated to solve grand challenges, Santi applied to the exclusive MIT global innovation and entrepreneurship bootcamp, which is being held at QUT in 2018.

We are thrilled that Santi has been selected to attend the bootcamp, to maximise his potential and impact as an entrepreneur, working alongside some of the world's brightest minds, who are united by a passion to help address the world's sustainability challenges.  

We hope Santi will be able to attend the bootcamp - he will need more funds to do so.


Co-Funding Santi's Bootcamp & Education

Santi needs to raise funds to accept and fund his position at the global entrepreneurship bootcamp and education.

To date Santi's been successful in attracting funds from QUT to pay USD$2000 towards the bootcamp.

He now needs to raise approximately AUD$6000 to cover the balance, which he needs to pay by January 10, 2018.

In addition to the bootcamp costs, Santi also has to pay  international student tuition fees.

He has applied for a scholarship to attend the bootcamp, but will not find out whether or not he is successful until after the due date for payment.  

If he is successful with a bootcamp scholarship, he intends to put these funds towards paying his international tuition fees.

Thank You for Helping

On behalf of our student entrepreneurs community, we want to thank you for reading about Santi's story.

We are so excited about his future plans, and hopes to bring solutions to the world's vision impaired and sustainability challenges.

Thank you in advance for any support you are able to give to help Santi, vision impaired people, and our planet.