Hello
Hello, I'm Orgesa Meli.
I didn't start Configur Academy because I had a business plan. I started it because one evening I sat across from my daughter and realised that the skills that had changed my life: how to speak in a room, how money actually works, how to back yourself when it counts, she hadn't learned them yet.
So I built a place where she could.
Who I am.
I spent 17 years in corporate finance, boardrooms, banks, pharmaceuticals, and start-ups. I loved it. But I spent most of those 17 years learning things I should have known at ten.
How to hold a room when everyone is watching. How to speak when your voice wants to disappear. How to understand money, not just earn it.
I left in my late 30s, and I finally knew exactly what I wanted to build.
So I built three businesses:
ConfigurAI, helping corporate professionals and organisations understand and actually use AI, without the overwhelm. Find more at https://configurai.com and the free AI newsletter at https://newsletter.configurai.com.
ConfigurSelf, a newsletter about health, identity, and building a life that actually fits you. Free newsletter at https://newsletter.configurself.com.
Configur Academy, the most personal thing I have ever created. Four programmes for children that teach everything I wish someone had taught me.
One mission running through all three. Build something that matters.
Rise to Lead
The programme for the child who has something to say but hasn't been given the room to say it yet. As a founding member of a public speaking club for adults, I've seen first hand how powerful these skills are, for confidence, for work, and for everyday life. I want children to experience that earlier, in a way that feels safe, joyful, and genuinely fun. Every Monday at Patch, children aged 8 to 12 debate, lead, speak, and surprise themselves. The term ends with a showcase where every single child stands up in front of their parents and delivers. I have watched children walk into that room barely able to make eye contact, and walk out with their heads up. That is worth more than anything I ever built in corporate life.
Young Founders House
The programme for the child who asks, but why, when they're told how things work. Because I believe the most important financial lesson a child can learn isn't about saving, it's about earning. Every child in Young Founders House borrows real money, builds a real product, and sells it at the Young Founders Market, a community event where children trade, pitch, and keep all their profits. My daughters, Eliza and Aurora, were the reason I started. Every child who walks through the door is the reason I keep going.
Configur AI Junior
The programme for the world our children are actually growing into. Every week a parent tells me the same 2 things: they do not want their child left unprepared for AI, and they do not want them anywhere near it. Both are right, and this club holds them together. The children never open an account or type into a chatbot. They learn what AI really is, a machine that predicts and is never a friend, how to catch it flattering them, how to tell what is real from what is made, and above all when to put it away and use their own brain. It opens in September 2026, and it is the club I most wish someone had built for me.
The Detective Club
The programme for the child who wants to know how to think, not what to think. Critical thinking, reasoning and problem solving sit at the top of every list of the skills children need, and no school timetable has an hour for them. So we teach them the only way children this age truly take them in, by having fun. Every Monday there is a sealed case on the table, and the children work in teams to crack it, weighing the evidence, cross-questioning a witness, working the numbers, and defending a verdict out loud. Ask them what they did and they will tell you they solved a mystery. They will not say it was an hour of proper reasoning, and that is exactly the point. It opens in September 2026.
This was never just about my kids.
Yes, it started with Eliza and Aurora. But the moment I opened the doors and watched other people's children walk in, something shifted. I want this for all of them. These clubs are starting small, but our intention is big: to help 1 million children by 2030 become more confident, capable future leaders, and to give 10% of everything we earn to support children who may not otherwise have access. Every child deserves this. That is why we are just getting started.
Want to know more? Email configuracademy@gmail.com, WhatsApp 07414 962803.
