A Vision to Reclaim Science For Everyone

In a Texas town, Jessica Ochoa Hendrix watched something disappear.

Walking through school hallways, she noticed when science stopped being for girls like her. By eighth grade, many had already decided: science wasn't for them. It wasn't that they couldn't do it. It was that they couldn't see themselves doing it.

Years later, she and her co-founder Mandë Holford, PhD, founded Killer Snails(opens in a new tab) to intervene before that gap could form. They wanted to reach students young enough that science still felt like exploration, like play, like somewhere anyone could belong. "Even if you don't want to be a scientist," Jessica says, "we want you to be able to see yourself as one."

The Product That Teaches 

Killer Snails started with Google Cardboard, affordable VR headsets that let classrooms explore immersive science worlds together. It was collaborative, it was tactile, and it made abstract concepts visible. Then 2020 happened. 

When schools reopened, Jessica learned something jarring, "There was absolutely no chance that people were sharing headsets. None." The pandemic had shifted what felt safe in a classroom, and the shared-headset model vanished overnight. The product had to change.

I want them to understand that science is collaborative, it's exciting, and that anyone can be a scientist. 

The platform shifted toward Chromebooks, tablets, and iPads, devices that felt natural in a classroom, that didn't isolate the learner. The core mission stayed intact: make science feel collaborative, exciting, and possible for everyone. But along with the product pivot, came the desire for growth.

The Moment It Became Real

Killer Snails started as an experiment and grew to change the way students engage in class by making inventive learning experiences that are accessible for educators and students. But experiments don't pay people, and Jessica knew she needed a team to make this real. The inflection point came through an SBIR grant, a small business innovation research grant that gave her something most early education companies never get: breathing room. The first Phase 1 grant, roughly $150K over six months, made it possible to stop hedging. The larger Phase 2 grant made it possible to hire and expand.

But the weight of that responsibility never left her. 

The idea of us not being able to make payroll was terrifying. That would be the single biggest fear. 

It wasn't just about cash flow. It was about the people who had decided to bet their livelihoods on her vision. She had made a promise to them not just to pay them, but to pay them consistently, reliably, fairly. 

But as the team grew, a constraint appeared that no amount of scrappiness could overcome: health insurance. Early on, hiring had been simpler, the first employees all had partners with health insurance. Then Jessica found a candidate she really wanted, but they didn't have that safety net. "I realized I need to find a way to get health insurance for my people," she remembers. The company had to figure out how to offer quality benefits, and that's what led her to Justworks.

But it wasn't just about enrollment. Healthcare continuity became an ongoing fear, not just getting coverage once, but not losing it when times got uncertain. That uncertainty became real during the SBIR freeze in early 2026. Justworks didn't just process her furloughs; we walked her through what to do and how to document it, turning a painful decision into one she could execute with confidence.

"There's always somebody live who will chat with you," Jessica says about Justworks. In moments like that, when the stakes are highest, that presence matters more than any feature.

The Vision Forward

With health insurance handled and payroll running seamlessly, Jessica and Mandë are expanding. A new product called Trend Trackers is launching, focused on data science and digital fluency. But the expansion isn't about getting bigger for size's sake. It's about reaching more moments in a student's journey where they can reclaim science as theirs. 

That belief, that science belongs to everyone, has to compete with all the moments that tell girls otherwise. And it's the belief they're building a company to prove true…one district, one classroom, one student at a time.