Cross your fingers. A finalist out of more than 230 teams competing to receive $100,000 in a Nevada Governor’s Office entrepreneur competition, Loogla is a unique web-surfing language learning tutor. You learn a language best when you care about what is being said. Loogla is like exploring the Internet in a foreign language next to an expert tutor guiding you, quizzing you, and lighting your way. Surf and learn, it’s really that simple. Loogla is a portmanteau word for Looking Glass Learning in honor of Lewis Carroll’s contributions to making linguistics fun. “He decodes language and makes it a game,” says Tyler Ulrich, co-founder. Just like in Through the Looking Glass, learning a foreign language is like stepping into another world, but Loogla makes the foreign familiar. Tyler’s idea was germinating back in 2006 when he resolved to pursue a goal of bilingualism to discover global opportunities. “In the most life-altering and difficult decision we’ve ever made,” says Tyler, along with his co-founder and partner Jen Peck, “we quit our jobs and moved to Latin America.” They soon found themselves on a “language learning plateau” as linguists call it. Despite earnest efforts, they struggled to become bilingual. After searching in vain for help, they consulted with world-renowned linguists, exhausted their savings and poured their hearts into building the solution they wished they’d had. Some call it “jaw dropping” after seeing a demo. Root these guys on (vote for them here) and see for yourself.