What if you spent 12 years chasing a dream, only to be stopped right before the finish line? That’s exactly the brutal reality for 1 in 5 students in Latvia who fail their high school math exam and lose their chance at a diploma.
But one man decided to do something impossible to ignore.
At Latvia’s biggest sporting event – Riga Marathon – the crowd was buzzing. All eyes were on popular rapper Finkis, who had been hyping his first-ever marathon on social media for weeks. He trained. He posted. He rallied his fans.
And then, in front of 40,000 runners and national media… he did the unthinkable.
He stopped running just before the finish line.
Why? To make a statement about a broken education system that’s quietly failing thousands of kids.
Holding a bold yellow sign that read, “School is a marathon that every 5th child doesn’t finish,” Finkis turned his race into a powerful metaphor. The message? These kids aren’t failing — the system is.
The stunt went viral, sparking a national conversation and driving a 500% spike in teacher applications to Mission Possible, an NGO that helps ordinary people become extraordinary teachers.
“This is what it feels like for 1 in 5 Latvian students,” Finkis said. “You’re so close, but then you get left behind.”
School is a marathon that every 5th child doesn’t finish
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