At the Vidzeme Technology and Design Technical School, programming is taught by “expensive Jēkabs,” who receives three times the usual teacher’s salary. One part of Jēkabs Krīgerts’ (30) pay comes from the school, while the rest is covered by Draugiem Group. The company is also calling on other entrepreneurs to support schools in a similar, practical way.
When the school’s director, Artūrs Sņegovičs, and Draugiem Group co-founder, Agris Tamanis, take me into the programming classroom, I don’t yet realize I’ve arrived at a special moment. For the fourth-year students, it’s their final class before they start internships.
There are 20 minutes left until the end of the lesson. Instead of study material, the projector shows 40 little faces—the same emojis we use in text messages. Around fifteen boys sit in the classroom, and teacher Jēkabs Krīgerts asks them to pick one emoji to describe their collaboration during lessons, and another to express how they feel about going into practice. The first student chooses the starry-eyed face to describe the time in class, and for practice he selects both a broad smile and a thoughtful one. Another student associates the learning process with a party hat and confetti—but also with a tear rolling down his cheek. For practice, though, he chooses stars in his eyes. Once all the students have spoken, the teacher joins in too—on this Friday afternoon, he admits, he feels tired. This kind of “check-in” starts every lesson.

Agris Tamanis reveals that the teacher is called “expensive Jēkabs.” The nickname comes from the fact that, on top of the school salary, Draugiem Group adds a stipend equal to two more salaries. But let’s go back to the beginning.
At the Front of the Classroom
Five years ago, at a party in his home in Cēsis, Agris Tamanis was chatting with an English teacher. Around eleven o’clock, as the celebration grew lively, the teacher shared her pain: the school was missing a programming teacher. It was already December, and the students specializing in programming were still waiting for their instructor.
“After a glass of wine we were in higher spirits, more content with life, and she told it so movingly that, without thinking of the consequences, I said—fine, I’ll come!” Agris recalls. He had no experience as a teacher, but he had studied programming and worked with it daily. “When you hear it like that—one of the schools in your own district is in trouble… I thought, I can help, at least until they find a proper programming teacher.”
The next morning, Agris woke with some horror at what he had agreed to. “I’d said yes, and I couldn’t take my words back, pretending it was just a moment of weakness.” So he began to look for positives—how becoming a teacher might benefit not only the students but himself.
Tamanis says that he had never felt confident speaking in front of an audience.
“I had a lot of complexes that haunted me and got in the way of life. As soon as I had to say something in public, my tail was between my legs.”
Standing regularly in front of a class, he discovered, was a perfect cure for his fear of people. “The students are so free—they can ask anything, and you have to handle the situation so you don’t turn into a boring teacher.”
He had to be ready to answer not only programming questions but also to support his students through difficult moments. Emotions run high at high school age—teenagers are extreme, and their mood can swing from white to black in a single lesson. “From day one, I felt the mentor’s role and the weight of responsibility,” he explains. So Agris decided to be genuine—no acting, no pretending. “It was hard for me to go out in public, to step on stage and share, because I was afraid of not knowing something. I thought I had to know everything. The school helped rid me of that illusion. I learned to say, ‘I don’t know this yet, but I’ll find out.’”
Which programming language to teach was up to him. Before his first class, Agris asked his company’s managers which skills were most in demand. They suggested PHP.
“I said—I don’t know it! They replied: perfect, then learn it, teacher Tamanis—it’ll be useful for you too!”
So the nervous new teacher told his class: “There’s one thing I have to tell you—we’ll be learning this language together.” The students accepted it easily, which immediately set the tone: it was okay not to know everything.
Facing His Karma
But how did an entrepreneur know what and how to teach? The same English teacher from that party gave him advice on methodology. Draugiem Group employees helped create tools to ease his workload. Agris also renovated the classroom. “We installed smart lamps with adjustable colors. The students had fun programming them—making lights run around like a snake, for example.”
Agris set himself a clear goal: when students graduated, they should at least know the basics of a programming language. “I told them honestly—I’ll teach you the fundamentals, we’ll cover the required literature, and after that, it’s up to each of you.” To get a good job in IT, he explained, they would need motivation, independent work, and constant learning.
Lessons had to engage both the highly motivated students who raced ahead and those who learned reluctantly. Agris appointed the stronger ones as assistants. And that inevitable group sitting in the back rows, “finding better things to do,” he saw with a smile as “facing my karma.”
“Back in technical school, I was part of that group—thinking I was the smartest and knew best how to spend my time. Teachers threw me out for misbehavior, but I kept disrupting and hiding behind desks.”
One talented but unruly student was reminded: think of what you’re doing to your friends! You ace the test and even get prizes (Draugiem Group still gives small gifts for good results), but what about letting your classmates achieve something too? After such talks, the student would admit: “Good point, teacher.”
The promise “until they find a teacher” stretched into three years. To keep teaching beyond two, Agris had to get up early on weekends to take mandatory pedagogy courses. But he realized he missed freedom—teaching meant a fixed routine.
To share the load, Agris brought in another teacher for a while—Draugiem Group’s very first programmer, Mārtiņš Pikšens.
Still, a permanent solution was needed. That’s when Jēkabs noticed the Draugiem Group job ad. Now, in his third year, he has taken Agris’ place.
Expensive Jēkabs
“Not strict, but he makes us learn,” say two students when asked to describe their teacher. Several boys sketch their final projects—one is creating a website for an organization, another a digital assistant for training and nutrition, another a tool to analyze the gold market. Each chooses their own project and programming language. A disco ball hangs from the ceiling, bought with money the class collected from recycling bottles.
Back in high school in Madona, when Jēkabs once had the chance to teach younger students for Teacher’s Day, he found it exciting but never thought of teaching as a career. He had good grades in every subject and wasn’t sure what to do next. He began studying medical engineering and physics at Riga Technical University. Programming courses were part of his studies, but his real interest came while working in a biology lab.
“I realized I could automate tasks like taking microscope images and analyzing them with programming.”
He graduated with top marks in 2018 and decided to try working as a programmer.
For two years, he worked at an international energy company, building databases and traveling often to Germany. “I enjoyed the programmer’s life, but I missed added value. And sitting for eight hours a day wasn’t my style.”
At a crossroads, his aunt called: her school in Ādaži needed a physics teacher. In September 2020, Jēkabs took the plunge—he left his programming job to become a full-time teacher for 8th and 9th graders.
After his first day, he was exhausted. “After eight lessons I sat in my aunt’s borrowed car in the Apelsīns store parking lot and thought: what have I done with my life? You’re exhausted, Jēkabs, and you know you’ll be paid less—what a decision!” Still, he stayed and taught for two years, including during the pandemic, when he felt like a YouTuber speaking to blank screens. Meanwhile, he studied in the “Mācītspēks” program. Eventually, though, he realized that even the relatively decent teacher’s salary wasn’t enough to live independently. Then came the Draugiem Group job ad—like a gift from above.
The story of Draugiem—programmers who built a huge social network—had fascinated him since childhood. As a programmer, he had dreamed of working for one of the group’s companies. After completing tasks and doing well in the interview, he became “expensive Jēkabs” and moved to Cēsis. He settled in, though for his first year he lived in a dormitory. “When the doors locked at ten o’clock, I had to be home too,” he laughs.
Passion and Creative Tasks
Jēkabs’ lessons, usually 80 or 160 minutes long, begin with standing up and sharing emotions. He tries to bring energy to the classroom. “It’s like theater—if the actor is tired and mumbling, no one cares.” Like Agris, he also learned to speak confidently in public. “I wasn’t very extroverted before—this job taught me.” Teaching also forces him to stay current with programming trends.
When a new course begins (about 30 students at first, though some drop out), he starts by learning everyone’s name. “That’s my first task—to address each student personally.” He finds disciplining technical school students easier than managing 8th graders. Still, with every group, he’s had desperate moments when the noise became overwhelming. Over time, his classroom management improved. “As one student told me recently—nothing is worse than when the nice teacher becomes the angry teacher.” He has seen himself that kindness pays off.
Both the director and Agris say his lessons are engaging. What makes them special? First, visually attractive presentations. Second, even dry theory is turned into practical exercises. Third, tasks come with stories. “There’s a character whose story develops. AI generates his appearance. For example, he works at the Cēsis Cultural Center, and the students must help him solve problems with programming. Later, he faces new challenges needing their help. In physics, I also had a character—Skaidris—who constantly ran into problems. By weaving a story, students found it more interesting to follow what happened to him.”
Preparing lessons takes time, and even a great plan doesn’t always guarantee success. Once, he designed slides styled like Tinder for a topic on compatibility. “Sounded fun! But they just chatted. Maybe the previous lesson hadn’t gone well, or they just wanted to talk.” He concludes that the atmosphere depends heavily on the students.
Taking Responsibility
Would Jēkabs have stayed in teaching without the Draugiem Group stipend? “Probably not,” he admits.
“But luckily, they had this idea! Hopefully, other companies will follow.”
Agris agrees: “Every company that’s stable should be able to mentor one school like this. It’s about responsibility and duty to society.”
“We have a catastrophic shortage of math, physics, and programming teachers. Most talent goes into companies that pay much higher salaries. But for children’s future, we must support schools.” He adds that entrepreneurs sometimes lecture publicly: kids, learn physics! But instead, companies could fund stipends for teachers. “For a company, it’s not that expensive!”
He also points out another “side activity” of his tech company—renovating derelict buildings in Cēsis’ old town. “Again, it’s about responsibility for the place we come from.”
Director Sņegovičs confirms that attracting teachers is a challenge with the resources schools have. “If companies can help, it adds great value. Support doesn’t have to be just stipends—it can also mean renovating classrooms, organizing field trips, guest lectures. The return might not be immediate, but in 5–10 years, perhaps with a company’s support, we’ll have raised a valuable future employee.” Indeed, some of Agris’ and Jēkabs’ students have already ended up at Draugiem Group.
“I strongly encourage companies to support a school—maybe your old one, or the one your children attend. We have a good example here that others can follow,” the director says. And Agris is convinced: “We’re not such a large nation that we can afford to be irresponsible in this situation.”
Photos by Liene Leonoviča and Māra Prindule