Wordpress -> EM4U Package -> Event inserted programmatically does not appear as featured

Question

I have a Wordpress site where I use the EM4U package to manage events. I’m programmatically inserting events from a JSON and defining with the following metaposts.

$meta = [
            [
                'meta_key' => 'imported_post_id', 'meta_value' => $actv->id,
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_order', 'meta_value' => 1,
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_featured', 'meta_value' => 'checked',
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_date_start_time', 'meta_value' => $this->buildTime($actv),
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_date_end_time', 'meta_value' => '',
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_address', 'meta_value' => 'Instituto - ' . $actv->extra_fields[2]->value,
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_venues', 'meta_value' => '',
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_org_name', 'meta_value' => 'Instituto',
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_org_email', 'meta_value' => '',
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_org_phone', 'meta_value' => '',
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_org_website', 'meta_value' => '',
            ],

            [
                'meta_key' => 'ovaem_org_desc', 'meta_value' => '',
            ],
            [
                'meta_key' => 'tax_input', 'meta_value' => [
                                                                "categorias" => [0 => "0", 1 => "1031"], 
                                                                "event_tags" => "Idiomas",
                                                            ],    
            ],
        ];

Although it is marked as a highlight(ovaem_featured) the event does not appear highlighted in the home. What else would I need to do?