Author Archive for williamslg21

Josh Feinsilber — Gimkit

Posted by williamslg21 
· Monday, December 5th, 2022 
· 2 Comments

Josh Feinsilber is the founder and CEO of Gimkit, a strategic game designed to assist learning in the classroom. The game is appealing to students because it lets them earn “currency” to win prizes. Gimkit has remained ad free, opting instead to offer subscriptions for more complex game packages. Gimkit also has team games available. It is designed to be used across many different subjects and even languages.

 

Josh Feinsilber created the game for a class project in 2017. After receiving good feedback about his project, he began to meet with the teachers and students at his school to make revisions based on their experiences and recommendations. Gimkit became wildly popular in just a year by word of mouth from teachers and students. Gimkit games are now played in over 100 countries by over 700,000 students. In 2019, Josh Feinsilber expanded his project and began working with Jeff Osborn. Together they worked on rebranding Gimkit, formerly known as Gimlet, and expanding their product to help shape and improve education. In an interview Josh Feinsilber has shared how he has learned through the process of creating a business. He said “Gimkit has shown me the importance of powerful education moments. Creating and running Gimkit has been the most educational experience I have ever had, and seeing students use this little game I made as a school project has shown me how awesome it feels to help students get more engaged in the classroom.”

 

Sources:

https://pglsinc.com/gimkit-a-new-game-in-town/

 

https://medium.com/gimkit/whats-next-for-me-and-gimkit-948a3459d275

 

https://www.thepioneercollective.com/blog/2019/7/17/tpc-member-spotlight-gimkit-josh-feinsilber-amp-jeff-osborn

2 Comments
Categories : Education

Safetrip — Langston Whitlock

Posted by williamslg21 
· Sunday, December 4th, 2022 
· 2 Comments

Langston Whitlock is a nineteen-year-old entrepreneur and the co-founder of Safetrip. Safetrip is an app that allows a person to book a ride for medical needs and emergencies. Similar to Uber, Lift, and other ridesharing apps, the Safetrip app lets users track their drivers in real time to see when the arrive. The app also allows users to rate their drivers and drivers to rate the users to “ensure safety and quality”. The app is primarily used in Georgia, but the Safe Trip team has plans to expand their platform into other states soon.

 

The idea for Safetrip began from one of Langston’s personal projects. When he was twelve, he began to learn how to code and build an anonymous messaging app to find his father. When Ja’Nese Jean saw Whitlock’s talent for coding and she began to form a team to make the Safetrip app. She had been inspired by the need of those who didn’t have or couldn’t afford health care and immediate emergency help. In an interview Whitlock reflected on the process, saying, “I never thought that it would lead me to where I am today. I’ve met so many people who have pushed me to become greater and I look forward to inspiring others.” Since the app’s launch, Langston Whitlock has been named in the 2019 Forbes 30 under 30.

 

Sources:

https://www.forbes.com/profile/langston-whitlock/?sh=8f7008167fa4

 

https://afrotech.com/meet-the-16-year-old-genius-behind-safetrips-technology

2 Comments
Categories : Uncategorized

Eterneva

Posted by williamslg21 
· Tuesday, October 25th, 2022 
· 3 Comments

In 2015, Adelle Archer lost a close friend and mentor to stage 4 pancreatic cancer. Her friend did not have any family or children, so she had her ashes given to Adelle after she passed. Wanting to do something special with her friend’s ashes, Adelle decided to have them turned into a diamond. In an interview she described why she choose this unconventional method, saying, “We started to look into our options, and I was exposed to the death-care space for the first time. It opened my eyes. I realized that it is such an old school industry, and it had not innovated for hundreds of years. I learned that we lack meaningful ways to honor remarkable people.” So, in 2017 she co-founded Eterneva with Garret Ozar. At the time, she had a connection to someone working for a diamond foundry specializing in industrial uses. She and Garret Ozar created Eterneva as a consumer brand for the foundry. The company started with a few large sales, then reached $1 million in sales in July 2019. Since then, Adelle Archer has taken Eterneva to shark tank and made a deal with Mark Cuban for $600,000. Adelle Archer was also featured in Forbes 2020 30 under 30 in consumer technology.

 

https://www.eterneva.com/about

https://www.forbes.com/profile/adelle-archer/?sh=3b61bcf91b2f

https://medium.com/allraise/the-future-of-deathtech-interview-with-adelle-archer-ceo-and-founder-of-eterneva-25b8cd9ce878#:~:text=How%20did%20you%20start%20Eterneva,help%20him%20build%20a%20brand.

3 Comments
Categories : Apparel/Accessories, Jewelry

Nohbo-Benjamin Stern

Posted by williamslg21 
· Tuesday, October 4th, 2022 
· 2 Comments

When he was 14, Benjamin Stern started creating eco-friendly products for an assignment for his 9th biology class. He was frustrated by the problem of waste, specifically plastic, so created his own solution. His product, called Nohbo, was a plastic free way of packaging toiletries like shampoo, conditioner, body wash, and shaving cream. It is, “the world’s first single use, water soluble Drop for personal care products.” The shampoo is surrounded by a biodegradable, water-soluble, polymer film, similar to tide pods. In 2016, Benjamin pitched his idea on Shark Tank and secured a deal with Mark Cuban for $3.4 million. Since then, his company has grown tremendously. He plans to expand his company to other fields and educate consumers on ways to reduce waste. Nohbo states that their goal is, “to combat plastic waste in hotel amenities, and create a superior line of eco-friendly personal care products. They also highlight the importance of educating their consumers about plastic waste in their mission statement which says, “With monodose packaging, there’s a consumer journey. We need to educate consumers about what the products are, how to use them and their benefits. Education is critical.” Nohbo note only presents an different perspective on personal care but also helps their consumers to understand why their alternative is so important.

 

Sources:

https://nohbo.com/pages/our-story

https://markcubancompanies.com/companies/nohbo/

2 Comments
Categories : Clean water, Enviornmental

“Buy a Bottle… Save a Bee.”

Posted by williamslg21 
· Sunday, September 25th, 2022 
· 2 Comments

When Mikaila Ulmer was 4, she received a 1940’s cookbook from her grandma that would lead to a multi-million-dollar company in just a few years. One of the recipes was for flaxseed lemonade and Mikaila decided to give it her own twist by adding honey instead of only sugar.  She came up with this idea when she was stung by bees twice in one week and began to research them and their importance. Mikaila then began to sell her lemonade, called Me & the Bees, locally to support organizations protecting honeybees. Since the beginning of her business, she has given 10% of her profits to charities that protect honeybees. In 2015, Mikaila pitched her business on Shark Tank and landed a $60,000 deal with Daymond John, to put toward growing her business. In just a few years, Mikaila’s lemonade now sold in over 1,500 stores and is carried in many major retailers such as Whole Foods and Kroger. Since then, Mikaila has expanded her business to include other honey and beeswax-based product such as lip balm. Mikaila is now 17 and, in addition to her company Me and the Bees, she works with the Health Hive Foundation, “a nonprofit to further help the mission of saving the pollinators.”

 

Sources:

https://www.meandthebees.com/pages/about-us

https://nypost.com/2022/06/19/teenager-mikaila-ulmer-became-a-multi-millionaire-with-lemonade-business/

2 Comments
Categories : Bees, Enviornmental, Lemonade

Kenan Pala- Kids4Community

Posted by williamslg21 
· Sunday, September 25th, 2022 
· No Comments

Kenan Pala is an 18-year-old entrepreneur who started the nonprofit Kids4Community. Kenan’s idea first began when he was on a run, and he saw the many needs of the homeless people in his city. He said that he felt like there should be a way for him and other children to volunteer their time and help with different service projects in the community. This initial idea became Kids4Community, an organization that focuses on including children in community related projects so that families could find more opportunities to invest in others. In its mission statement, the company says that “We want to help children and their families give back to their communities in a meaningful way…When kids are taught from an early age about the benefits of charitable work, they will carry that forward into their teen and adult lives. Not only does it benefit the charities they work with, it benefits the children themselves as they transition into young adults.” One of Kids4Community’s larger projects was a world-record-setting mural of cereal boxes, all of which were donated to a local food bank. Kenan’s organization is truly innovative because it meets multiple needs through benefiting the people it is serving, the people who are serving, and the city as a whole.

 

Sources:

Home

https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/highschool/sports-awards/2022/05/27/kenan-pala-team-focused-elite-cross-country-athlete/9966943002/

No Comments
Categories : Charity, Volunteer