It took two months, hundreds of student pitches and thousands of national votes to find the SAP Teen Innovator. But find her, we did!
Ciara D., an 8th grader from the Our Lady of Cavalry school in Philadelphia, beat out students from across the country with her Community Wellness App idea for our AdVenture Capital (AdCap) program.
Ciara came up with, and designed her idea at the Philadelphia Social Innovation Series event, hosted by SAP and GENYOUth as part of AdCap. She impressed the judges with her creativity, spirit and poise when she delivered her pitch. And the fact that her idea integrated technology could only have helped her win over judges, which included executives like David Hutchison, SVP of Marketing for SAP.
Ten students from each Social Innovation Series city took home a $1,000 grant to bring his/her AdCap idea to life via the AdCap digital platform, with the top two qualifying for the national competition. Ciara’s prize? $10,000 in additional funding to plan and build her app, which aims to track and award points to students for their healthy lifestyle choices. She’ll have some help with her planning process when she heads to California in just over two weeks to meet with a handful of SAP executives at their Palo Alto office to talk strategy and execution.
This passionate young social entrepreneur has another item on her agenda when she’s out west. Super Bowl 50! As the SAP Teen Innovator, Ciara won four tickets to Super Bowl, and will be honored by SAP in the Energy Fan Zone the Friday before the game. Her lucky parents and brother will join her on this trip of a lifetime, which also includes a trip to the NFL Experience in Santa Clara, near 49ers stadium.
You can read all about our young social entrepreneur and her adventures thus far in some of the press she’s gotten as the SAP Teen Innovator. And be sure to follow that Teen Innovator on the GENYOUth and AdCap twitter feeds, and the GENYOUth Facebook page (need to insert links to those pages). You can also follow the hashtag #SAPSIS for the latest news.
We’re so proud of Ciara, but even more excited about all that she will achieve as she grows through her AdCap experience. Way to go Ciara!
Press links:
Alexis Glick Op-ed in the Hill: http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/technology/259992-hang-on-america-these-creative-youth-are-racing-toward-a-new
Dallas Morning News: http://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/headlines/20151104-a-shark-tank-for-student-troubles.ece