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Our grand finale of our XPRIZE Connect youth program was a huge success! Our two teams of students pitched with confidence, authenticity, passion, creativity, and a human touch. The judges panel (and family, friends, and guests) were all very impressed. Our distinguished panel included a lot of fire power Frantz Alphonse, Maria Alphonse, David Henkin, David Dungey, Monica Groves, Brianne Ward, Tony Holland. They scored according to a detailed rubric, and spent a lot of time discussing the strengths and merits of each.

I am so moved that they came out to support the next generation of innovators, taking them so seriously and giving so much. One of our students even landed a summer internship with someone who was an XPRIZE finalist in their Avatar (empathetic robot) prize competition.

The seamlessness and joy of the day transmitted the spirit of the previous 10 weeks, where we had fun and learned far out things. Put students in a challenging, warm, and creative context, where you expect a lot of them and allow them to lean into and struggle with some of life’s big questions and magic comes out. Every student learned, matured, persevered, and gained confidence.

We also did a lot of innovating with the content and I’m looking forward to creating mini-modules from our mindfulness for innovation, paradigm shifting, systems thinking, and emergent dialog sessions for use in classrooms moving forward.

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Monica Groves, Program Director of XPRIZE Connect, awards Tony Holland and me with an Inspiring Leader Award, in recognition of our support of Next-Gen Innovators. Moved and grateful, it’s been an honor and a pleasure.