Week 3

This week was a tough one, group dynamic wise. It definitely challenged me to work on my communicating skills and flexibility. I don't necessarily think that this is a bad thing, because often in the work place you will be forced to work around certain issues, but it certainly wasn't much fun. This was the week that we were supposed to finish the edits on our storefront proposal, so that it would be ready to be sent off to the bank for loan approval. Unfortunately, this didn't go quite as well as planned. Most of us spent the first day or so working on minor edits to the first three parts of the proposal, while two others worked on the last two parts. I emailed the group member who was making the phone call with a list of things to ask salon managers, that we wouldn't be able to figure out on our own. On Wednesday, no one but me showed up to class, which was pretty frustrating, but I was okay with it because one group member was making relevant phone calls, two members had been doing lots of work all along, and the last group member was sick. On Thursday, the group member who was making the phone calls the day before was missing yet again, but I figured it would be alright because I could now finish the fourth part of the proposal since she had spoken to several salon managers and employees. Unfortunately, when I went on our shared documents folder, I didn't find any edits made. The issue with this was that I was unable to move forward on part four, and both parts five and six rely completely on part four in oder to be accurate. Because the final three parts of the proposal were the only things left to be edited, there was nothing we could do in class on Thursday, so that whole class period went to waste. We don't have class on Friday, so I emailed the group member in charge of phone calls and ask to make a meeting before the end of the week to go over what had happened.

I met with her after school yesterday for an hour and a half, and it turned out that she had made a copy of the document, taken notes from her phone conversations there, and forgotten to share the document with the rest of the group. This is an easy mistake to make, but it's still very frustrating because we missed the deadline, and I now have to spend time this weekend finishing part four. I have to finish part four before the end of the day today so that the group members in charge of parts five and six can accurately finish the rest of the proposal before Monday. I understand that it was just a small mistake, I just wish it hadn't have happened, so that we could have finished on time.

Bracelet update: We will be printing and hanging flyers on our first day back, but I made both a Facebook page and email account for the group, and member of the senior as well as freshmen class will be invited to "like" the Facebook page (meaning they will see all updates posted by us) over winter break.

Thanks for reading,
Zank

Chapter 3

So I think I'm starting to lose interest in the book. It started out at a great pace, with interesting and insightful passages, but it seems to have turned into talking about specific examples of people, that I need to measure up to. This chapter is like the last one, in the way that it takes a successful adult (Shanna Tellerman this time), and goes into detail about how they were raised. It has become predictable that the childhood was slightly unconventional, with the child being able to make a lot of important life decisions for themselves, mostly in relation to schooling, but that this unconventional childhood lead to the person in question becoming a wonderfully creative adult with an amazing job. I think that when a student reads this book, they will feel as though they need to aspire to be as wonderfully creative or smart as these examples, and that when a parent (or aspiring parent) reads this they will feel like they have to raise their children exactly how the parents of the examples given in book raised their kids. The interesting part about the latter issue is that in the beginning of the book, the author stated that one of the biggest problems that first-time parents make is trying to raise their children exactly how someone else raised their kid, to try and have their child turn out the as smart or creative or sporty as someone else's child. I understand that the author is just trying to give examples of how some parents raised their children differently, and their children turned out really great, but I think the book is still being a bit "preachy" about how to raise a child the "right" way. Hopefully the coming chapters will stray away from giving specific examples of "perfect" people, and turn more towards more interesting topics.

There was one part of this chapter that I did find interesting though, and that was when Tellerman was explaining a program she did in grad school: "There were no classes or tests. Teams were usually given a real-world client or problem to solve. Grades were determined by the presentations we did at the beginning of our project, halfway through, and then at the end when you'd showcase your project to everyone in the program to be critiqued." I found this interesting because it reminded me of the communications for entrepreneurs class. I found it interesting that she chose to mention this class as a large part of her success later in life, and I hope that I can get as much out of the communications for entrepreneurs class as she did out of her grad school program. Unfortunately, this was the chapter's only highlight.

Thanks for reading,
Zank

Week 2

This week, after having finalized our plan for the storefront, we began thinking of the financial side of both opening and running it. It was difficult to come up with a list of all of the things we would require to get us to opening day. Things like a reception desk, licensed beauticians on payroll, permits, shampoo, hair drying chairs, and many others. Then we had to research each of these to find out how much each would cost. One of the lucky breaks we had was that a woman was selling all of her salon supplies on Ebay, for pretty cheap. We made a list of everything she was offering and the total price, and it was hugely helpful. After this we had to make projections about the cost of running the salon for a year. For me this meant choosing all of the services we would be providing, and deciding the price of each. We decided that we wanted to distinguish our salon from others in another way (other than allowing students to work in it): we will provide services to people of all ethnicities. When you pass by a hair salon, it is usually geared toward one ethnicity. We want to expand this and have our salon cater to not only people with white women, but also black and hispanic ones. The products and services are different for the different ethnicities, so we will need to account for that. We would also like to make sure that the people we hire are well versed in handling more than one type of hair.

A big part of what I did this week was working on a 3D model of the storefront. On Wednesday, I went with my project manager to do a few more measurements of the space, and then this weekend I finalized the model. It took me quite some time to get it right, but I finished the entire front room of the store. My group has decided that we do not want to use the back rooms until our business is off the ground. We will be using the other rooms as storage and office space to begin with. If we do well in our first year, we want to expand the business to include a nail salon in the large room directly through the back left door of the main room. We may also include either a waxing or massage station in the closed off room (located in the protruding area in the center of the back wall of the main room). I think all of these plans are good ones, but they will take a lot of work in those back rooms, and I think it is better for us to focus on doing one thing really well, before we expand the services we offer.
Below are screen shots of the 3D model.

Thanks for reading,

Zank

Chapter 2

Chapter two of the book takes the specific example of Kirk Phelps, a 29 year old who works at SunRun, a company that is trying to change the way people buy and use energy in the US. Phelps dropped out of both high school (Exeter) and college (Stanford), to work on the first IPhone for Apple. Wagner (author of the book) interviewed his parents to see how this "perfect" innovator was raised, trying to determine if that had an impact on how he turned out. What Wagner found out was that they had much less extracurricular structure. Instead of always shipped away to some soccer practice or other structured activity. They believed that in order to come up with interesting things to do, kids first had to be bored. They also made sure that their kids were surrounded by tons of books, they even enforced an hour long reading period everyday.

Both of these things, along with many of the other things that Phelps' parents mentioned about the way they raised him, reminded me a lot of how I was raised. Although I didn't attend elite private schools, or move my family around the country in order for me to get the fanciest education, I was encouraged to go outside and come up with things to do. My brother and I were also always surrounded by books. Although I didn't read very much in school, I was always encouraged to read on my own. I think that where I went for primary school (Mission Hill) was a great environment for innovation. Creativity was always encouraged, and although we did not have as many resources as Exeter, I was able to learn all of the basic things I needed to get good grades in high school while also learning how to use my mind for more than algebra.

Thanks for reading,
Zank

Week 1

This was not the first week that we started on our two new projects, but it was the first week that my group really got to work. We focussed heavily on our holiday services idea to make as much money out of $200 as possible before realizing early this week that it might not work out the way we had planned. There is a short time to capitalize on the holidays and in Brookline, Christmas probably isn't the best way to go. We decided to go a different route, and sell BHS class of 20_ _ bracelets. The price to buy a significant number for every grade went way over budget, so we decided to target the freshmen and the seniors because we figured they probably had the most school spirit. The freshmen are still very excited to be in high school and a part of something bigger, while the seniors are beginning to feel sentimental because they can see the end in sight. Unfortunately, the bracelets won't arrive until December 26, so we will just have to do a lot of advertising and marketing to build up excitement about the product before it arrives.

As far as opening a storefront, we couldn't think of a solid idea until this week. At first we wanted to open a bakery, but we decided that with our funds and our current status as students, that wouldn't be feasible. We also wanted to think a bit more outside of the box. We thought a bakery might be a popular idea for other groups, and there is quite a bit of competition in the area. So we decided on a new idea: a salon. We noticed that there is hardly any competition for salons in the area, and that there is a lot of foot traffic in the area. We wanted to be sure we can bring in customers, so we want to make our services cheap because we want to attract students. We will offer hair, nails, and possibly other services. What will set us apart from other salons will be that we will set up a partnership with the school. We want to offer to students the opportunity to work in the salon as an elective (either career and tech ed or art), and possibly offer them summer or after-school jobs. I am much more excited about this project than the $200 project because I am apprehensive about making this venture with someone else's money, but hopefully it will succeed.

Thanks for reading,
Zank

Chapter 1

I just finished the first chapter of Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who Will Change the World by Tony Wagner. The first chapter was all about the new generation. What stuck with me the most was the bit about twenty somethings who are no longer just motivated by money, and that there is no allure in working their way up the corporate ladder to achieve success twenty or thirty years in the future. The new generation wants immediate results, but not in a bad way. They want to know what impact everything they do has on the world, and why they are doing it. People are returning to their creative roots, and this needs to be encouraged. Our education system drums into our minds that we need to focus on finding the right answer, instead of asking interesting questions. This new generation that is just starting to penetrate the workforce however, thinks differently. They are motivated not by external sources, but by internal drive. Corporations are having a difficult time holding on to these young people because their new employees are asking how they will continue to grow and impact the world, and if the company doesn't have an answer, they new generation just walks out the door.

What is endangering this new, creative world of thinking is technology. In some ways, technology is doing great things for this generation. Kids are much more in tune with the world. They actually know what's going on outside of the US in a way that they never would have even ten years ago. They also have communication and networking skills that will be very useful for them in the future. All of this is great, but studies are showing that young people are often spending more time learning on their devices than in a physical classroom. Not all of this is productive, and all this time spent on screens decreases creativity, and the bright future of innovators starts slipping away. In order to avoid this, our education system needs to adapt. Our education system needs to embrace and encourage creativity and alternative forms of teaching. Creativity cannot just be encouraged through second grade and in art class. It needs to be a theme found in every classroom throughout the entirety of a young person's education. This is the only way to secure a brighter and better future for us all.

For a summary of the book click here

Thanks for reading,
Zank