Atom Factory and URBAN Teens eXploring Technology partnered this week to host a discussion on business development and leadership with founders and principals of top-level companies, like Facebook, for URBAN TxT’s 30 teens.
After arriving in Culver City from South Los Angeles on Tuesday, 30 teens and members of the URBAN Teens eXploring Technology staff were greeted by warm smiles at the Atom Factory offices.
The teens were there for a discussion on all things business and leadership, hosted by Troy Carter’s Atom Factory, a multi-dimensional entertainment and artist management company, and URBAN TxT, a technology nonprofit that inspires teens in South Los Angeles to become tech entrepreneurs using computer programming as its main tool.
Atom Factory’s leadership team invited an all-star cast of tech and business minds, including Margaret Chin, the Manager of Corporate Communications for Facebook, and Micah Schaffer, Director of Operations for Snapchat.
“Starting a company is a grind,” said Mr. Schaffer to the 30 wide-eyed teens. “It takes time and hard work. Every one of you here can make it happen.”
Sergio Perez, 16, pulled some valuable insight from the chat. “I learned everyone there had to work very hard to get to where they are,” he said. “They taught me that sometimes we have to do things that we need to, even if we don’t want to. To succeed, I need to have a passion for what I do.”
Some of the founders present included Steve Pomerantz of Tuition.IO and Scott Snibbe of Snibbe Interactive touched on the reasoning behind their own ventures. “When I got out of college,” Mr. Pomerantz said, “I had a lot of student loans. Yet I had no idea how much I owed, to whom or when I had to pay them.
“I knew there were other recent grads out there who were as lost as I was. So I created Tuition IO.”
Mr. Snibbe started developing apps as a hobby well before there was an ample marketplace for them. “It was just something I enjoyed doing in my off time,” said the music and technology aficionado. “When the app store opened, I decided to release a few of my creations. Skip ahead to now and I’ve been able to form a variety of businesses around my passion for music and technology.”
Some of the URBAN TxT young men were shocked and excited to see how young all the panelists were.
Maliik Cleveland, 14, was very impressed by Meredith Chin of Facebook. “She joined the company when it was just starting,” he said. “But she provided value to Facebook. She was able to pinpoint her passion. I want to go create those opportunities for myself. Thanks to URBAN TxT, the panelists, and Atom Factory, I know I can go out there and make it happen.”
The panel served as the perfect way to lead into the organization’s last week of the summer coding academy. URBAN TxT’s Demo Day tomorrow (see Community Update), which is a fast pitch session where the eight production teams made up of the organization’s students, will present the iPhone, Android, Facebook, and web apps they have developed over the last 15 weeks. See www.urbantxt.org/DemoDay13.
Mr. Vasquez may be contacted at URBAN Teens eXploring Technology, URBAN TxT, 754.367.1033, juan@urbantxt.com, www.urbantxt.com, Twitter: @urbantxt
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Scenes from this week’s Culver City visit.
