NYC Kickoff 2019
Another kickoff in the books! On Saturday, October 26, we gathered at the beautiful Google offices in NYC for a day of connecting, learning from industry professionals, and ideating. We had visitors from New York, Vermont, New Jersey, and Rhode Island attend! Here are some highlights from the event:
We started the morning with a tour of the Google offices. We learned a lot about what a workplace designed for innovation looks like. There was an inspiring view of the city, scooters, and a massage room! Many students asked, “What do I need to do to work at Google?”
After touring, we heard three lightning talks and engaged in a panel with Gina Jeancharles (UX Design Lead, Google), Brian Hendricks (Product Manager, Google for Education), and Flora Baik (UX Designer, Orion).
Some great takeaways:
Focus on the user and all else will follow
Ship the right product, to the right user, at the right time
Trial and error is how you learn and is an important part of entrepreneurship
After lunch, our young designers embarked on their own design journeys and started crafting “How Might We” questions. Students designed for everything from grocery shopping with wheelchairs to engaging their peers in recycling.
After crafting “How Might We” questions, all teams brainstormed ideas. In just 5 minutes, we brainstormed 200+ ideas as a group. We went around the room and each team shared their favorite idea. We heard some incredible ideas ranging from a tube maze installed in a school to make recycling fun to an elevator timer to help peers using wheelchairs get to class on time.
Thank you to everyone for coming out and participating in this event and a huge thanks to Gina Jeacharles and the team at Google for being generous and welcoming hosts!
We are so excited to see you all again at Launch Weekend, where all 30 of our Project Invent schools will present their human-centered inventions to top investors and tech executives in the Bay Area and NYC.
