November Newsletter
What I've been up to this month!
About Me! 👋
Hey! I’m Peyton, a 16y/o who is super passionate about making an impact on the world 🌎. A little bit about me, I am an Innovator at TKS, very interested in business and entrepreneurship (in fact, I have even founded two start-ups) and I’m a triple threat. 🎭💃🎶
November has been a month filled with firsts, from participating in my first hackathon to publishing my first Medium article. Well, what are we waiting for? Let's get into it!
The Knowledge Society 🚀
Third month down at TKS ✅ and the sessions just keep on getting better and better. For those of you who are not familiar with this program, let me fill you in. TKS is a 10-month long human accelerator designed to train teenagers to solve the world's biggest problems through training in emerging technologies and mindsets. 🦄
We started out the month learning about BCI’s (Brain Computer Interfaces) along with discussing their philosophical and ethical implications. In this session we were tasked to create a pitch in under 60 minutes for an application of this technology. My group chose BCI’s to help slow the detrimental effects of Alzheimer’s and Dementia.
My first ever Hackathon 💻
The following weekend I participated in my first ever 12 hour Hackathon. It was certainly a fun, but stressful experience! If you don’t know what a hackathon is, it’s when small groups of people come together to create a viable solution to an existing problem and compete against other teams. We wanted to help speed up the child adoption process, that can take upwards to 2-3 years by reducing the amount of time spent on verification of important identification documents such as background checks of future parents. 👶🏻 📑 My group and I created Soteria (named after the Greek goddess of safety and salvation). We aimed to streamline the adoption process by securely automating it utilizing blockchain technology to digitize adoption dossiers into personal wallets. 📝 ➔📱
My 🔑 takeaways:
Done>Perfect ➔ Can't stress this enough, perfection comes from your imagination and it simply does not exist. This doesn't mean to rush what you’re working on and finish it just because. It means to learn from the process of getting stuff done and continually iterating upon it, instead of striving for perfection. 👌
Time management is so important, especially when you are in a time crunch. In order to better optimize for success and to mitigate burnout, setting time for breaks and having a more strict timeline is crucial. 🕐
Delegation of tasks is also key when working in a team. Having guidelines of who is doing what and setting times for check-ins and updates helps keep the team stay on track and ensures that work will actually get done. ✅
6:30am Zoom Call every Wednesday?! 😳
I have also been participating in Velocity which is an add on program for TKS Innovators who want to push past their limits, form meaningful habits and expedite their personal growth. 🚀 Every Wednesday, before school I have Velocity sessions starting at 6:30am, really early I know, but I'm loving it! 💯 It has really reinforced the importance of punctuality as you get kicked out even if you are one minute late!!! ⏰
Through Velocity I have been learning more about philosophy, diving deeper into a variety of mindsets and been getting into listening to podcasts. Recently, I have been binging the Philosophize This podcast and I highly recommend you give it a listen. 🎧
Blockchain Focus ⛓
This month I published my first ever article on Medium. 📝 During TKS, Innovators choose a technology or science to gain a deeper understanding of through the process of completing a focus. The first step in this process is to write a Learn Article, in order to gain a technical understanding of your topic. If you’re wondering what blockchain is and its ability to impact the world 🌎, click here to read my article.
Win of the month 🏆📚
Although I typically like to steer away from talking about school in my newsletters, I felt the need to share a recent accomplishment of mine. 🏫 At the beginning of the month, my school held our academic awards ceremony. I was fortunate enough to be able to walk away with the Overall Highest Average Award in my grade along with the Mathematics, Business, History, Leadership, and Physical Education subject awards. Although having motivation and focus at times was hard, I was able to push through and make the most out of these current pandemic circumstances. 💪
Goals and What to Expect in December:
Start and complete my Replicate project for my Blockchain focus 💻⛓
Keep on going in Velocity, have 5+ external meetings and listen to many more podcasts 🧠 🎧
Relax and enjoy the holiday break with family and friends🎄
If you’ve gotten this far, be sure to sign up to receive future newsletters down below :) I hope you enjoyed reading this newsletter as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thanks for tuning in and I'll see you next month!
Feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn ➔ https://www.linkedin.com/in/peyton-verhoeven-661a53185
Follow me on Medium ➔ https://medium.com/@peytonverhoeven