The Last Wednesday, our class was lucky enough to get to go to the BC Tech Summit, which unfortunately I didn’t get to attend as I had Volleyball Nationals in Edmonton. The BC Tech Summit is the largest tech conference in Western Canada. At this conference, thousands of people get the amazing opportunity to listen to people who push the boundaries of what is possible. Entrepreneurs, investors, key leaders, and change markers. Usually tickets are sold for a crazy amount of $999 dollars, $999 DOLLARS!! That’s crazy. However, our class didn’t have to pay this as our teachers applied and got the class into Youth Innovation Day.
Youth Innovation Day is for students in grade 10 to 12 allowing teens to be given the opportunity to learn about different technologies and hear from influential speakers. There were over 2,000 students who got to experience the amazing experiences at the BC Tech Summit.
As I didn’t go to the Youth Innovation Day, my day was very different from the Tech Summit schedule. The only similarity between the two was how early we had to wake up. This is the day schedule for the youth Innovation:
During the time in which my class was leaving for the BC Tech Summit I was on a plane to Edmonton. I had to leave my house at 6am in the morning which was way too early as I had to wake up at 5 am. I got to the airport by 6:50am which was pretty early considering our flight was domestic and didn’t leave until 9. The plane ride was an hour and a half and was pretty fun as it was the first sports trip in which I have travelled on a plane. My entire team was super excited for Nationals as we were ranked in Division 1 (the highest division) and we were ready to compete. Once we got off the plane, we went for food and then we went to the facility where we would be playing which was the Edmonton Expo Centre. We arrived at the Expo Centre at around 12 and changed for our team practice to prepare us for our games the next day. This facility was HUGE!! There were so many courts and teams from all over Canada. Nationals was a super cool experience that was very memorable and at the end of the tournament my team didn’t do that badly coming in 30th in the whole country.
Although I wasn’t at the Tech Summit, I still did the research part of the project. We were given the task of choosing two speakers, who would be presenting at the conference, researching about them and their company. I decided to look into David Katz and Scott Sampson.
David Katz
David Katz is the founder and CEO of Plastic Bank, an organization that has come up with a solution for plastic waste while helping people in poverty. Katz was recognized on Salt Magazine’s list of 100 compassionate business leaders at #4 right between Dr. Muhammad Yuma and Elon Musk. David has been featured on the award winning documentary A Plastic Ocean as well as he has spoken at many events to help spread the word about plastics, saving the oceans and the economy. His business allows people from around the world, help the world by handing in their plastic to help others in developing countries make a living by collecting plastic. The end result is the economy along with our planet is being protected.
There is a garbage truck of plastic being dumped into the ocean every minute of everyday, this plastic is killing the ocean and the animals that live in it and feed off of it. Over 150 million tons of plastic is in the water already and the world isn’t doing much to try and stop it. Much of this plastic is coming from countries with a lot of poverty. David created the plastic bank to help these countries in poverty by allowing people to buy what they need with plastic.
The money people receive by bringing in plastic is transferred into an online banking account which allows the money to be kept safely. This allows people who were living in poverty to learn and experience technology thus allowing these people to have a new sense of worth and value to their life. How this company connects to technology is by the online banking which allows people from anywhere in the world to deposit and take out money. The app adds rewards and incentives for the users which allows people to have fun and make money. David says that social plastic could be “the Bitcoin for the earth” with an estimated of 4 trillion dollars worth of plastic that could be collected.
Scott Sampson is the PhD president and CEO of Science World. Sampson is a dinosaur palaeontologist, science communicator, and advocated for making cities a place where both people and nature thrive.
Many people know Sampson for his educational books including the book How to Raise a Wild Child which is about how many children are disconnected for nature because of the digital age. He hope that he can mentor youth to spend more time with nature while still having a balance with a future that is rich in technology.
Sampson, becoming the president of Science World, just in the last couple of years has and will still have a big impact on the technology community. In this position as CEO, he wanted to teach youth and help lead people and Science World to make a difference. He is driving the tech industry in a way to not only further our technology to the future but use the technology in a way that will help our community and planet.
Scott Sampson is someone who is fighting for balance between the technology based cities and nature. He is an educational speaker who has spoken to numerous audiences of all ages about sustainability and connecting youth to nature.
With Technology Advancing everyday, career paths and different fields of work are changing drastically. Nowadays you can go to university or into so many different technology programs that weren’t offered a couple decades ago. For example, at UBC there is the MET program (Master of Educational Technology) which allows students to follow career paths along the route of course designer, educational technology Developer or IT professional. Although this isn’t something I’m interested in it shows people that there are so many options out there that are technology based.
A career path that does interest me in which technology plays a huge role is neurophysiology. New technology makes the assessment process more efficient and also develops new capabilities. Technology is being explored through many fields to help and improve, finding new approaches to learning and researching. There is a neurology course offered at UBC along with many other universities.
Throughout this research I have learnt a lot about technology’s part in our society today and how many people and organizations are using it to better the world we live in. I think we have definitely taken a step forward in using the technological advancement that comes out every day to our advantage. The next step is for each individual person to take action.