Here’s a quiz: Which recent weekend-long activity for kids sold out in a flash and was oversubscribed by almost 2x? No, it wasn’t a soccer tournament or a video game competition- it was a ‘design thinking’ workshop called “Design Daze,” which was hosted by DFarm, a local organization that works in partnership with the City of Palo Alto to cultivate entrepreneurship in teens through the lens of design thinking.
Kids working together with purpose and urgency
During the three-day ‘design-a-thon’ event—which started at Palo Alto High School on a Friday afternoon and continued through the weekend at the Mountain View headquarters of software company Mozilla, 34 youth worked together in small teams to choose a “need area,” design and prototype a solution to tackle it, and ultimately present a solution to a panel of judges. The design teams, made of students in elementary through high school, were supported by 25 Silicon Valley mentors who volunteered their time and expertise to help make Design Daze so successful.
From bike thefts to soggy takeout, kids tackle real problems
The student teams identified problems including bike thefts, buoy-dropping during sailboat races, and lack of women in STEM fields, then spent time designing solutions through a process of exploration, discovery and prototyping. Thanks to sponsors including Mozilla, Northwall Builders and Sparkfactor.org, students had access to a 3-D printer, building tools, and more for their prototype creations.
Pitching ideas to panel of Silicon Valley judges
Design Daze culminated on Sunday afternoon, when each team gave a 2-minute pitch to a panel judges where they described the problems they chose to combat, defined their target audiences, outlined their solutions, demonstrated their prototypes, and provided ideas for the “next steps” in implementing their solutions. Students came up with innovative ideas, such as a smartphone-controlled bike lock with GPS locating abilities; an app that would automatically drop buoys in the water based on wind speed, water depth, and a multitude of other factors; a reusable takeout box with a grate on the bottom to combat food sogginess, and a new group to encourage women to enter STEM fields.
Judges and participants at Design Daze event
The impressive panel of judges from the local community- John Roos, former U.S. ambassador to Japan and former CEO of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati; Catherine Crystal Foster, Executive Director of the Westly Foundation; Alison Wagonfeld, head of marketing for Google’s enterprise businesses; and Apple engineer Sri Santhanam– awarded cash prizes in two categories: A product or service as a business, and a social good design.
Cooperation, not competition
Design Daze was unique for the spirit of cooperation and collaboration between the participants, their mentors, and the judges. After each pitch, judges and audience members asked the teams questions about their project, which then sparked healthy discussion about the feasibility of the ideas and potential impact on the community. While two teams won the actual awards, all of the presentations were highly impressive, “blowing the judges away,” as Catherine Foster put it.
Sri Santhanam said, “I’ve been working in the industry for many years, and there are experienced people who can’t even do what you kids did- concept, plan, Prototype, present in just two days!”
Process creates ownership and independence
While the kids were busy all weekend, their parents were intentionally on the sidelines. Parents were invited to attend Design Daze, but they were encouraged to—and did—simply observe. This allowed students to take ownership for their work and drive to the finish through a combination of teamwork, trial and error and perseverance. Despite the challenging timeframe, all of the students stuck with their teams to the end.
Learning through failure…and growing grit
“We learned how important it is to celebrate failure as part of the process and show kids that innovation comes from learning to fail,” explained D Farm’s founder, Donald Olgado. “One student broke down on Saturday afternoon when his team’s prototype fell apart, but he kept plugging away that night and came back on Sunday to finish. It was so cool to have the distinguished panel tell parents that failure is good, as this is such a toxic message in both the corporate world and in schools.” With all the talk of ‘grit’ lately, maybe design thinking is an interesting way to show kids the power of persistence?
“The best weekend of my life”
And what may have surprised the participants the most is how much fun it is to try, fail, keep going and complete a difficult project together. As Anika, 
a middle schooler in Santa Clara, told Ross Venook a Stanford lecturer in bioengineering and D Farm advisor, “This was the best weekend of my life.”
Innovation…has a bright future
Ultimately, the judges awarded the grand prize to Team “Outside the Locks” for its idea of a dual-purpose bike lock and water bottle holder, and gave second place to Team “Not So Fast, Not So Furious,” which proposed a dashboard tracker to prevent distraction for new teen drivers. But all the student teams demonstrated an inspiring passion for problem-solving and innovation.
As judge and former ambassador John Roos said during his closing speech, “While living abroad, people would ask if innovation in America is dying. Watching teens today, its clear it has a bright future. What we saw here was the future generation of Silicon Valley—and of the United States.”
Learn more: Visit the D Farm website to sign up for summer camps and workshops, donate and get involved. Or read more about D Farm on Palo Alto Pulse– we love this cool Palo Alto organization.
All photos courtesy of D Farm
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