From high school to Silicon Valley

"How many of you have gotten up in the night and bumped into something? We're offering you a solution to this problem: Max Light, the slippers that light your way". Dressed in a white shirt in front of an auditorium filled with more than 300 people, yesterday Sergi brandished a pair of pink house slippers with a LED light in front and a switch on the heel. It's a homemade prototype that has opened doors, for both him and his four 4th ESO classmates from the Jaume I High School in Salou, to work in Silicon Valley for ten days this summer.

Everything began last September with a class brainstorming session. "Each member of the group said random words, and on joining them together we got the idea, after rejecting a bracelet with WiFi and a mobile phone case with built-in speakers", explained Santi, another student from Salou, yesterday at the doors of the auditorium. After coming up with the idea they created a prototype and a business plan for their company. The catharsis came last week, when they received the news that their project had beaten 363 other teams to win the award.

Like them, students from two other Catalan schools -Bell-lloc High School in Pla de Girona, and Badalonès High School for mid-level Professional Training in Badalona- and one from Palma, the Ramon Llull High School, will travel on 11 July to the Mecca of innovation in the United States, each with a new challenge. They are four of the five winning teams from the whole of Spain in the first edition of the Take Up The Challenge Award, organized by the LaCaixa Foundation and presented yesterday at CaixaForum in Madrid. The fifth winning group comes from the LaSalle School in Almeria. But the work doesn't end here. After having come up with the ideas to solve a social problem -such as an app that organizes and distributes volunteers, a plug that allows for energy savings, and a special dynamo for bicycles that recharges mobile phones- the LaCaixa Foundation and five other partners in the competition have now presented them with a number of challenges in Silicon Valley.

Yesterday Elisa Duran, Deputy General Director of the LaCaixa Foundation, pointed out that "this is not a sightseeing trip, but a learning trip requiring a lot of work". Mediapro has signed up the four students from Bell-lloc in Girona -to whom they presented a symbolic t-shirt- and has asked them to propose new trends for incorporating interactive elements in audiovisual web channels that have traditionally been unidirectional. And SegurCaixa Adeslas has charged the four students in the Mallorcan team to find the five best practices used by large companies in Silicon Valley to help employees enjoy their work more.

A challenge for the teachers

During the sojourn in the technology hub, they will meet with companies like Google, DropBox, Pixar, Wikipedia, and IDEO in the mornings, and in the afternoon with educational institutions like Brightworks, HighTech High, Startup School, and Berkeley. In June the partners will organize activities with each team to make sure that they have a good background before going to Silicon Valley. For now, in this first edition, they have not made English a requirement. The teachers won't have a chance to stop working either, as they will form a sixth team. Elisa Duran gave them credit yesterday for their work. "Without them you would not be here today. They are the ones who believe in you the most" she said to the students. The educators will make up a sixth team to present a report to LaCaixa on profiles and competencies for new teachers.

The winners yesterday received advice from Carlos Blanco, entrepreneur and business angel: "In Silicon Valley you have to have a lot of nerve. You have to have a very well prepared idea that you can present in 15 seconds with a card, and be very direct'.