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Startup Weekend Girls
Friday, May 15 - 17, 2015
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Startup Weekend Girls
Friday, May 15 - 17, 2015
Friday, May 15 - 17, 2015
Event starts at 5:30 pm
Lake Washington Girls Middle School
810 18th Avenue
Seattle,
Washington
98122
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StartUp Weekend Girls, Seattle, WA, (5th-10th grade girls)
Startup Weekend GIRLS is almost here!
Participant's Packet
Ever wondered what it takes to be an entrepreneur? The professional and personal challenges, the highs and lows, the failures and the successes?
Startup Weekend Girls Edition is specially designed for the next generation’s entrepreneurs-in-the-making, fifth through tenth grade GIRLS. Our team of highly innovative and connected mentors and judges will create an atmosphere of exercises and experiences that will teach girls how to come up with business ideas, conduct market research, prototype, work in teams, and “pitch” their ideas to a room full of people. Our goal is to give girls the confidence to innovate and create they will need to succeed in all aspects of life.
Startup Weekend is a global grassroots movement of active and empowered entrepreneurs who are learning the basics of founding startups and launching successful ventures. It is the largest community of passionate entrepreneurs with over 1800 past events in 120 countries around the world in 2014. The non-profit organization is headquartered in Seattle, Washington, but Startup Weekend organizers and facilitators can be found in over 200 cities around the world. From Mongolia to South Africa to London to Brazil, people around the globe are coming together for weekend long workshops to pitch ideas, form teams, and start companies.
All Startup Weekend events follow the same basic model – which we will massage to fit the needs of our aspiring entrepreneurs: participants pitch their startup idea and receive feedback from their peers. Teams form organically around the top ideas (as determined by popular vote) and then it’s a frenzy of business model creation, coding, designing, and market validation. The weekends culminate with presentations in front of local entrepreneurial leaders with another opportunity for critical feedback. Everyone is guaranteed to leave the event better prepared to navigate the chaotic but fun world of startups. If you want to put yourself in the shoes of an entrepreneur, register now for the best weekend of your life!
Ready to be part of something big? Join us: we’re assembling 35 to 40 of the most motivated and excited entrepreneurial-minded girls for a very special edition of Startup Weekend on May 15, 16, and 17, 2015. We provide the working space, brain fuel, food, mentors, new friends, and inspiring speakers and judges. You supply the energy and innovation to build something big over the weekend.
Ready to join us? We only have 35-40 (depending on demand) spots available so we expect the event to sell out fast. The weekend will be hosted at Lake Washington Girls Middle School in the Central District of Seattle.
Get ready to build something exciting. Sign up now and see you May 15!
FAQ
Why a girl-focused Startup Weekend?
The entrepreneurial talent we see from girls in Seattle is inspiring, and we are excited about creating an event that will inspire them to dream big and work hard. We hope to provide the opportunity for the aspiring girl entrepreneurs in our community to innovate and create; to get inspired by an idea/product/team; to become more connected with other brilliant entrepreneurially-minded individuals in Seattle (so when they’re ready for the “real world,” they already have a support system!); and to show the girls that not only are their dreams and goals a real possibility, but that their gender does not impact the difference they can make in the world.
Why is it important to teach girls entrepreneurial skills?
- Entrepreneurship teaches life skills. Not everyone will grow up wanting to own a business, and there is nothing wrong with that. Still it is important for girls to learn the basics of running a business because they will pick up life skills that can be useful in a variety of situations. Risk taking is a big one. To be an entrepreneur, you must be comfortable with taking action, even without having a clear idea of the outcome.
- It is not an either/or situation. We all might be tired of talking about this, but the problem still exists: Starting from a young age, girls feel like they have to decide between a career or personal life. We can’t sit around waiting for society to change. Instead, we have to teach girls that it can be normal to have both a career and a rich personal life, if that's something that they want.
- Women kick butt in business! This is not an us-vs.-them debate, but statistics show that women are good at business. So why not try to encourage more of this? Recent research by Vivek Wadhwa and Lesa Mitchell found that women-led private tech companies achieve a 35 percent higher return on investment. Think about how much better off we would all be if we taught women about business at a younger age.
- When women are encouraged to start businesses, the world can become a better place. A 2012 study by the Women’s Philanthropy Institute at the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University found that many women use their success for social good, donating more money to worthy causes than their male counterparts. This can’t be a bad thing for any of us!
Will the participants be required to pitch or work on “girl-focused” startup ideas?
No, participants can pitch and work on any kind of startup idea they wish!
What will the girls be learning?
When running a business, it's important to make sure you have the basics down pat.
Over the weekend girls will be exploring...
1. Business Model Validation
Who are the key partners? Is there a customer acquisition/rollout strategy? Are they able to identify customers (demographic, location etc)? Did they get out and talk to customers? What is the value proposition to customers? What is the cost and revenue breakdown?
2. Product Execution
Can they establish a "Minimal Viable Product" (MVP) for the weekend (software, hardware, tangible product, service etc)? Are they able to demo something functional?
3. User Experience Design
Does it have a professional look and feel? Does it deliver a compelling and captivating user experience? Is it memorable? What key insights were gathered over the weekend to go into this creative direction?
EVENT SCHEDULE
Friday May 15th
Saturday May 16th
Sunday May 17th
Speakers
Rebecca Lovell
Director, Create33
Event Judges
Mónica Guzmán
Columnist at The Seattle Times, GeekWire
Zach Smith
Technology & Innovation Leader
As a Partner with Social Venture Partners, a Seattle-based philanthropic organization, Zachary serves on the Portfolio Grant Committee and is dedicated to helping to strengthen non-profit organizations committed to the mission of improving K-12 education and making the Puget Sound region a place where sustainable communities thrive.
Zachary speaks at conferences, teaches, and facilitates workshops on topics including Lean and Agile software development, leadership, design thinking, and innovation. Zachary is co-founder of the Seattle Design Thinking & Innovation Collective, a monthly Meetup with over 1200 active members focused on creating a network of innovators in the Seattle area and teaching design thinking through immersive and experiential activities.
Coaches and Mentors
Bryan Lhuillier
Founder/CPO of Shiftboard
Diane Najm
Founder at PhotoPad/ The Founder Institute/Olive Crest
T.A. McCann
Founder, Rival IQ
He was previously VP of Product Strategy at Blackberry (formally Research in Motion), focused on BBM (Blackberry Messenger), Blackberry social applications (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter…) as well as the native Contacts apps. He was the founder of Gist.com (sold to RIM in February 2011) as well as Jump2Go and 3 other web based companies.
He is an active advisor to startup companies in Seattle including Creative Live, Venpop (sold to Lockerz), Zooppa, Thinkfuse (sold to Salesforce, Aug 2012), and EveryMove. He is an active angel investor via Founders Co-op and SKV.
He likes sharing his experience and ideas, so he spend lots of time at Founders Institute, Startup Weekend (on the board) and Techstars (active mentor) as well as Lake Washington Girls Middle School (on the board).
Thibaut Labarre
Software Development Manager, Angel Investor
Alexis Mohr
Director of Demand Generation at Azuqua
Liz Hunt
Entrepreneur
Buzz Bruggeman
Co-Founder of ActiveWords
Sébastien Motte
Founder & Chief Business Enabler of Mintonic
Sébastien’s passions include yoga, living by the water, sailing, skiing, trekking, adventure travelling and photography. He is a certified Kundalini yoga instructor and the proud single father of two kids, Luca and Stella, an ongoing humbling and fulfilling experience.
Adam Pearson
Software Developer at Substantial, Inc
At Substantial I have had experience building a variety of software products ranging from mobile games to a real-time, globally distributed whiteboard system. I currently lead and manage a team of eight people at Substantial.
I have some general experience in team building, people management, and creative collaboration.
I have more specific and deep experience in modern object-oriented software design including test-driven development.
In January, my wife gave birth to our first child, our daughter, Ayla, who we hope to someday be interested in such an event!
Alexandra Koch
Joey Aquino
Business Development Manager at Amazon.com
Wes Ducey
Project Engineer
Alex Vollmer
I also have extensive web, database and networking experience. I get things done, express thoughts clearly and treat people with respect.
Dan Gigante
Digital Director, 19 IDEAS
Named one of Buffalo Business First’s ‘40 Under 40’ in 2013, Dan is a tireless advocate for the start-up and tech community in Western New York. He is a founding organizer for Startup Weekend Buffalo, and co-chair for BarCamp Buffalo 2014. Dan has served on several non-profit boards, including March of Dimes, American Cancer Society and InfoTech Niagara. He has given numerous talks to computer programming and business classes at Buffalo State College and State University of New York at Buffalo, and was a featured speaker at the 2014 TEDxYouth@Buffalo event. At Buffalo Startup Weekend 2014, Dan pitched and led the first place team, Three Square Meals, a working food-centric mobile app that was developed in 54 hours.
Melissa Scott
Lead Designer, Substantial
Joni Barrott
Customer Service Executive
I am passionate about cross functional collaboration that helps create a superior customer experience. Anticipate customer expectations, provide resources for self help, prepare employees to respond intelligently, and rapid feedback loops for course corrections ...iterating endlessly on those simple steps will lower costs of operations and create better products for your customers.
Mobile devices and innovative software are huge opportunities to create better customer and employee experiences! This will affect all products and services in the near future, what an exciting time for a creative problem solver.
Event Sponsors, and Partners
The Startup Weekend Girls team is grateful for the support of local community partners without whom this event would not be possible.
Learn how to become a sponsor here.
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Organizing Team
Techstars Startup Weekend Seattle is 100% led by volunteer community leaders.
Learn how to get involved here
Facilitators
Marion Desmazières
International Expansion Lead, Amazon Alexa
Marion is a tech business developer based in Seattle, WA. She manages international expansion of developer programs for Alexa, the voice service powering Amazon's Echo devices. Before joining Amazon about four years ago, Marion coordinated the 2012 Global Startup Battle and managed partner relations for Startup Weekend in Seattle. She holds a Master's in Business Management from EDHEC Business School and an MBA in Technology Commercialization from the University of Alberta. A Startup Weekend veteran, Marion has facilitated 20+ events in France, Canada, the US, Algeria and Morocco.