The Genius Generation

Seeker and TRAX from PRX

This podcast is a deep-dive into one incredible invention, entrepreneurial pursuit, or discovery per episode and the young person behind it.

Did you know that the trampoline was invented by a 16-year-old? That popsicles, snowmobiles, and even the Braille language were also invented by young people? In this podcast we’re talking to innovative kids, tweens, and teens who run their own businesses, made a new discovery, or invented something new using science. For season two, our host Stephanie Castillo, a science communicator who is dedicated to inspiring the next generation of scientists through representation, is exited to interview and be inspired by the talented innovators!

This podcast is a deep-dive into one incredible invention, entrepreneurial pursuit, or discovery per episode and the young person behind it.

7hr 11min

July 8, 202112min 41sec12.18 MB

After witnessing a mismatch in food bank donations — massive lines at one, and barely any supply at others — Tavish Sharma created Solve Hunger.

August 11, 202214min 43sec14.13 MB

Representation matters to Emily Flores.

August 4, 202211min 47sec11.32 MB

Neil Deshmukh learned the hard way that building trust with a community is crucial to an invention’s success.

July 28, 202212min 7sec11.63 MB

Khloe Thompson is an expert at giving back.

July 21, 202211min 48sec11.34 MB

Hand-washing is an easy way to prevent the spread of germs, but many people (even doctors!) aren’t doing it correctly.

July 14, 202212min 47sec12.29 MB

A concussion left Ela Gokcigdem with time on her hands and plenty of ideas.

July 7, 202212min 2sec11.56 MB

Inspired by the challenges that paralyzed people like Stephen Hawking face when communicating, Varun Chandrashekhar designed SpeakUp

June 30, 202212min 11sec11.7 MB

What if there were a way to biodegrade plastic, instead of having it collect in landfills and pollute oceans?

June 23, 202211min 42sec11.24 MB

At 15, Lino Marrero is already a serial entrepreneur: his inventions include the String Ring and the Sole Solution.

June 16, 202210min 23sec9.97 MB

Thumbnail for "Mary Catherine Hanafee LaPlante".

One day at softball practice, Mary Catherine Hanafee LaPlante noticed that noxious pesticides and herbicides were being sprayed on the field directly next to her.

June 9, 202213min 50sec13.29 MB

Jonathan Tamen wants to be an upstander and not a bystander, and so far, he’s succeeding

June 2, 202215min 36sec14.99 MB

When 14-year-old Sarah Park moved a close family member to tears by playing the violin for them, she realized the huge potential that music can have on a person’s emotions.

May 26, 202213min 10sec12.65 MB

Thumbnail for "Genius Generation Season 2 Trailer".

Get ready for Genius Generation Season 2!

May 19, 202256sec909.19 kB

Nala is the creator of the non-profit organization MyHairLove. Her mission is teaching younger black children how to care for their natural hair while breaking stigmas and negative stereotypes at the same time. She plans to do this through YouTube, educational “hair kits,” and live workshops with elementary and middle school aged children.

August 12, 202112min 1sec11.55 MB

Anugreh, at just 17 years old founded a technology company called Hybrid Idea to solve some of the problems he saw in his home country of India. But his company isn’t just dedicated to one interest. Everything from visual impairment to autism to clean water, Anugreh has taken them all on.

August 5, 202110min 13sec9.81 MB

Emily and Kyle are a brother and sister duo who founded an environmental advocacy organization called Clear Water Innovation that’s dedicated to solving the global water crisis. Through their organization, they encourage young people to solve environmental problems. Emily and Kyle are also quite the pair of scientists and conduct experiments out of their own garage science lab.

July 29, 202112min 48sec12.3 MB

When Victoria was 13 years old she had an epiphany at a speech and debate summer camp where her peer mentor, Ashna supercharged her learning experience. When Victoria and Ashna realized how powerful peer-to-peer mentorship could be they knew they wanted to spread that power to others.

July 22, 202113min 22sec12.84 MB

Peter was a freshman in high school when he learned that monarch butterflies are disappearing at an alarming rate, so he decided to act. He formed an organization called Homes4Monarchs which has distributed 10s of 10,000s of milkweed seed packets all around his native city of Chicago.

July 15, 202113min 29sec12.95 MB

Caleb Anderson is a college student studying aerospace engineering at the prestigious Georgia Institute of Technology. Did we mention Caleb is 12?

July 1, 202110min 41sec10.27 MB

Since her realization Anna has developed an underwater robot that can detect microplastics deep in the ocean, started developing a model to predict where plastic pollution will occur, and written a book about her journey. Did we mention she’s 14?

June 24, 202113min 14sec12.72 MB

Max Feldman believes the key to saving our planet is educating the next generation about the problems facing our environment today.

June 17, 202113min 22sec12.83 MB

At just 16 years old Adithi Raghavan founded her organization BEEducated.

June 10, 202112min 18sec11.82 MB

Sophia was determined to educate her relatives, so she started translating scientific information into Farsi to help her relatives understand. This experience led to the founding of Sophia’s organization, Climate Cardinals

June 3, 202114min 10sec13.61 MB

In the summer of 2020, Devin made his dream come true completing a summer internship at NASA and working directly on the Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover.

May 27, 202113min 13sec12.69 MB

Chander Payne had a life changing moment in his high school cafeteria (how many of us can say that?). He noticed his fellow classmates didn’t have access to healthy foods like fruit and vegetables - so he decided to grow them himself.

May 20, 202111min 26sec10.98 MB

The summer before her freshman year of high school, Kyla Guru discovered a unique passion for cybersecurity at the NSA GenCyber Camp. It was there she discovered that 90% of cyberattacks were due to human error. To combat this problem, Kyla founded Bits N’ Bytes Cybersecurity Education

May 13, 202114min 25sec13.85 MB

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit and schools closed, high school junior Zachary Siegel found himself with a lot more time on his hands. He used that free time to explore his passions (like computer programming), but quickly realized this was also an opportunity to share his passions with others. So he founded The Youth Passion Project

May 6, 202112min 38sec12.14 MB

During this incredibly low moment in her life, Hannah had an idea: What if there was a way to immediately alert the people around her that she was not ok? Aided by her tech-savvy brother, Charlie, Hannah’s idea came to life.

April 29, 202112min 25sec11.92 MB

While studying abroad in Japan, 16-year-old Luna Abadia saw the effects of climate change first-hand. Typhoons were getting stronger, snow becoming rarer, and traditional crops were no longer able to grow. This inspired Luna to act.

April 22, 202114min 24sec13.84 MB

When he was 11 years old, a volunteer trip to a center feeding the homeless and hungry in San Francisco opened Kiran Sridhar’s eyes to the devastating effects of hunger and food insecurity. After a lot of research and even more hard work, Kiran’s drive to eradicate hunger led to the creation of his online platform, Waste No Food

April 15, 202114min 36sec14.03 MB

Through his research, Neil discovered the way we detect forest fires hasn’t changed all that much over the years.

April 8, 202112min 5sec11.61 MB

Very early on in the COVID-19 pandemic, 18-year-old Avi Schiffmann recognized people needed a quick and easy way to get accurate information about the spread of the disease.

April 1, 202110min 34sec10.15 MB

15-year-old Anisha Musti isn’t your average teenager. After she lost her great-uncle to Parkinson’s disease, she was inspired to do something to help others.

March 25, 20219min 47sec9.4 MB

When Ananya Sridhar was 12 years old she heard about the water crisis in Flint, Michigan. Despite being 2,000 miles away in California, Ananya decided to act.

March 18, 202112min 55sec12.41 MB

Thumbnail for "The Genius Generation Trailer".

Trailer for The Genius Generation

March 11, 202159sec958.81 kB

Gia Mar Ramos

July 8, 202112min 41sec

Ever since she was a little girl, Gia Mar Ramos had an interest in computer science and technology, but as she got older she noticed something: there were very few girls in her technology classes… so Gia decided to do something about that. The summer before high school she started a non-profit organization called Girl Innovation (https://www.girlinnovation.net/) dedicated to closing the gender gap in computing and technology. She does this by educating middle school girls about computer science on her home island of Puerto Rico.