The AdVenture Capital “Fuel Up Five” Shared Their Ideas with Warren Buffett!

Five Student Ambassadors recently won GENYOUth AdVenture Capital grants for their entrepreneurial ideas to make their school a healthier place. These winners traveled to Omaha, Nebraska for a personal meeting with business legend Warren Buffett and each received $4,000 to implement their rockstar ideas in school. Kaylene K. even received a marriage proposal from Mr. Buffett! Check out Emma B.’s recap of her weekend “AdVenture,” watch the highlights video, and read what Lily A. and Josh M. had to say about this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

From Lily A.:

Hi everybody! My name is Lily and I am one of five winners from the GENYOUth Foundation’s AdVenture Capital grants who won money to implement the ideas that we came up with. Today I am here to talk to you about what GENYOUth and AdVenture Capital is and what these projects are all about. So, to start off, both of these programs are amazing programs as well as Fuel Up to Play 60 and they really help kids’ voices be heard and let their ideas come to life and shine in a way that I wouldn’t think possible with any other program. These programs as I said, are really about the kids. They surround us with this welcoming environment and this program so we can show what we are and what we can do. Basically, they have provided us with the money that we need to support the programs that we have come up with. We went through this application process, we had phone calls, interviews, and arrangements so it could finally come down to this whole big weekend where we got to show all the things we had worked so hard for and all we did to be there. Lastly, I want to tell you a little bit about these projects. As you probably know by now, Fuel Up to Play 60 is all about healthy eating and physical activity. So in order to be on this whole adventure we had to spend a lot of time doing ground work. We had to come up with a pitch idea to solve a problem in our schools whether it was healthy eating or physical activity. Then we had to fill out the application and have all these interviews and phone calls until we finally got to where we are today. And I have to say it is an amazing place to be. So to finish up, I want to give A BIG BIG thank you to GENYOUth and AdVenture Capital for this amazing program and opportunity. Also to Fuel Up to Play 60 for everything. So if you’re reading this, be as involved as you can and you will go places. Thank you.

From Josh M.:

Recently, the Fuel Up Five (Emma, Kaylene, Lily, Lashon, and myself) won a trip to Omaha, Nebraska, to meet with legendary business magnate Warren Buffett and attend the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting. Each of us submitted our “perfect pitch” to make our school a healthier place, and our ideas were chosen as the most creative and sustainable. Our big prize was getting to meet Mr. Buffett, which made this one of the best weekends of my life!

We learned so much from Mr. Buffett about so many different things. One of the main lessons we learned was the idea of “quality over quantity.” Working hard to create your best idea or best product should be the ultimate goal.  Mr. Buffett told us that this applies to our investments as well! Overall, he was such a humble and down to earth man. He even spent time telling us many funny stories! Mr. Buffett told us about his business and his family. In fact, we found out that he still has the same house he bought in 1958, and gives lots of his money to charity. He is the kind of man that likes to live a simple life, even though he has the money to live more extravagantly. Meeting with Warren Buffett was one of the greatest experiences of my life and I will use the lessons that we learned to get my project started!