Essentials of Entrepreneurship: Collaborating on a Cooling Sunscreen
In our latest student essay, John H., a sophomore at Glendora High School in California, U.S., who studied in Wharton Global Youth’s Essentials of Entrepreneurship program in summer 2024, shares the story of his team’s final project. It will have us all hanging onto those summer vibes – the design of a revolutionary cooling sunscreen.
July 28, 2024, was a big day in my high school life. It was the start of an intensive two weeks on the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School campus in Philadelphia that reshaped my perspective of learning and innovation: Wharton Global Youth’s Essentials of Entrepreneurship program.
The core of this business education experience was the entrepreneurship final project (similar to a Shark Tank pitch), a team effort to design the start-up plan for an innovative product. This was no ordinary classroom assignment; it was a hands-on test of creative potential, collaboration, persuasion tactics, and problem-solving. My randomly assigned team had four other high school students, a blend of skill sets that came together to imagine the design and creation of something new and unique: a cooling sunscreen.
Teammates Ideate
How did we arrive at such an idea? Ideating was a process of brainstorming and research that stemmed from shared experiences within our group. Shaurya and Maan, high school juniors from Dubai and India, testified to the impacts of intense heat in their home countries — most notably conditions like heat stroke affecting outdoor athletes. Inspired, we targeted a tool to help athletes deal with excessively high temperatures during exercise. Our mission moved beyond money; we wanted to resolve this growing crisis facing athletes worldwide.
First, we got behind the science of the product. Using micro-encapsulated caprylic triglycerides as phase change materials, our product would interact with users’ sweat in an endothermic reaction to draw heat away from the body. Our sunscreen offered science-backed protection against heat-related injuries. Devising our entire formula took time and deliberation. Our teammate Henry, a junior from New York, U.S. with biomedical experience, led the development of the chemistry and composition behind the sunscreen. We had long discussions about creating a safe and effective product. Then, it was time to strategize our product launch.
This is where Emmi, a senior from Texas, U.S., came in. Her social media management expertise helped us to understand the digital market landscape. A product needs a strong narrative to resonate with its target audience. She devised social media campaigns with well-known athletes, designing Instagram and TikTok pages to captivate sports-inspired youth worldwide through short-form content.
My role in the project was to manage financial planning and market analysis, with an eye toward real-world practicality and application. I had to ensure that our business design was financially sound, composing a detailed income statement and roadmap of our product’s future. It was an exercise in ‘innovation meets viability.’
The process from brainstorming to presentation took work. We spent hours in Study Room G60 in the Wharton School’s Huntsman Hall, each of us contributing to the vision of our cooling sunscreen. Our strong team spirit motivated us to persevere through the process. We evolved into more than a randomly assigned team; together, we became innovators, critical thinkers, and more effective entrepreneurs.
We had seven minutes to present our finished product, EnduraChill Sunscreen, on the final day of the program. The judges, a small assembly of Wharton student mentors had one purpose: to analyze our presentations and award the three strongest pitches.
Time Management and Clarity
We were one of the last groups to present, and we watched in anticipation. A series of creative, well-presented ideas preceded us. An eco-friendly bug spray with a natural smell, custom origami lamps, a platform to help released convicts get a job, a delicately engineered intelligent solar panel, and a chess program to slow the effects of dementia were just a few of the innovative pitches.
Then, it was our turn. Shaurya started a passionate speech about the increasing impacts of heat-related injuries on athletes. His delivery transitioned into Henry’s demonstration of the science behind our product. Then Emmi, Maan, and I strengthened our pitch by detailing the intricacies of our marketing and scaling strategies.
Our time was up. It had flown by, and I didn’t get to finish detailing our business roadmap. We answered a quick round of questions from the judges and our product development experience came to an end. Although my team did not place in the competition, I learned a lot about how a good presentation requires time management and clarity.
While I’m planning to pursue a career in medicine, I will hold onto the lessons from my summer with Wharton Global Youth. Learning to design and commercialize a product were first steps toward my plan of starting a clinic and contributing to biomedical innovations. EnduraChill Sunscreen showed me that the best ideas come from collaboration, where each person’s expertise feeds a solution that could only have been developed together.