January 19th, 2023, 10:00 am PT / Category: Interviews
How does data and creative thinking super-power teen decision making?
Sunmary of the video
Montana Butsch, CEO of “spottivity,” shares his journey from discovering rowing in Chicago to creating a platform that helps teens access diverse activities. “Spottivity” offers personalized activity recommendations based on teenagers’ profiles.
The platform aims to broaden teenagers’ horizons and provide a wide range of activity choices. Montana emphasizes empowering teenagers to explore activities they’re passionate about, using social media and challenges for engagement.
“Spottivity” is a utility app that accumulates points for users participating in activities. It offers transcripts of out-of-school activities, addresses the challenge of engaging teenagers, and partners with local vendors for rewards.
The platform’s points system is based on location check-ins, and it serves as both an app for users and a tool for program providers. Adapting for adults is a potential avenue.
Advice for similar ventures includes thorough research, seeking input, openness to change, humility, and leveraging networks.
Montana Butsch is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, read Education Research at Oxford University, is an Executive Scholar at Northwestern University, and, most recently, an Executive MBA Graduate from Brown University. Upon concluding work at Oxford University, he focused on pursuing social ventures in Chicago, which led to the founding of the Chicago Training Center ‘CTC’ in 2006.
Bio
Montana Butsch is an avid rower who focuses on helping teens and advocating for social change. For his work with teens, Montana has been featured in the NYTimes and CBS News. He has also given a TedX on the power of youth sports.
