Rich Tech Bro Speaks at Kensington HS, Struggles To Give Advice

Kensington CAPA | Google Street View

On Wednesday this week, entrepreneur Alex Klein spoke at Kensington Creative and Performing Arts High School. He went to Yale and Cambridge and is creating a built-it-yourself computer with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. Klein’s dad founded Getty Images.

The Inquirer’s Maria Panaritis was there to capture the exchange between Klein and a smart Philadelphia kid with a pointed question.

“Did you have a strong support system while being raised, to get where you are now?” asked senior Joshua Camacho, 18 […] “What would you tell people,” Camacho added, “who might not have that support system?”

“I was very fortunate,” said Klein, whose London-based company sells the Lego-like computer he began to finance a year ago through a Kickstarter campaign that raised $1.5 million. “I did have a very strong support system. Both parents at home, my dad had a job. Didn’t see him very much, but he was at home.

“Um, I, uh, I went to a good college . . . um, I can’t really give too much advice to people who don’t – who don’t share circumstances that allow them to,” he said.

Ooof, this was hard to read.

Kudos to Klein, at least, for admitting his upbringing wouldn’t allow him to share much about support systems with the students at Kensington CAPA. Though maybe he should have just given everyone a $150 Kano computer and, I dunno, told them not to smoke.

[Inquirer]