The famous American weekly Time magazine publishes a list of influential people every year. But this is the first time it has published the first-ever “Kid of the Year”.
Indian-American Gitanjali Rao, 15, is a scientist, and inventor. She has invented a device that can identify lead in the drinking water. Also, she has developed an app that can detect cyberbullying.
Gitanjali has been chosen from over 5,000 nominees in the United States for this landmark title. She is from the US state of Colorado.
The list was prepared by selecting five children between the ages of 8 and 16 based on contributions from the nominees in various fields including science, industry, and science.
In an interview with actor and humanitarian Angelina Jolie, Gitanjali highlighted her work on using technology to combat problems like contaminated water, drug abuse, and cyberbullying, Time magazine reported.
Gitanjali said that his goal was to create a global community of young innovators to solve problems the world over.
She gave an inspiring message to young people: “don’t try to fix every problem, just focus on one that excites you.”
“If I can do it,” she said, “anybody can do it.”
She said: “I don’t look like your typical scientist. Everything I see on TV is that it’s an older, usually white man as a scientist.”
She added, “My goal has really shifted not only from creating my own devices to solve the world’s problems, but inspiring others to do the same as well.”
