Eli Wachs

Bryn Mawr, PA | 18

2016 Award Recipient

Shortly after starting high school, Eli read a book by Dr. Peter Diamandis, founder of Xprize, an
organization that incentivizes the world to fix problems that governments, philanthropists, and the
private sector haven’t solved. Eli was inspired by the central theme of the book, that many of the
world’s greatest challenges are overcome by a combination of innovation and growing access to
technology. Eli harnessed his passion to identify the issues affecting his city, Philadelphia, and created
High School HeroesX; a youth movement created with the belief that youth can change the world. The
program hosts incentivized competitions by providing high school students with a platform to tackle
issues facing their communities. High School HeroesX also provides an advisory board of experts to
assist in these challenges, and resources to increase engagement from government officials. Projects
range from narrowing the education gap with inner-city schools to launching a Beijing Food Safety
Challenge. Since High School HeroesX’s inception in 2013, Eli has become a trailblazer in social entrepreneurship and mending broken communities, both at home and internationally, by inspiring
his peers to solve social issues.