DEMO REEL
BIO
Vedant Gupta, age 18, started Global Kid Media as a platform to motivate kids to succeed early in life and convince kids / parents / society that the conventional way of waiting doesn't have to be a box we resign to. Stepping out of the box can lead to amazing things learning skills and life lessons from communication to networking to partnerships to outreach to celebrity production / hosting content.
From his start at age 9 reading a motivational poem in 4th grade on his high school announcements to helping with teenage mental wellness and a unique reverse mentoring angle, the growth kept coming as you can see on his resume with speech competitions and presentations well above his age to media events being covered doing star interviews and then a show launched. Along the way came partnerships to be able to cover major events like the Super Bowl and expansion of the kid entrepreneur concept.
Vedant has now done over 2,000 star interviews and hosted about 250 shows on his Instagram Live. The stars he has talked to include the biggest names: Patrick Mahomes, Zion Williamson, Magic Johnson, Dierks Bentley, Snoop Dogg, Martha Reeves, Coach K, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Jack Nicklaus, and many more. His partnerships have included MSC Cruises for the Super Bowl, hotels across the country from AC Hotels to Fairfield Inn properties to cover the Final Four to restaurants in Atlanta and Holyoke / Springfield to cover the NCAA football semifinals plus Hall of Fame ceremonies to destination and attractions like Mall of America and Splittsville Entertainment while driving through Canada making literally 100 calls to find partners even when meeting CBS executives such as in New York. He won $10,000 1st place prize in the Youth category for the Rocket Mortgage Detroit Demo Day entrepreneur competition as a 10th grader making national media for sharing some of that with his fellow youth contestants, along with having placed in other entrepreneur competitions going back to middle school. He won a $2,500 1st place scholarship for the state of Michigan for being state champion of the Optimist Oratorical speaking championship. He has additionally earned about 50k between revenue and expense offset via partnerships.
His book "Global Kid Media - A kid entrepreneur's time-traveling journey" which is available on Amazon has sold nearly 500 copies. It includes the stories of his incredible grit to make luck happen often driving cross country [including interviews in 19 different states!] even with no access with almost a dozen roundtrip drives of over 20 hours to get work in often waiting hours in the cold. This book has allowed Vedant to do paid speaking as well as he continues to present at larger events and conferences with hundreds of attendees.
Now a college freshman at Michigan State University, Vedant shares his journey, adventures including with the celebrities, and the inspiration via his book and speaking. He has had to battle a lot as a young person from the weather with narrow escapes to difficult media gatekeepers to security where reverse age discrimination is a very real thing for often the only kid in the place fighting for access or seeking his own opportunities in life. See his DEMO REEL above to see all the work. Hear his journey by doing a search of "NPR Only A Game Global Kid Media" Few by age 18 are supposed to be doing all this which includes the interviews all over the place and hosting hundreds of shows with deep star discussions. Yet if it is up to Vedant, this will become the norm where kids follow their own passion and build their brand from elementary school as he did. The proof is in the work and that is the whole goal of Global Kid Media: To inspire millions of kids and families. Appreciate your support of the book. For companies / sponsors / partners, let's talk.
EDUCATION
12th Grade
Before currently becoming a freshman in college at Michigan State University, I graduated high school with gold chords with a 3.6 GPA while having taken 11 total AP classes throughout high school. This included being a senior captain of football and track along with playing basketball. In total throughout middle school and high school, I missed an estimated 100 days of school to be able to cover events and get content which included covering 5 NCAA Tournaments, 4 Super Bowl weeks, and traveling to 19 states still balancing taking the hardest classes in school with year-round school and varsity sports. Yet it was a worthwhile journey with this incredible book "Global Kid Media - A kid entrepreneur's time-traveling journey" released in my senior year after 2 years of writing it to document all the entrepreneurship / life lessons from this Global Kid Media journey.
11th Grade
Continuing to play sports year round including being on the varsity football, basketball, and track teams while taking 5 AP classes, this year brought 3 competition victories in the Optimist Oratorical speech contest resulting in my being a 1st place winner for the state which came with a $2,500 college scholarship and a trip to St. Louis to compete in the World Championship for speaking as a wonderful experience. The media business continued to grow with content again covering the celebrities from the golfing Ally Challenge including interviews with country music star Kane Brown and sports celeb Jalen Rose. A trip to cover Fatherhood Festival in Canton, Ohio included catching up on interviews with NFL greats like David Tyree, Shaun Alexander, Mike Singletary, and more. A Michigan Sports Hall of Fame event coverage allowed interviews with NBA greats Chris Webber and his family along with Olympic ice skating gold medalist Meryl Davis and more. Then came a quick chat with the President of the United States Joe Biden in covering the Detroit Auto Show as he asked his staff to take my business card plus an interview feature with auto executives like from Jeep sitting in the car as I was driven over a steep ramp above the floor.
A highlight of the year personally was my driver license officially giving me the opportunity to drive on the long road trips which would include catching up with a Cleveland Browns NFL player with his young daughter on a 10-hour same day drive to cover the 1st NFL preseason game kicking off the season. In between were more events to cover including the Super Bowl in Phoenix interviewing some of the Super Bowl participants like from the Philadelphia Eagles plus his wife along with NFL greats like Steve Young and a nice feature of Patrick Mahomes' father Pat Mahomes plus catching up with great Hollywood supporters like another interview with actress Holly Robinson Peete. The Peach Bowl just before this was a thrill to cover though had to cover the thrilling game all from the outside catching up with Georgia and Ohio State current and past stars including unexpectedly covering the media conference after an overnight 12-hour straight drive in my pajamas! There in Atlanta included a catch up interview with NBA great Isiah Thomas and walking miles on some tips about LeBron James' birthday party networking on the outside with executives from Pepsi and making a small group pitch presentation on the spot at about 2 AM too about my business. Meantime the basketball side included traveling to Houston and doing one of my best partnerships ever with Houston Sports Authority getting to see the thrilling Final Four games on the inside for a change and doing great interviews separately on my own with the players from all 4 teams represented including covering post championship night sitting down with social media influencer Dixie D'Amelio and interviewing the winning UConn national team along with even legend Dick Vitale and catching up post game with his colleague Ashley Brewer of ESPN for a sit down plus some Houston Rockets right after their game.
There were also several trips to cover in state opportunities from an invite by Los Angeles Lakers owner Jeanie Buss to watch the Lakers play Detroit to a Flint Pistons player day helping kids talking to some local team NBA execs to many college football games covered including talking to Michigan, Ohio State, Michigan State, and other Big Ten players and coaches both on the football and basketball side in numerous 1-hour drives to those venues. Partnerships and sponsorships were also done including a great car dealership sponsorship allowing for trip expenses to be covered for the Super Bowl trip and many restaurants plus hotels and more worked with allowing for a sit down with those like the great Doug Flutie in covering several events from the wonderful Leigh Steinberg party again catching up with the man himself to the Off the Field NFL Wives Association, Taste of the NFL, and more. A great Calvin Johnson camp getting to improve my quarterback and safety football skills for my senior varsity season while interviewing the NFL great Calvin and his family and more was one of the final events before the final 12th grade senior year gets underway with more to do. The great thing is that you can take a stroll through INSTAGRAM GLOBAL KID MEDIA to see all this work and keep up to date!
10th Grade
In between Junior Varsity sports including playing quarterback on the football team, I started the fall year with winning 1st place in the Youth category of the Rocket Mortgage Detroit Demo Day entrepreneur competition (including pulling some late nighters!). Next came a busy winter of covering the College Football Playoffs championship game of Georgia vs. Alabama interviewing players / coaches of both teams in Indianapolis along with the NBA All-Star game in Cleveland sitting down with some NBA superstar talent and more. There was also the Super Bowl in Los Angeles covering the red carpet at the Leigh Steinberg agent Hollywood party and covering the NFL Off the Field Players' Wives Fashion Show. In spring came the next trip to New Orleans to cover the Final Four doing championship Kansas team interviews and catching up with various top coaches and players. Summer involved finishing writing my book looking forward to next publishing steps soon and also working with Successful Jocks foundation led by Tampa Bay Buccaneers player Sean Murphy-Bunting and his Mom Kim Murphy coming out to Tampa Bay to cover the Buccaneers vs. Dolphins game interviewing dozens of players and others along with covering the big Neiman Marcus fashion event there. Getting ready for varsity football with lifting and practices throughout summer as a new season dawns!
9th Grade
I continued to adapt to Covid life without in person interviews by building up more show content and partnerships. This included shows with the likes of Heisman Trophy winner Charlie Ward, Dwyane Wade's Dad, NBA stars like JJ Redick, NFL stars like Mark Sanchez, national media personalities like NBC's Michele Tafoya, CBS's Nate Burleson, and ESPN's Rece Davis / daughter and Jay Bilas. The show content also went beyond sports expanding to including guests from Academy Award winning directors and actor / actresses to authors, entrepreneurs, tv show hosts, and more. The school workload virtual with Covid and to adapt to the busy show schedule included Chinese 2, Spanish 4, AP Language, Honors Chemistry, World History, and Honors Algebra 2. Sports included playing 9th grade quarterback and making the cut to be roughly 1/3 of the kids to play on the 9th grade basketball team. I also worked with book mentor Janine Hernandez to write my book working weekly with her for months. New partnerships also were formed including with Rukus Avenue Radio which is called the #1 South Asian podcast network in the world with 30 millions listeners globally partnered with DASH radio.
7th & 8th Grade
In a busy past 2 years, I took primarily 9th and 10th grade high school classes including attending my high school in the morning while also playing sports (football, basketball, and track) in the school team year round along with volunteering with the varsity football and basketball teams. Primarily though, I built up my media company by securing about 1,000 interviews covering the NFL, NBA, NCAA, NASCAR, PGA, MLB, and more partnering with sponsors creating unique content as well building up my media company to attain my short-term goal of being a kid visible on tv to inspire youth and families. I traveled to cover the NFL Pro Bowl, Duke basketball, Final Four, games and events across the state of Michigan, Baltimore Ravens camp, and more. I am on track to graduate high school 2 years early if desired. With Covid, I have also started hosting my own show “Global Kid Power Hour” with special guests from ABC, NFL players, etc,. to keep the content coming during the sports shutdown.
6th Grade
I started to accelerate in the educational curriculum through an experimental seat time waiver to do all online classes including some high school subjects like Expository Writing and IPS 3 years or more above grade level. I also started to form the roots of my business by calling University Presidents persistently eventually getting help despite the long odds with access to the NCAA Tournament covering the entire tournament first 2 rounds over 4 days. Additionally, I did a long live phone interview with sports mogul Brandon Steiner on his national show.
I also worked with my sister on 2 projects. One was a Design for Change volunteer project communicating our work with the homeless, environment, and the help for my cancer classmate. The other was a partnership exploration with a cruise line where we created a video to engage kids showcasing some hosting / writing / producing.
5th Grade
I started to develop an interest in community and business through working with a couple classmates to raise 6k for a cancer classmate as a schoolwide effort and recruiting help from local businesses. I took leadership to initiate at the beginning of the school year a video for her, and later our group together worked on the school wide walk and fundraiser going business to business for fundraising
4th Grade
I started to develop my talent and passion for communication. This included trying to prevent teen depression by speaking on the high school announcements, placing among the top in speaking competitions like Midwest Business Professionals against mostly upper middle school students, and doing presentations at my Sunday classes.